02 NOVEMBRE 2017 NEWS: Dyadovo - Fife - Gaya - Azhagankulam - Perth -- Gizeh - Namur - Ar Horqin - Tenea -
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BULGARIE – 
Dyadovo - Archaeologists have found parts of a silver wreath dating back to the period after Ancient Thrace was conquered by the Roman Empire (1st-3rd century) during excavations of a burial mound located near the 8,000-year-old Dyadovo Settlement Mound in Southeast Bulgaria. The Dyadovo Settlement Mound is a world-famous archaeological site near Bulgaria’s town of Dyadovo, Nova Zagora Municipality, features traces of civilized human life from the end of the 7th millennium BC until the High Middle Ages (11th-12th century AD). Probably the most valuable discoveries there, however, date from the Middle Bronze Age up until the Iron Age – 3rd-2nd millennium BC because of the Thracian fortress found there which exhibits a number of similarities with the organization of ancient Troy. Troy is known, including from Ancient Greek poet Homer’s Iliad, to have been allied with the Ancient Thracians. Part of the silver wreath is melted which suggests that the person who owned and was buried in the excavated burial mound was cremated, says the National Museum of History in Sofia.The surviving parts of the Ancient Thracian silver wreath depict plant leaves and fruit. “The appearance of the silver wreath found in Dyadovo demonstrates that it probably belonged to a person with a high social and economic status," the Museum says. In another of the graves in the burial mound, the archaeologists have found an almost fully intact wooden bead. Other burial afterlife gifts have also been discovered, including ceramic and glass vessels. “The material and the appearance of the finds suggest that they are from the period between [the reign of] Roman Emperor Domitian (r. 81-96 AD), i.e. the 1st century AD, and the reign of Roman Emperor Geta (r. 209-211 AD), i.e. the beginning of the 3rd century AD," the Museum adds. “The burial mound was built and used during this entire period. The population was most probably made up of local Thracians. No research has been done on the Roman period in Dyadovo so far, so these are the first Roman Era finds from the area," Bulgaria’s National Museum of History elaborates. It also emphasizes that the craftsmanship of the new finds does resemble that of ancient artifacts discovered in Troy and its vicinity, a further piece of evidence that Troy and the Ancient Thracian settlement in the Dyadovo Settlement Mound have much in common.
ROYAUME UNI – 
Fife- The face of a Scottish woman persecuted for witchcraft more than 300 years ago has been reconstructed by forensic scientists. Lilias Adie died in 1704 in prison before she could be burned for her "confessed" crimes of being a witch and having sex with the devil. Locals buried her under a large stone on the Fife coast, perhaps believing it would stop her rising from the grave. Her remains were exhumed in the 19th Century by antiquarians. Her skull ended up in the St Andrews University Museum and was photographed before it went missing during the 20th Century.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-tayside-central-41775398
INDE – Gaya - A wall hitherto buried under the sands of the river Muhane and discovered by Chhath devotees this year may add to the list of historical sites in the district. Some women from Binda village in Barachatti block, around 45km south of the Gaya district headquarters and around 150km south of Patna, noticed the wall when they had gone to take a dip in the Muhane on October 24, first day of Chhath. When some villagers removed the sand a wall was clearly visible. Local villagers believe the wall may be part of the ruins of the palace of the Kolhan kingdom that ruled the area around the 18th century. Kolhan was a tribe in Jharkhand, said Rajiv Kumar, a research scholar of history. "The area of the Kolhan kingdom was spread up to Barachatti, which is on the border of Bihar and Jharkhand. Although it is a matter of verification by archaeology experts, it cannot be ruled out completely that the wall belongs to the Kolhan kingdom,"
https://www.telegraphindia.com/states/bihar/wall-found-in-riverbed-182418
INDE - Azhagankulam - Minister for Tamil Official Language and Tamil Culture K. Pandiarajan has said the excavation at Azhagankulam near showed archaeological evidence that Tamil culture and tradition was more than 2000-year-old. Talking to reporters on Tuesday after inspecting about 13,000 artefacts unearthed in the recently concluded eighth season of excavation at the village, A comprehensive excavation in the eighth season was taken up in May and ended recently, he said. Nakkeerar, the medieval Tamil poet had mentioned about the profession of conch sawing in Sangam literature and the department has retrieved hundreds of sawed conches and furnace from the site, he said. The artefacts retrieved from the site included ivory objects, semi precious stone beads, copper coins, silver punch marked coins, carnelian, quartz, crystals, amethyst, amphorae, furnace and iron smelters, he said. The retrieval of broken Roman amphora, embossed Roman potsherds and rouletted ware showed that the coastal village had functioned as an important trading post between the Sangam Pandyas and the Romans, he added.
ROYAUME UNI – 
Perth - The exciting archaeological find temporarily stopped work on the £35 million A9/A85 project and the stone was identified by Mark Hall, of Perth Museum and Art Gallery, as displaying a particular kind of Pictish carving not previously seen in the area. Described as a “significant” find, the stone shows a figure walking right to left, holding a spear in his right hand. The weapon is believed to be typical of spears of the mid-first millennium AD. The figure appears to be holding a club or a staff in his left hand and is wearing a cloak and shoes. He also has a very pronounced hair style, with a shaven front scalp. The figure’s face is obscured by wear to the stone but archaeologists believe he had a large nose. No Pictish archaeological sites are known in the immediate vicinity but archaeological experts believe the stone suggests the presence of a powerful noble locally.
