Inscription from time of David & Solomon found near Temple Mount in Hebrew University excavation

Dated to the 10th century BCE, the inscription is written in the Canaanite language

Working near the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, Hebrew University of Jerusalem archaeologist Dr. Eilat Mazar has unearthed the earliest alphabetical written text ever uncovered in the city.

The inscription is engraved on a large pithos, a neckless ceramic jar found with six others at the Ophel excavation site. According to Dr. Mazar, the inscription, in the Canaanite language, is the only one of its kind discovered in Jerusalem and an important addition to the city's history.

Dated to the tenth century BCE, the artifact predates by two hundred and fifty years the earliest known Hebrew inscription from Jerusalem, which is from the period of King Hezekiah at the end of the eighth century BCE.

A third-generation archaeologist working at the Hebrew University's Institute of Archaeology, Dr. Mazar directs archaeological excavations on the summit of the City of David and at the southern wall of the Temple Mount.

The discovery will be announced in a paper by Dr. Mazar, Prof. Shmuel Ahituv of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, and Dr. David Ben-Shlomo of the Hebrew University, following their extensive research on the artifact. Prof. Ahituv studied the inscription and Dr. Ben-Shlomo studied the composition of the ceramic materials. The paper, "An Inscribed Pithos From the Ophel," appears in the Israel Exploration Journal 63/1 (2013).

The inscription was engraved near the edge of the jar before it was fired, and only a fragment of it has been found, along with fragments of six large jars of the same type. The fragments were used to stabilize the earth fill under the second floor of the building they were discovered in, which dates to the Early Iron IIA period (10th century BCE). An analysis of the jars' clay composition indicates that they are all of a similar make, and probably originate in the central hill country near Jerusalem.

According to Prof. Ahituv, the inscription is not complete and probably wound around the jar's shoulder, while the remaining portion is just the end of the inscription and one letter from the beginning. The inscription is engraved in a proto-Canaanite / early Canaanite script of the eleventh-to-tenth centuries BCE, which pre-dates the Israelite rule and the prevalence of Hebrew script.

Reading from left to right, the text contains a combination of letters approximately 2.5 cm tall, which translate to m, q, p, h, n, (possibly) l, and n. Since this combination of letters has no meaning in known west-Semitic languages, the inscription's meaning is unknown.

The archaeologists suspect the inscription specifies the jar's contents or the name of its owner. Because the inscription is not in Hebrew, it is likely to have been written by one of the non-Israeli residents of Jerusalem, perhaps Jebusites, who were part of the city population in the time of Kings David and Solomon.
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References:

EurekAlert. 2013. “Inscription from time of David & Solomon found near Temple Mount in Hebrew University excavation”. EurekAlert. Posted: July 10, 2013. Available online: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-07/thuo-ift071013.php

Did Neandertals have language?

A recent study suggest that Neandertals shared speech and language with modern humans

Fast-accumulating data seem to indicate that our close cousins, the Neandertals, were much more similar to us than imagined even a decade ago. But did they have anything like modern speech and language? And if so, what are the implications for understanding present-day linguistic diversity? The MPI for Psycholinguistics researchers Dan Dediu and Stephen C. Levinson argue in their paper in Frontiers in Language Sciences that modern language and speech can be traced back to the last common ancestor we shared with the Neandertals roughly half a million years ago.

The Neandertals have fascinated both the academic world and the general public ever since their discovery almost 200 years ago. Initially thought to be subhuman brutes incapable of anything but the most primitive of grunts, they were a successful form of humanity inhabiting vast swathes of western Eurasia for several hundreds of thousands of years, during harsh ages and milder interglacial periods. We knew that they were our closest cousins, sharing a common ancestor with us around half a million years ago (probably Homo heidelbergensis), but it was unclear what their cognitive capacities were like, or why modern humans succeeded in replacing them after thousands of years of cohabitation. Recently, due to new palaeoanthropological and archaeological discoveries and the reassessment of older data, but especially to the availability of ancient DNA, we have started to realise that their fate was much more intertwined with ours and that, far from being slow brutes, their cognitive capacities and culture were comparable to ours.

