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ROYAUME UNI – Londres - Waterlogged wood expert Michael Bamforth is here recording and subsampling various timbers lifted during fieldwork on foreshore sites in London for the Thames Tideway Tunnel project.The timbers include one which may belong to London’s oldest prehistoric structure – a group of timbers on the foreshore outside the MI6 building at Vauxhall, others of which have been previously dated to the Late Mesolithic at around 4800–4500 BC. Following recording, the timbers will be subsampled for species ID and radiocarbon dating.
http://www.wessexarch.co.uk/blogs/news/2015/03/27/londons-oldest-prehist-structure?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+wessexarchaeology+%28Wessex+Archaeology%29
ROYAUME UNI – Hillington - Society chairman Dr Clive Bond, said that 10 test pits were excavated, including one at the Norfolk Hospice, Tapping House, which produced facts about the village previously unknown.He said: “Near to the church we found medieval pottery which suggests an early settlement in the area. We found Thetford ware, which dates back to just before the Norman Conquest, and also Ipswich ware, which dates from 650 to 850. “The suggestion is that there was some activity before the present church was built – possibly there was another church there before which would have been Saxon and is contemporary with the pottery.” He said that close to the church they also recovered “work flints” used for tools, which it is estimated date from 6500 to 2900BC.
http://www.lynnnews.co.uk/news/local/latest-local-news/hillington-dig-suggests-earlier-church-1-6657871
ROYAUME UNI – Cambridge -The skeleton of a horse thought to be from the Roman period has been discovered at the Biomedical Campus in Cambridge – three metres below ground with a broken leg. Archeologists said finding the almost complete skeleton was "unusual" and was an indication that a "specific incident" must have occurred in the past for it to be unearthed still fully intact. The skeleton, which is about 2,000 years old, was found three weeks ago during preparatory work on the site of a new hotel and conference centre. Alison Dickens, archeological manager at the Cambridge archeology unit at Cambridge University, said a full analysis had not yet been carried out but initial investigations by an animal bones specialist found it was a horse about one-and-half metres high. Although experts have not yet analysed the skeleton in detail, they believe it is from the Roman period as it was found near a Roman settlement which was discovered 12 years ago. "It was in a pit around it which we think were dug for quarrying gravel in the Roman period," said Alison. "The other signs were fragments of pottery and fragments of other animals. It was probably just on the edge of a settlement, there is certainly a Roman settlement to the north of it and it's in the general area of Roman activity." She added: "We find animal bones everywhere but finding a whole one intact is slightly more unusual but you do find them. A specific incident must have occurred in the past as to why it is there. Maybe it was ill or diseased, maybe it died or it had to be put down. We just don't know at the moment."
http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Ancient-Roman-horse-skeleton-hotel-site/story-26238732-detail/story.html?
CHINE – Jiahu - In his speech on China's ancient fermented beverages, Patrick E. McGovern, scientific director at the University of Pennsylvania Museum in Philadelphia, illustrated the bio-molecular archaeological approach behind the discovery of the most ancient, chemically-attested alcoholic beverage in the world, recovered from a Neolithic tomb site in Jiahu, in China's Henan province, dating back to 7,000 BC. This discovery dates to almost 2,000 years earlier than the hitherto discovered most ancient wine production in the Middle East, he said. A mixed fermented beverage of rice, hawthorn fruit/grape and honey was reconstructed on the basis of the analyses of the pottery recovered from the Jiahu site. The ancient Chinese made a unique contribution to alcoholic beverage-making by using specific grains, especially rice and millet, whose carbohydrates were broken down into simple and fermentable sugars by mold saccharification or amylolysis, he said. He also proposed that the mass production and precise formulation of a range of fermented beverages during the Neolithic period was likely a result of the domestication of plants and the process of fermentation between western and eastern Asia.
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/world/2015-03/27/content_19926236.htm?
CHINE – Yanghai - Archeologists have found the oldest processed wheaten food remains ever unearthed in the country, indicating that people ate bread-like food 2,600 to 2,900 years ago. Yang Yimin, associate professor with the University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said yesterday that his team used infrared scans to screen the food remains, which were discovered in pottery wares unearthed from Yanghai Cemetery in north China's Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region. "The ingredients were mainly flour made from barley and millet. It was also mixed with lactobacillus and yeast," he said. The food was made in a period between China's Western Zhou Dynasty (1046-771 BC) and Spring and Autumn Period (722-476 BC). Yang said the discovery showed wheat had became an important staple food in Xinjiang during that period. Food decomposes quickly and is rarely found at archeological sites. However, the remains were preserved because of the extremely arid climate of the Gobi Desert. There are more than 500 ancient tombs located in the cemetery. Yang said the recent discovery would not only lead to better understanding of ancient food processing methods, but also shed more light on the role Xinjiang played in influencing China's cuisine. Among the major grains consumed in ancient China, only Chinese millet originated from the central Yellow River region, while rice was domesticated in southern regions. Wheat and soybean, which were generally believed to have been originated from Central Asia, were cultivated in northwest China. Archeological research shows wheat cultivation in China began in Xinjiang and spread to Qinghai and Gansu provinces, which further suggests Xinjiang's role linking China with the West.
http://www.china.org.cn/china/2015-03/27/content_35170394.htm?
EGYPTE – - A chair that belonged to King Tutankhamen was broken in transit from the Egyptian Museum in Tahrir Square to the Grand Egyptian Museum (GEM) in al-Haram of Giza, an anonymous official in the Grand Museum stated Wednesday. The other three artifacts were also damaged in transit: the top of the sarcophagus, a round offering table, and a marble vessel, the official told Youm7. The chair’s base frame was broken, while the offering table’s stick detached from the round table. A glass cover for a papyrus was also broken.
http://www.thecairopost.com/news/143389/culture/king-tuts-chair-broken-in-transit-to-new-egyptian-museum
FRANCE – Bayeux - 2016 is the 950th anniversary of the momentous year 1066, which climaxed with the Battle of Hastings and the Norman Conquest of England. The Bayeux Tapestry commemorated the lead-up to that Conquest and we commemorate, in this conference, both historical events and the work of art. We compare The Bayeux Tapestry’s version of history with other sources and examine the cultural milieu that produced and appreciated it. We consider the ways in which the Bayeux Tapestry is unique among medieval textile furnishings; and we examine how The Bayeux Tapestry itself has been and still is being commemorated, from the nineteenth-century replica displayed in Reading to recent and current community projects that portray history in needlework.
http://archeurope.com/pdf/btnc.pdf