After being thwarted repeatedly by ill health and hurricanes, retired East Carolina University archaeologist David Phelps said he will return a priceless 16th-century gold signet ring to the school by the end of January.
Phelps had last assured the school that he would bring the ring and other artifacts from his digs at the site of the Croatan chiefdom in Buxton back to the university in December.
T he veteran archaeologist said that bad weather at his Florida home hindered his travel plans. He has had the ring since 1998.
More here.
New N5 … a highway to the past
ARCHAEOLOGISTS working on the €63 million Charlestown bypass are uncovering rich seams of information on Mayo’s historic past.
The eighteen kilometre stretch of modern roadway, which will stretch from the Swinford bypass to Carracastle, west of Ballaghaderreen, has unearthed what is described as a “treasure trove” of archaeological material.
Indications of pre-historic settlements have been unearthed at Cloonaghboy (Swinford); Sonnagh (Charlestown); Madogue (Swinford) and Castleduff (Carracastle).
But a site at Lowpark, near the GAA pitch at Charlestown, is a double delight. It was apparently a settlement during the Neolithic (2.500 years B.C.) as well as during the early Christian ( 500-900 A.D.) periods.
The site has a picture of the 'souterrain'.
News from Iraq New Equipment for Iraqi ArcheologistsM
Polish soldiers provided computers and specialist equipment for Iraqi students from the archaeology faculty, Diwaniyah University.
The new equipment will help students in scientific research. This project was undertaken to support the process of protecting Iraqi historical monuments.
Thanks to MultiNational Division Central-South, in the beginning of 2006, the archaeology department of the University in Ad Diwaniyah city received 25 computers and a satellite internet server. Equipment was provided to laboratories including measurement apparatus and a power generator. Around one hundred Iraqi archeology students will benefit from this project.
International archaeology congress kicks off in Osaka
The Inter-Congress of the World Archaeological Congress, being held for the first time in East Asia at the Osaka Museum of History in Chuo Ward, Osaka, will welcome more than 300 archaeologists from about 30 countries from Thursday to Sunday.
The organization, formed in 1986, is a worldwide body of archaeologists with the goal of fostering international cooperation and interaction. Its inter-congress is an event to bridge the major international congresses held every four years.
The event, "Coexistence in the Past--Dialogues in the Present," will include discussions on important issues and presentations under various subthemes, such as archaeology in schools and education.
Archaeologists tour Garamendi Ranch
A band of 30 historical archaeologists, looking for a break from the tedium of scuba diving in shipwrecks or digging up ancient castles, pulled up here Wednesday in a big green tour bus.
They munched sandwiches inside this historic hamlet's library and confessed to being charmed by the Mother Lode's rusting ore-stamping mills and the weirdly eroded hills left behind by placer mining.
"It's been well worth coming," said Harold Mytum of the University of York in Great Britain, who usually spends his time digging up 2,500-year-old pre-Roman settlements in Wales.
Mytum is one of hundreds of archaeologists - both underwater and terrestrial - who are in Sacramento this week for the annual conference of the Society for Historical Archaeology.
Eh, kind of an uninformative article.
Say, more Chinese tombs. . . 1,900-year old tombs excavated in SW China
Chinese archaeologists have discovered six tombs in Yunyang County dating back more than 1,900 years, and unearthed a large number of pottery utensils. Yunyang County is in southwest China's Chongqing Municipality.
Located in Jiangkou Town, the brick tombs are in knife, square and triangular shapes. Archaeologists discovered that the earth around these tombs had been pounded and were surprised to see that the tomb bricks were carved with fine patterns of net strings, rhombus and animals.
Cao Kuanning, who participated in the recent excavation at the site, said judging from the size of the tombs, the building materials and the funeral objects - the tombs belonged to a family from the Wang Mang period (45 B.C. - 23 A.D.) in the early Eastern Han Dynasty.
"Though we are not sure who the owners of the tombs were, it is clear the family enjoyed a high social status," said Cao.
The tombs are of great significance in studying social life during the Eastern Han Dynasty and provide evidence for studying ancient funerals in the area, he said.
That's the whole thing.
Has anyone else noticed that at the bottom of every Xinhuanet story there are links to stories involving attractive and usually scantily-clad (and almost always Western) women?
New archaeological discovery rewrites Hong Kong's history of human activity
Archaeologists have discovered a new site of human activity in remote antiquity in Sai Kung, Hong Kong.
Zhang Shenshui, researcher of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told Xinhua here Wednesday that the important archaeological discovery not only rewrites the history when Hong Kong began having human activity, but also puts forward new topics of research for archaeologists.
More than 6,000 artifacts have been unearthed at the site, which is located at the Wong Tei Tung of Sai Kung, covering 8,000 square meters. The site was a field for stone artifacts making in the Paleolithic era ranging from 35,000 years to 39,000 years ago.
The significance of the discovery lies in the fact that, as the only discovery in Hong Kong from the Paleolithic era, it changes the traditional view that Hong Kong had no human activity until the Neolithic era.
Still more from China 12 archeological sites unearthed in Beijing
Archeologists have discovered 12 cultural heritage sites and ancient tombs during the construction of the Beijing section of the south-to-north water diversion project.
Excavation has started to unearth the relic sites, which are located near Nanzheng village in Fangshan district, southwest Beijing.
At Nanzheng heritage site, one of the biggest covering 6,100 square meters, archeologists have unearthed, after two weeks of excavation, 10 tombs and three pottery kilns that date back to the Western and Eastern Han Dynasties (206 BC - AD 220), said Zhang Zhiqiang, who is in charge of archeological work along the 80-kilometer-long Beijing section of the water diversion project.
The site contains large quantities of bronze and ceramic wares and ancient coins, he said.
Fight! Fight! Parish ‘shocked’ at plan to relocate 500 skeletons
PEOPLE living in the rural Co Laois parish of Cullahill have expressed outrage that the National Roads Authority is pressing ahead with its plan to relocate 500 skeletons uncovered by archaeologists working on the route of the proposed new M7 motorway.
Local priest Fr Willie Hennessy said: “Local people here are shocked that the burial site of their ancestors which remained undisturbed for 1,500 years is now being desecrated.”
Initial investigation by a team of archaeologists suggests that the previously unknown 7th century settlement at Parknahown near Cullahill became a major burial site by the 9th or 10th century.
“All the people living here feel that this historical site should be preserved,” Fr Hennessy stated.