Dediu and Levinson review all these strands of literature and argue that essentially modern language and speech are an ancient feature of our lineage dating back at least to the most recent ancestor we shared with the Neandertals and the Denisovans (another form of humanity known mostly from their genome). Their interpretation of the intrinsically ambiguous and scant evidence goes against the scenario usually assumed by most language scientists, namely that of a sudden and recent emergence of modernity, presumably due to a single – or very few – genetic mutations. This pushes back the origins of modern language by a factor of 10 from the often-cited 50 or so thousand years, to around a million years ago – somewhere between the origins of our genus, Homo, some 1.8 million years ago, and the emergence of Homo heidelbergensis. This reassessment of the evidence goes against a saltationist scenario where a single catastrophic mutation in a single individual would suddenly give rise to language, and suggests that a gradual accumulation of biological and cultural innovations is much more plausible.

Interestingly, given that we know from the archaeological record and recent genetic data that the modern humans spreading out of Africa interacted both genetically and culturally with the Neandertals and Denisovans, then just as our bodies carry around some of their genes, maybe our languages preserve traces of their languages too. This would mean that at least some of the observed linguistic diversity is due to these ancient encounters, an idea testable by comparing the structural properties of the African and non-African languages, and by detailed computer simulations of language spread.
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References:

EurekAlert. 2013. “Did Neandertals have language?”. EurekAlert. Posted: July 9, 2013. Available online: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-07/m-dnh070913.php

What makes theme parks popular vacation destinations?

One of the hallmarks of the Fourth of July weekend here in the United States is that it’s a big travel weekend. Many people take advantage of the holiday to plan vacations (it’s an extra day off, after all). And if children are a part of the traveling troupe, theme parks are often popular destinations.

S is a huge fan of roller coasters. As a result, we usually make biannual trips to the Six Flags family of parks—the one in New Jersey is close enough to arrange group trips. And theme parks work their way into most of the trips we take if the opportunity presents itself. There was a fateful trip to Busch Garden in Williamsburg, Virginia where we were caught in a hurricane-like storm on our way back from the park. We were in a brand new car in zero visibility conditions, trying to figure out to close the sun roof while the rain poured in. Ah, this is the stuff that memories are made of!

I’ve only been to Disney World once. It was one of the first “big” vacations that S and I took. It was an experience. Disney marketing isn’t kidding when they say it’s the happiest/most magical place on earth—it’s intense. And the experience stays with you. It’s the promise of this experience draws people: Disneyland receives approximately 10 million visitors annually (1). And lots of folks are repeat visitors. It may not be for everyone: I know people who absolutely refuse to have anything to do with the magic as well as some who aren’t comfortable around costumed representatives, but overall they seem to be in the minority given the volume of traffic these places experience. Researchers have suggested that Disney generates a successful experience because our brains are responsive and receptive to art, creativity, storytelling, humor, wit, music, fantasy, and morality, all of which may have been important to social development—and feature heavily in the “Disney experience”—and successful theme parks—in a rather amplified way.

Humans have large brains, which are really expensive to produce. Researchers have not yet determined why our brains are so large, but everything from diet to climate change to social competition to changes in gestation has been proposed. Geoffrey Miller, an evolutionary psychologist, suggested that big brains are a result of sexual selection. He argues that the brain is “an entertainment system that evolved to stimulate other brains” in an effort to attract mates (2). Miller’s “mating mind hypothesis” states

The large size of the brain evolved because mates (in most cases females) favoured a mate (in most cases males) with increased abilities to produce such aspects of culture as art, creativity, storytelling, humour, wit, music, fantasy, and morality (3).

These “courtship tools” are meant to attract sexual partners. However, Miller’s hypothesis is not supported by the actual development of the human brain, which does not display the characteristics of a sexually selected trait. Two of the the major points of divergence that researchers Palmer and Coe discuss are the lack of sexual dimorphism and the actual growth of the brain. Male brains do not significantly differ from female brains:

Although there do appear to be clearly evolved sexual differences in specific parts of the brain directly related to mating (e.g., mate preferences, jealousy), there are no similarly striking differences related to production of and responsiveness to the traits he is attempting to explain (art, creativity, storytelling, humour, wit, music, fantasy, and morality) (4).

