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Archaeology

Updates every hour. Last Updated: 22-Jun-2026 15:15 ET (22-Jun-2026 19:15 GMT/UTC)

Retelling the Jomon story

University of Tokyo
Peer-Reviewed Publication

It’s long been assumed the Jomon people, who had inhabited the Japanese archipelago since around 16,000 years ago, had multiple lineages resulting from different migration routes. But, new genetic evidence, including mitochondrial DNA from 13 newly sequenced Jomon skeletons, suggests that an initial migration of a single lineage later split, giving rise to regional diversity. This research puts greater emphasis on environmental and cultural factors being the possible drivers for the East and West of prehistoric Japan, respectively.

Journal: Anthropological Science
Funder: JSPS KAKENHI

Singapore’s first ancient shipwreck reveals record cargo of Yuan dynasty blue-and-white porcelain

KeAi Communications Co., Ltd.
Peer-Reviewed Publication

A four-year maritime excavation in Singapore waters recovered about 3.5 tonnes of ceramics from the Temasek Wreck, the first ancient shipwreck found locally. The assemblage includes an unusually large and diverse group of Yuan blue-and-white porcelain, plus Longquan celadon and Jingdezhen qingbai/shufu wares. Evidence suggests a mid-14th-century Chinese junk bound for Temasek, creating a tightly dated reference set for comparative ceramic studies.

Funder: National Heritage Board of Singapore

Hunter-gatherers northwestern Europe adopted farming from migrant women, study reveals

Bournemouth University
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Ancient DNA has revealed that hunter-gatherers in Belgium, the Netherlands and nearby parts of Germany adapted to farming thousands of years later than elsewhere in Europe.

Journal: Nature

Fascinating archaeological find becomes a source of knowledge

Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin für Materialien und Energie
Reports and Proceedings

The Bavarian State Office for the Preservation of Historical Monuments (BLfD) has sent a rare artefact from the Middle Bronze Age to Berlin for examination using cutting-edge, non-destructive methods. It is a 3,400-year-old bronze sword, unearthed during archaeological excavations in Nördlingen, Swabia, in 2023. Experts have been able to determine how the hilt and blade are connected, as well as how the rare and well-preserved decorations on the pommel were made. This has provided valuable insight into the craft techniques employed in southern Germany during the Bronze Age. The BLfD used 3D computed tomography and X-ray diffraction to analyse internal stresses at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB), as well as X-ray fluorescence spectroscopy at a BESSY II beamline supervised by the Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM).

Rich medieval Danes bought graves ‘closer to God’ despite leprosy stigma, archaeologists find

Frontiers
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Scientists studying social exclusion based on illness in medieval Denmark expected to find that people with chronic diseases, especially leprosy — a heavily stigmatized disease that Christianity associated with sin — would be barred from burial in prominent, prestigious graves. However, they found that these higher-status burial places were still open to leprosy or tuberculosis patients, despite the social stigma. This suggests that medieval communities may have treated severely ill people with more compassion than traditional portrayals, like Monty Python and the Holy Grail, suggest.

Journal: Frontiers in Environmental Archaeology
Funder: National Science Foundation, Wenner-Gren Foundation, American-Scandinavian Foundation, Velux

Bird poop powered the rise of the Chincha Kingdom, archaeologists find

University of Sydney
Peer-Reviewed Publication

New archaeological evidence reveals that seabird guano – nutrient-rich bird droppings – was not only essential to boosting corn yields and supercharging agriculture in ancient Peru but may have been a driving force behind the rise of the Chincha Kingdom as one of the most prosperous and influential pre‑Inca societies.

Journal: PLOS One

Bison hunters abandoned long-used site 1,100 years ago to adapt to changing climate

Frontiers
Peer-Reviewed Publication

More than 1,000 years ago, bison hunters on the Great Plains of North America left behind a small hunting site despite the continued presence of bison. Their abrupt departure could not be explained until researchers dug deeper and found that it wasn’t bison depletion that drove hunters elsewhere. Instead, they may have responded to decade-long droughts and moved to sites with a more reliable supply of water and had features that better lent themselves to an emerging and more coordinated way of hunting. This pattern shows bison presence alone wasn’t enough to keep hunters at a site. Rather, climate variability favored select sites and different ways of hunting that weren’t always reversed when environmental conditions improved.

Journal: Frontiers in Conservation Science

New study uses Neanderthals to demonstrate gap in generative AI, scholarly knowledge

University of Maine
Peer-Reviewed Publication

Generative AI has the power to influence how the past is represented and visualized. Researchers across the country are exploring this phenomenon, including the University of Maine's Matthew Magnani, assistant professor of anthropology, and Jon Clindaniel, a professor at the University of Chicago who specializes in computational anthropology. They asked two chatbots to create images and narratives depicting daily life of Neanderthals and found that accuracy rests on AI’s ability to access source information. In this instance, the images and narratives referenced outdated research.

Journal: Advances in Archaeological Practice

New ‘URBank’ database enables comparative archaeological and historical urbanism

Max Planck Institute of Geoanthropology
Peer-Reviewed Publication

MPI-GEA researchers have worked with an international consortium to create a new open-science computing platform for studying the diversity of past urbanism and systematically comparing it to the cities of today.

Journal: Antiquity

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