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Ancient fort excavated in Dorset

The first excavation of a well-known pre-historic monument has shown it to be much older than previously thought. The archaeological dig at Badbury Rings near Wimborne in Dorset (England) has uncovered evidence that the site was inhabited at least 5,000 years ago ... Stone Pages Archaeo News

Reward offered to solve riddle of ancient cliff tombs

Management of a famous Taoist mountain in east China's Jiangxi Province has offered to pay 400,000 yuan (US$48,000) to anyone who can give a convincing explanation of how tombs were built on its steep cliffs more than 2,600 years ago ... Stone Pages Archaeo News

Textile Fragments Provide Details of Ancient Lives

Charred and brittle bits of fabric are providing new insights into the lives of prehistoric people, thanks to advances in chemical analysis of textiles.

In the past, scientists piecing together a picture of the lives of prehistoric peoples were confined to studying human and animal skeletal remains and the more durable objects found at archaeological sites—tools, weapons, and other artifacts made of stone, bone, shell, metals, and clay.

Organic materials such as cloth and wood rarely survived ... National Geographic.com

Farms sitting on hidden treasure

Farmers planning on changing the use of their land should have it studied by experts to prevent hidden treasures being lost forever.

Part of the Viking find at Cumwhitton near Carlisle.

And in doing so, say archaeologists, farmers might make more money than they would have done from their intended plans.

The plea comes just weeks after archaeologists revealed they had discovered one of the most exciting historical finds for decades in England on farmland just outside Carlisle ... The Cumberland News

Computer scientists develop wireless system to monitor volcanoes

A rumbling South American volcano has gone wireless: Computer scientists at Harvard University have teamed up with seismologists at the University of New Hampshire and University of North Carolina to fit an Ecuadorian peak with a wireless array to monitor volcanic activity. The sensors should help researchers, officials, and local residents understand and plan for eruptions of Tungarahua, one of Ecuador's most active volcanoes in recent years ... EurekAlert

Mummy Hair Reveals Drinking Habits

Mummy hair has revealed the first direct evidence of alcohol consumption in ancient populations, according to new forensic research.

The study, still in its preliminary stage, examined hair samples from spontaneously mummified remains discovered in one of the most arid regions of the world, the Atacama Desert of northern Chile and southern Peru ... discovery.com

Ancient sea creature sucked in prey

Image: Science/Carin L. Cain

A bizarre marine reptile used a neck nearly twice the length of its body to grab its food, a fossil skeleton reveals ... New Scientist

The Baja Connection

Did the first Americans make the crossing from Asia by boat? If so, they may have stopped here.

It isn't an easy drive from Alberta to Baja California, but Ruth Gruhn and Alan Bryan, archaeologists from the University of Alberta (and husband and wife), have been making the journey since 1991. The barren desert peninsula is the spot they chose to test the theory that the earliest settlers of the Americas traveled by boat, not on foot. ... Center for the Study of the First Americans

Signs of an earlier American

Al Goodyear is holding his breath in anticipation. Within days, the affable archaeologist expects to read the results of lab tests indicating that stone tools he recently found in South Carolina are 25,000 years old - or older.

Such results would be explosive. They would imply that humans lived on this continent before the last ice age, far earlier than previously believed. Even if the dates came in younger than 25,000 years old, researchers say, the find would add to the mounting body of evidence that humans trod North and South America at least 2,000 years before the earliest-known inhabitants, known as the Clovis culture ... csmonitor.com

Mars rovers given six more months

NASA's rovers have their missions extended by six months after weathering the Martian winter solstice, announces the space agency ... New Scientist