And if the brain were a sexually selected feature, it would become more prominent after puberty. This isn’t the case: The human brain weighs about 25% of its adult weight at birth, and it doubles in weight in about 6 months. At puberty, there isn’t another of these types of gains. The brain completes most of its development within the first few years of life.

As an alternative to understanding why specific forms of entertainment are so appealing, Palmer and Coe (2010) instead suggest they reflect parenting strategies intended to influence the behavior of offspring. The “parenting mind hypothesis” proposes that the size of the human brain developed via natural selection in response to parental ability to influence behavior—big brains allowed offspring to store and replicate behaviors modeled by parents that enabled survival and reproduction (5). This latter hypothesis takes into account one possible reason why children develop language skills so early in life: language helps them receive information from their parents, which increases their fitness for survival.

Where does the Disney franchise fit in this discussion? Palmer and Coe propose that Disneyland (which is not Disney World, but I would imagine the experience is essentially the same: extreme stimulation of the senses) is an extension of the traits that are important to the parenting mind hypothesis:

Although Disneyland and fairy tales in general are often mistakenly seen as mere entertainment, they both clearly provide moral lessons. Pinocchio warns children not to tell a lie. Cinderella tells children that virtue has rewards, and the three pigs teach children about planning and industriousness (6).

They suggest that our susceptibility to these forms of entertainment allow Disneyland—and other forms of art and entertainment—to exist. But I would amend that to say that any potential susceptibility to these traits allows the Disney franchise and other good examples of art, creativity, storytelling, humor, wit, music, fantasy, and morality—such as movies and plays—to be successful because they help us construct (non-sexual) social connections around these messages which make them more effective. Packaged with interactive experiences, visitors get to live tales and the experiences create lasting memories because they reinforces messages we have already received previously.

In other parks, rides typically also have some sort of story or theme attached to them, even if they aren’t of the animated variety. For example, at Six Flags Great Adventure, the Kingda Ka roller coaster is designed to fit into a jungle theme. The entire experience contributes to this theme from the music played for waiting riders to the decorations to the name of the ride itself, which is a distant reference to a Bengal tiger housed in the nearby safari. While Disney can claim popular story lines, the actual tactical aspects of the theme park can also function similarly. Line management teaches patience and orderliness with the ride being the ultimate reward.

One of the things Palmer and Coe could have explored further is the connection between relationship building and the traits linked to the Disney experience. Art, creativity, storytelling, humor, wit, music, fantasy, and morality may be important elements in the relationships we develop and maintain—not in a sexual sense, but in terms of network building. The researchers touch upon this briefly in their conclusion, and it seems to warrant exploration because it has broad implications in terms of how our social networks are engaged with these traits. When we experience an instance of storytelling or humor or music with someone else, we’re creating a bond through that experience that helps define our places within our network relative to each other. Revisiting stories could then be an act of reaffirming ties—which could help us understand why people return to Disney theme parks and other forms of creative entertainment.
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References:

D'Costa, Krystal. 2013. “What makes theme parks popular vacation destinations?”. Scientific American Blogs. Posted: July 7, 2013. Available online: http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/anthropology-in-practice/2013/07/07/what-make-theme-parks-popular-vacation-destinations/ Notes: 1. Palmer and Coe 2010: 2
2. Palmer: 2
3. Palmer: 3
4. Palmer: 4
5. Palmer: 5
6. Palmer: 10

Japan’s ancient Kofun culture explored with new technology

Using powerful geographic information systems technology to accurately survey Japanese burial mounds or ‘Kofun’ built between the third to seventh centuries AD Professor Izumi Niiro an archaeologist at Okayama University in Japan, is exploring the’ topography’ of this culture from landscape, burial mound to artefact.

“I first became aware of geographic information systems during a sabbatical at Southampton University in 1991,” explains Professor Niiro. “I decided to experiment with this technology for archaeological surveying when I returned to Japan. It enables me to visualize and analyse many types of geographical information such as topographic details of maps.”

