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© Tolga İldun
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Features
The Many Faces of the Kingdom of Shu
Thousands of fantastical bronzes are beginning to reveal the secrets of a legendary Chinese dynasty
Courtesy Sichuan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology -
Digs & Discoveries
Egyptian Crocodile Hunt
Courtesy the University of Manchester -
Features
Ancient DNA Revolution
How the rapidly evolving field of archaeogenetics is unlocking secrets of the past
AdobeStock/lucaar
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Digs & Discoveries November/December 2024
Nineteenth-Century Booze Cruise
Tomasz Stachura/Baltictech -
Features November/December 2024
Let the Games Begin
How gladiators in ancient Anatolia lived to entertain the masses
© Tolga İldun -
Features November/December 2024
The Many Faces of the Kingdom of Shu
Thousands of fantastical bronzes are beginning to reveal the secrets of a legendary Chinese dynasty
Courtesy Sichuan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology
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Features May/June 2023
Peru's Great Urban Experiment
A millennium ago, the Chimú built a new way of life in the vast city of Chan Chan
(Alamy)
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Features March/April 2023
The Ancient Promise of Water
How people of the past harnessed the power of the world’s most precious resource
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Features March/April 2022
Paradise Lost
Archaeologists in Nova Scotia are uncovering evidence of thriving seventeenth-century French colonists and their brutal expulsion
(© Jamie Robertson) -
Features March/April 2022
The Last King of Babylon
Investigating the reign of Mesopotamia’s most eccentric ruler
(iStock/HomoCosmicos) -
Features May/June 2022
Secrets of Scotland's Viking Age Hoard
A massive cache of Viking silver and Anglo-Saxon heirlooms reveals the complex political landscape of ninth-century Britain
(National Museums Scotland)
Around the World
NAMIBIA
The Namib Sand Sea, home to 350-foot-tall sand dunes, receives so little rainfall that it is almost uninhabitable. Scholars believed it had been this way for millions of years—but this turns out not to be the case. New research at a site called Narabeb identified layers of mud beneath the sand that were deposited by an ancient freshwater lake. Fragments of stone tools found nearby suggest that early humans visited Narabeb occasionally between 200,000 and 20,000 years ago.
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ITALY
Excavations outside the Archbasilica of St. John Lateran in Rome revealed walls of a papal palace dating to the 9th century a.d. The sprawling complex was founded in the 4th century a.d. after the Roman emperor Constantine converted to Christianity. It was expanded and remodeled over the following centuries. The Lateran palace was the home of the papacy until the 14th century, when it briefly moved to Avignon, France, before relocating to the Vatican, where it remains today.
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MEXICO
Between a.d. 600 and 1000, the Maya city of Cobá was inhabited by 50,000 people and was home to Nohoch Mul, the second tallest pyramid on the Yucatán Peninsula. Off a causeway connected to the temple, archaeologists recently discovered a panel including 123 Mayan glyphs carved into the rock floor of a sacred pool. These glyphs describe the founding of a town called Keh Witz Nal on May 12, a.d. 569. They also reference a previously unknown Maya ruler named K’awill Ch’ak Chéen.