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Welcome to History Buff, a blog for history lovers everywhere! History Buff brings news stories about archaeology from around the world together on one site. From finds in ancient Egypt to new discoveries in anthropology, History Buff wants to know.

Michelle Moran
Historical fiction author








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8.31.2010

Foreign religions grew rapidly in the 1st-century A.D. Roman Empire, including worship of Jesus Christ, the Egyptian goddess Isis, and an eastern sun

by Carly Silver

Of the religions that expanded rapidly in the 1st-century Roman Empire, worship of Mithras was particularly popular among Roman soldiers, who spread his cult during their far-flung travels.

Read the rest here.


Israel archeologists uncover 2,000-year-old cupid in City of David dig

Israeli archeologists unveiled a 2,000 year old semi-precious cameo bearing the image of Cupid on Monday, which the Israel Antiquities Authorities (IAA) said was among several items located in the City of David archeological area in Jerusalem's Old City in the last 12 months.

Read the rest here.


Oldest house in Ontario discovered at 4,500 year old settlement near Lake Huron, Canada

Archaeologists have discovered a 4,500 year old settlement, on the Ausable River, near the shore of Lake Huron in Canada.

Read the rest here.

8.30.2010

Archaeologists find new clues why the Maya left


YUCATAN, Mexico— Bird calls ring from the forest, echoing amid the crumbling ruins whose darkened doorways have long beckoned explorers and scholars. The Maya ancients who built the ruins of Kiuic (kee-week) here fled those doorways in a hurry, an international archaeology team now realizes. Left behind may be frozen-in-time clues to the fabled collapse of their civilization.

Read the rest in USA Today.


Acoustic archaeology: The secret sounds of Stonehenge

by Trevor Cox

Just after sunrise on a misty spring morning last year, my fellow acoustician at the University of Salford, Bruno Fazenda, and Rupert Till of the University of Huddersfield, UK, could be found wandering around Stonehenge popping balloons. This was not some bizarre pagan ritual. It was a serious attempt to capture the "impulse response" of the ancient southern English stone circle, and with it perhaps start to determine how Stonehenge might have sounded to our ancestors.

Read the rest on New Scientist.


Archeologists Find Gateway to the Viking Empire

By Matthias Schulz

For a century, archeologists have been looking for a gate through a wall built by the Vikings in northern Europe. This summer, it was found. Researchers now believe the extensive barrier was built to protect an important trading route.

Read the rest here.

8.26.2010

What have the Romans ever done for us (socks and sandals excepted)?

by Jonathan Brown

They gave the world decent roads, indoor plumbing and some of the goriest spectator sports known to man, but now it appears that the Romans made a hitherto secret contribution to global civilisation by pioneering the wearing of socks with sandals.

Read the rest here.


Mayan pool in the rainforest

Since 2009, researchers from Bonn and Mexico have been systematically uncovering and mapping the old walls of Uxul, a Mayan city. "In the process, we also came across two, about 100 m square water reservoirs," explained Iken Paap, who directs the project with Professor Dr. Nikolai Grube and the Mexican archaeologist Antonio Benavides Castillo.

Read the rest on eurekalert.

8.25.2010

Roman 'industrial estate' unearthed in North Yorkshire

Archaeologists have unearthed the remains of a Roman "industrial estate" in North Yorkshire.

The site includes remains of a water-powered flour mill used to grind grain and produce food. Clothes, food remains and graves were also uncovered.

Read the rest on the BBC.

8.24.2010

24 August 410: the date it all went wrong for Rome?

by David Willey

Tuesday marks the 1,600th anniversary of one of the turning points of European history - the first sack of Imperial Rome by an army of Visigoths, northern European barbarian tribesmen, led by a general called Alaric.

Read the rest on the BBC.


Greek Archaeologists Claim They Discovered Odysseus' Palace

Greek archaeologists have claimed they have found the palace of Odysseus during excavations on the Ithaca island in the Ionian Sea.

Read the rest here.

8.23.2010

Discovery of ancient cave paintings in Petra stuns art scholars

by Dalya Alberge
winged child

Detail of a winged child playing the flute, before and after cleaning. Photograph: Courtesy of the Courtauld Institute

Spectacular 2,000-year-old Hellenistic-style wall paintings have been revealed at the world heritage site of Petra through the expertise of British conservation specialists. The paintings, in a cave complex, had been obscured by centuries of black soot, smoke and greasy substances, as well as graffiti.

Read the rest on The Guardian.


Dig unearths insight into life before the Romans

by Jay Moreno
Dig unearths insight into life before the Romans
The Big Dig 2010 at Brading Roman Villa. Picture by Robin Crossley.