Initially Professor Niiro started by using IDRISI from Clark University, now however, he uses the powerful open source system software; GRASS (Geographic Resources Analysis Support System).

Professor Niiro confides that there are very few archaeologists in Japan, if any, who produce their own software programs to analyse geographic information.

Findings by Professor Niiro include visualization of a bronze mirror from the early Kofun Period, third century and he explains, “I wrote my own software to visualize the surface of the mirror based on 3D scan information, our results clearly show a triangular-rimmed mirror that is decorated with deities and beasts.”

Burial mounds

Japan has many Kofun sites as the distribution of typical ‘key-holed’ burial mounds in Okayama Prefecture shows. The largest site in Okayama and the fourth largest in Japan is the Tsukuriyama Kofun—the burial mound of the king of the ‘Kibi’ completed in the fifth century. The tomb consists of the main Tsukuriyama burial mound and six smaller structures to the south. The dimensions of the Tsukuriyama Kofun are: length-350m, key-hole diameter-200m, height-31 m, and front length-215m. “Our analysis shows that it was built using very precise procedures using Chinese ‘shaku‘ units of length,” says Professor Niiro. “One shaku is 232 mm.”

Effect of disasters

Recently, Professor Niiro is extending his research activities to the effect of disasters on culture and civilization. “Volcano eruptions have had tremendous effects on the environment and human culture,” says Professor Niiro.

“In particular the sixth century saw unprecedented changes in the environment. In Japan, the Emperor of the time ordered the storage of rice in northern Kyushu to assist people in Korea who were affected by disasters precipitated by global climate changes. Similar disastrous effects of climate changes occurred in Ireland.

“The recent massive earthquake and tsunami in Tohoku has led to the rise in ‘disaster archaeology’. The Kofun Period ended in 600 AD probably due to climate change. This led to the introduction of Buddhism in Japan. Archaeologists still have a lot to do. “
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References:

Past Horizons. 2013. “Japan’s ancient Kofun culture explored with new technology”. Past Horizons. Posted: July 7, 2013. Available online: http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/07/2013/japans-ancient-kofun-culture-explored-with-new-technology

Danish archaeologists uncover ancient killing fields in the Ukraine

Chersonesos is an ancient city on the Crimean peninsula, which was founded by Greek colonists at the end of the 6th century BC in order to supply their homeland with grain and other strategic resources. The farmland in the Greek colonies was vital to the survival of the Greek city-states. The excavations by the Aarhus archaeologists are exploring the development of the rural area from its peak until its decline. One of the conclusions so far is that during a period of crisis in the early 3rd century BC a large proportion of the rural population was killed following a military invasion. The skeletons of these people can be found just 40 cm beneath the surface of the soil in a number of housing structures which the Aarhus archaeologists have excavated.

"We've learned things that have changed our view of what life was like in the Chersonesean countryside, which the Greeks called chora. The city's rural territory, particularly on the Herakleian and Tarkhankut peninsulas, is incredibly well preserved. The houses of the rural population dating back to about 300 BC lie dotted around the untouched landscape in the form of ruins that are still visible. For instance, in one of the excavated ruins we have found the remains of a whole family. So we're working on a murder scene dating back 2,300 years," reports project director Vladimir Stolba, an archaeologist from Aarhus University.

UNESCO world heritage site

Chersonesos and its rural area have just been added to UNESCO's list of world heritage sites – the area is a unique example of the way the ancient Greek cities and surrounding landscape were organised.

