The 300-year-old linen-lined trunk is filled with over 2, 600 letters that were mailed out—but never received—between the years 1680 and 1706. Historians are now taking a closer look. Read more…
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This Rediscovered Leather Trunk Contains Thousands of Letters From the 17th Century
This is the Altamura Man. He’s old . In 1993, cave researchers stumbled across an odd formation in Italy: a skull that had essentially grown over time to become part of the cave, calcite budding from its features. Now, scientists have discovered that it could easily be 150, 000 years old. Read more…
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After 150,000 Years in a Cave, a Neanderthal Skull Looks Like This
Having survived 8, 000 years, the Chinchorro mummies found in modern-day Chile and Peru have started decaying more quickly than ever before—in some cases even melting into gelatinous “black ooze.” Scientists at Harvard think they’ve found the reason why. Read more…
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The World’s Oldest Mummies Are Suddenly Turning Into Black Goo
Music scholars are recreating ancient Greek songs that haven’t been heard for thousands of years. The results aren’t very inspiring, but we’re finally getting a sense of what the ancients were listening to. Read more…
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Listen to 2,500-year-old music brought back to life
The medieval crusaders may be long gone, but some of them left behind something a bit personal. In a ruined castle in Cyprus, researchers discovered a latrine that still contained the fecal parasites of the European invaders. Read more…
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12th-century latrine still holds parasites from the crusaders’ feces
The sentences above are special. According to newly published research, they comprise words that have been passed down for millenia, from a language that all but disappeared toward the end of the last ice age. What remains of that tongue are words like the ones above – words that mean the same thing today, and sound almost exactly the same, as they did 15,000 years ago. Read more…
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Spoken in the ice age, these words might actually have made sense
The Maya civilization was among the most advanced in history, and its disintegration has perplexed researchers for ages. One of the most compelling theories to date suggests that a shifting climate, playing puppeteer to sociopolitical marionettes, had a devastating role in the Maya’s downfall. Now, researchers have combined remarkably detailed climate data — recorded in a Central American stalagmite — with historical records to help determine what really happened to this mysterious Mesoamerican society. More »
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What destroyed the Maya? We have a new clue, in the form of an ancient stalagmite.