THE third phase of the Big Dig at Brading Roman Villa may well have been one of the toughest excavations eminent archaeologist Sir Barry Cunliffe had ever undertaken but it has yielded some treasures and a greater understanding of Brading’s history up to its Roman occupation.

Read the rest here.

8.20.2010

Queen of the Inch to be re-interred

Queen of the Inch head
A reconstruction of the queen's head and the necklace are on show in Bute

A 4,000-year-old skeleton, known as the Queen of the Inch, is to be re-interred in the tiny island of Inchmarnock in the Firth of Clyde.

Read the rest on the BBC.


Disease killed soldiers from Oliver Cromwell’s army discovered in Fishergate

Mark Stead

ARCHAEOLOGISTS have revealed how they discovered more than they bargained for when a York excavation unearthed the remains of a “forgotten” army’s soldiers.

Read the rest here.

8.18.2010

Did Boudica live near Norwich?

Dr Will Bowden with the skeleton discovered at Caistor St Edmund during the last excavations.
Dr Will Bowden with the skeleton discovered at Caistor St Edmund during the last excavations.
Archaeologists are set to unearth further secrets of a Roman town on the outskirts of Norwich - and are hoping to discover evidence linking the settlemt to East Anglia's Iceni queen Boudica.

Read the rest here.


'Mitochondrial Eve': Mother of All Humans Lived 200,000 Years Ago

ScienceDaily — The most robust statistical examination to date of our species' genetic links to "mitochondrial Eve" -- the maternal ancestor of all living humans -- confirms that she lived about 200,000 years ago. The Rice University study was based on a side-by-side comparison of 10 human genetic models that each aim to determine when Eve lived using a very different set of assumptions about the way humans migrated, expanded and spread across Earth.

Read the rest on Science Daily.


Statues older, more numerous than terracotta warriors found in Hunan

A large cache of ancient stone statues outnumbering the Qin Terracotta Warriors was found in the depths of the Nanling Mountains located in Dao County of Yongzhou City, according to the Xiang Gan Yue Gui Archeology Summit Forum held in Yongzhou, Hunan Province on Aug. 17.

Read the rest here.

8.17.2010

Major buildings find at Roman fortress of Caerleon

Archaeologists have discovered several large buildings at the fortress of Caerleon in south Wales, one of Britain's best known Roman sites.

Read the rest on the BBC.


Mysteries Abound in WTC Ship Remains

by James Williams

On July 12 the remains of an 18th-century ship were found buried 20 feet below street level at the site of the World Trade Center in New York City. The question is -- how did they get there?

Read the rest on Discovery.


Ancient temple complex discovered near Le Mans

by Pierre Le Hir

Excavations near the antique city of Vindunum (now Le Mans) have revealed a vast religious site dating from the first to the third centuries AD with remarkably well-preserved offerings.

Read the rest on The Guardian.

8.16.2010

Archaeologists Discover the Tomb of a Teenager Buried for Over 1600 Years

LIMA.- Archaeologists have discovered, 16 meters from the tomb of the Great Lord of Sipan, the remains of a teenager belonging to the Moche society who was buried over 1600 years ago in Peru.

Read the rest on Art Daily.


Archaeologists uncover egg from 9th-century Great Moravia

Hradiste - Czech archaeologists were surprised at uncovering an unharmed hen´s egg at the burial site of Hradiste, a 9th-century Great Moravia settlement, chief researcher Bohuslav Klima has told CTK.

Read the rest here.

8.13.2010

Tool Use by Early Humans Started Much Earlier

Jennifer Viegas

Fossilized bones scarred by hack marks reveal that our human ancestors were using stone tools and eating meat from large mammals nearly a million years earlier than previously thought, according to a new study that pushes back both of these human activities to roughly 3.4 million years ago.

Read the rest on Discovery.


Ancient language mystery deepens

Pictish stone
Many of the stones are believed to have been carved during the 6th Century

A linguistic mystery has arisen surrounding symbol-inscribed stones in Scotland that predate the formation of the country itself.

Read the rest on the BBC.


"Thor's Hammer" Found in Viking Graves

Kate Ravilious in York, U.K.

Long dismissed as accidental additions to Viking graves, prehistoric "thunderstones"—fist-size stone tools resembling the Norse god Thor's hammerhead—were actually purposely placed as good-luck talismans, archaeologists say.

Read the rest on National Geographic.


Ancient Phoenician City 'Relocated'

by Clara Moskowitz

The site of an ancient city called Aüza, the earliest African city of the Phoenician civilization that existed 3,500 years ago, may have been in a different spot than experts have thought, archaeologists report.

Read the rest here.