"We've had several teams of students from Denmark and the host country Ukraine on our expeditions. It's been a great experience and very fruitful collaboration. We are in a lucky and, in a sense, unique situation to work on short-lived rural sites which have never been re-inhabited since their destruction in the early 3rd century BC. The picture that emerges from the excavations is a snapshot of daily activities of the ancient peasantry, of its life and dramatic death. We've found answers to many of our research questions: for instance, who cultivated the Greek grain fields, how densely the area was settled and how it was organised, and how the ancient population adapted to changes in cultural and natural environment. The answers have given rise to new questions that we want to explore next. The world heritage status will hopefully help to preserve this unique area despite the increase in tourism and tourism infrastructure development, enabling us to continue our work," concludes Vladimir Stolba.
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References:

EurekAlert. 2013. “Danish archaeologists uncover ancient killing fields in the Ukraine”. EurekAlert. Posted: July 5, 2013. Available online: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-07/au-dau070513.php

Mysterious Toe Rings Found on Ancient Egyptian Skeletons

Archaeologists have discovered two ancient Egyptian skeletons, dating back more than 3,300 years, which were each buried with a toe ring made of copper alloy, the first time such rings have been found in ancient Egypt.

The toe rings were likely worn while the individuals were still alive, and the discovery leaves open the question of whether they were worn for fashion or magical reasons.

Supporting the magical interpretation, one of the rings was found on the right toe of a male, age 35-40, whose foot had suffered a fracture along with a broken femur above it.

Unique rings in a unique ancient city

Both skeletons were found in a cemetery just south of the ancient city of Akhetaten, whose name means "Horizon of the Aten." Now called Amarna, the city of Akhetaten was a short-lived Egyptian capital built by Akhenaten a pharaoh who tried to focus Egypt's religion around the worship of the sun disc, the "Aten." He was also likely the father of Tutankhamun.

After Akhenaten's death, this attempt to change Egyptian religion unraveled, as his successors denounced him and the city became abandoned. Even so, Anna Stevens, the assistant director of the Amarna Project, said the newly discovered rings are unlikely to be related to the religious changes Akhenaten introduced.

The findings do appear to be the first copper alloy toe rings discovered in ancient Egypt. "I'm not aware of any, but that doesn't mean they don't exist. Bear in mind that if we found something like this in a house, for example, we would have no idea of its purpose,"Stevens wrote in an email toLiveScience.

A gold toe ring was previously found on a mummy named Hornedjitef, a priest at Karnak more than 2,200 years ago. The mummy, which resides at the British Museum, has a "thick gold ring on the big toe of his left foot," writes anthropologist Joyce Filer in her book "The Mystery of the Egyptian Mummy" (British Museum Press, 2003).

A magical healing device?

The man whose right foot had been injured was likely in great pain when alive.

He "showed signs of multiple antemortem [before his death] fractures, including of several ribs, the left radius, right ulna, right foot (on which the toe ring was found) and right femur," Stevens wrote. "The fracture of the right femur healed at an angle and must have caused this individual considerable ongoing pain."

The ring was placed on the toe of the injured foot, suggesting perhaps it was intended as a magical healing device of sorts.

"The act of 'binding' or 'encircling' was a powerful magical device in ancient Egypt, and a metal ring, which can be looped around something, lends itself well to this kind of action," Stevens said. "This is a possibility that we will look into further, checking through sources such as the corpus of magico-medical spells that have survived from ancient Egypt, to look for parallels."

However, the skeleton of the second individual with the toe ring, found in 2012, bore no visible signs of a medical condition. Stevens notes that this individual has yet to be studied in depth by bio-archaeologists and its sex is unknown.

Who were they?

The skeletons were wrapped in textile and plant-stem matting, and both burials had been disturbed by tomb robbers.

None of the skeletons in the cemetery were technically "mummified" so to speak. "There is no evidence from the cemetery as a whole of attempts to mummify the bodies, in terms of the removal of internal organs (we quite often find remains of brain within the skulls) or the introduction of additives to preserve tissue (the bodies survive largely as skeletons)," Stevens wrote. "But in a way the wrapping of the bodies within textile and matting is a step towards preserving the shape of the body, and a form of simple mummification."

Figuring out who these individuals were in life is tricky, Stevens said. This cemetery appears to represent a "wide slice" of the city's society. These people were not wealthy enough to get buried in a rock-cut tomb but could afford, and were allowed, the simple burials seen at this cemetery.

"They [the two individuals] probably lived, like most citizens of Amarna, in a small house adjacent to that of a larger villa belonging to one of the city's officials, for whom they provided services and labor in exchange for basic provisions, especially grain," Stevens said.

In the case of the male with multiple fractures, his life appears to have been especially difficult and he also has signs of degenerative joint disease. It "suggests a life [of] labor was more likely for this individual than, say, an existence as a scribe," Stevens said. In both cases, however, the individuals' lives ended with each having a copper alloy ring on one of their toes.

The case of the male individual with the toe ring was published in the most recent edition of the Journal of Egyptian Archaeology. More information on the Amarna Project can be found at www.amarnaproject.com.
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References:

Jarus, Owen. 2013. “Mysterious Toe Rings Found on Ancient Egyptian Skeletons”. Live Science. Posted: July 5, 2013. Available online: http://www.livescience.com/37985-toe-rings-found-on-egyptian-skeletons.html

No single origin for agriculture in the Fertile Crescent

Transition from foraging to farming occurred over the entire Fertile Crescent

A rich assemblage of fossils and artifacts in the foothills of the Zagros Mountains in Iran has revealed that the early inhabitants of the region began cultivating cereal grains for agriculture between 12,000 and 9,800 years ago. The discovery implies that the transition from foraging to farming took place at roughly the same time across the entire Fertile Crescent, not in a single core area of the "cradle of civilization," as previously thought.

Until recently, political pressures had limited excavations of archaeological sites in the eastern Fertile Crescent, or modern-day Iran, while findings to the west—at sites in Cyprus, Syria, Turkey and Iraq, for example—provided detailed clues to the origins of agriculture.

Now, Simone Riehl from the University of Tübingen in Germany, along with colleagues from the Tübingen Senckenberg Center for Human Evolution and Paleoecology, have analyzed plant remains at the aceramic (pre-pottery) Neolithic site of Chogha Golan in Iran, and their results show that people were growing and grinding cereal grains like wheat and barley at the same time as their counterparts to the west.

Their findings appear in the 5 July issue of the journal Science.

"During the last few decades, numerous archaeological excavations were conducted in the Near East that led researchers to consider the possibility that multiple regions in the Fertile Crescent began cultivating cereal grains roughly at the same time, rather than just a single core area," Riehl explained.

The plant remains found at the Chogha Golan site document more than 2,000 years of the region's land use and represent the earliest record of long-term plant management in Iran, according to the researchers. The site's excavation, which was conducted by archaeologists from the University of Tübingen and the Iranian Center for Archaeological Research between 2009 and 2010, shows that Chogha Golan's early inhabitants cultivated wild barley, wheat, lentil and grass peas—and eventually domesticated emmer wheat—during their occupation, which began about 12,000 years ago.

"Plentiful findings of chaff remains of the cereals indicate that people processed their harvest within the sites they were living in," Riehl said. "Mortars and grinding stones may have been used for turning the grain into some kind of bulgur or flour, which may have been further processed either by cooking or roasting." (The author also notes, however, that chemical studies of the grinding tools showed that they were multi-purpose—not just for processing plant materials.)

Taken together, these new insights suggest that the eastern region of the Fertile Crescent likewise made significant contributions to the development of Neolithic culture. The findings by Riehl et al. indicate that essentially simultaneous processes led to the management of wild plants and the domestication of cereal grains across most of the Fertile Crescent.

But, how such strategies were disseminated over the entire Fertile Crescent—whether by the communication of ideas, the spread of crops or the migration of people—remains to be seen, according to the researchers.

"For some time, the emergence of agriculture in Iran was considered as part of a cultural transfer from the west," Riehl said. "This opinion was, however, mostly based on the lack of information from Iranian sites."

"We meanwhile assume that key areas for emerging domestication existed over the whole Fertile Crescent, and that there were several locations where domesticated species evolved as a result of cultivation by local human groups," the author concluded. "This does not, of course, exclude the possibility of some kind of transfer of ideas and materials between the different groups populating the Fertile Crescent."
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References:

EurekAlert. 2013. “No single origin for agriculture in the Fertile Crescent”. EurekAlert. Posted: July 4, 2013. Available online: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2013-07/aaft-ns062813.php