EGYPTE – 
Gizeh - Archaeologists in Egypt have reopened a so-called cursed tomb containing the remains of the people who built the Great Pyramid of Giza. This is the first time it has been opened since its discovery almost 30 years ago. The pyramid dates back 4,500 years and is located in the “tribal mountain” area, near the Pyramid of Giza. It contains a cemetery of workers along with the graves of three important people—the supervisor of the royal palace, the supervisor of the construction workers and a man of significance who was buried with the workers. Archaeologists working with the Ministry of Antiquities believe the man who supervised the workers filled the cemetery with curses. This was to protect the dead from thieves. The tomb of the royal palace supervisor, known as Nefer Theth, was well preserved and was found to have two fake doors and inscriptions along the walls. As well as opening up the three tombs, Ashraf Mohi, director general of the effects of the Pyramids of Giza, said two other tombs discovered in the same cemetery have been reopened—including the tomb of Khufu Khaf, the son of King Khufu, who ruled between 2589–2566 B.C. The other tomb is Seshem Nefer 4, which dates to the Sixth Dynasty, around 2340 B.C. This grave includes images of the cemetery owner with his family, bulls being slaughtered and birds and animals being hunted. The Great Pyramid of Giza was built during the Fourth Dynasty between 2580 and 2560 B.C.
http://www.newsweek.com/ancient-egypt-tomb-cursed-giza-pyramid-workers-reopen-698463
BELGIQUE – Namur - Deux constructions, dont un atelier de poterie datant du VIe siècle, ont été récemment découvertes sur le site de la Confluence dit Grognon, à Namur, ont indiqué les archéologues en charge des fouilles. Tout récemment, les équipes ont découvert un four de potier indiquant la présence d’un atelier de poterie datant de l’époque mérovingienne (VIe siècle). Par ailleurs, les équipes ont mis à jour la présence de deux bâtiments de forme carrée et qui ne sont pas destinés à de l’habitat. Il pourrait s’agir d’un monument funéraire ou d’un temple religieux, selon les deux hypothèses envisagées par les archéologues.
http://www.lesoir.be/122062/article/2017-10-31/namur-le-grognon-devoile-un-atelier-de-poterie
CHINE - Ar Horqin Banner - Ruins found in north China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region have been confirmed as dating back to the Middle Paleolithic Period, local authorities said yesterday. Carbon-14 dating has determined that the ruins, at Sanlong Mountain in Ar Horqin Banner, are at least 50,000 years old, said Wang Dafang of the region’s cultural department. “This period is close to the earliest time-frame that carbon-14 dating can determine, and therefore, the ruins may actually be older than this,” Wang said. The ruins were discovered in 2015 and subsequently excavated and studied by archeologists from the Chinese Academy of Sciences and Inner Mongolia Museum. Around 500 pieces of stoneware have been unearthed from the two layers dating to the Paleolithic period, which were covered by three layers from later periods. The stoneware includes tools believed to have been used for cutting and peeling, Wang said. The items resemble others unearthed from Middle Paleolithic Period ruins discovered in central and western regions of the Eurasian continent. Very few ruins dating from the Middle Paleolithic Period have been unearthed in north China, and this new discovery will boost research into the living environment, activities and skills of hominids, the ancestors of modern humans, he said.
https://www.shine.cn/archive/nation/Ruins-found-to-be-more-than-50000-years-old/shdaily.shtml
GRECE – 
Tenea - Archaeologists in Greece have uncovered rare jewels, coins and other artefacts while excavating tombs near the ruins of the classical city of Corinth dating to between the fourth and first centuries A.D. The team of experts, working with the Greek Ministry of Culture, made the discoveries in eastern Corinthia, at the site of the ancient village of Tenea, while excavating a burial ground with two distinctive chambers built when Greece was part of the Roman Empire. The Greek Ministry of Culture said in a statement that the Roman burial monuments appeared to have been built into a preexisting Hellenic substructures from the period between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 B.C. up until the Roman conquest in B.C. 146. Five of the most well-appointed tombs, the experts said, would have belonged to wealthy inhabitants of Roman Greece. Bodies were found alongside elaborate gilded bronze leaves, a golden ring, precious stones and gold and bronze coins from the surrounding region.Among the other ritualistic items buried with the dead were perfumes, artefacts made of gold, gold foil and elaborately crafted glassware, as well as items of pottery. Also within the dig site the archaeologists recovered items from a series of different burial plots. Fourteen graves, organized in circles, as was Roman convention, yielded a number of gold and and silver coins, vases and a series of lamps, the most striking of which bore depictions of the Roman goddess Venus and two cupids. Of particular interest to the excavation team, led by Elena Korka, were the older Greek parts of the structures. One side of the Roman burial monument was built above an typical rectangular Hellenistic basement made of limestone and then coated in a thick layer of mortar. In other areas they found evidence of graves from the earlier Greek period, pottery including a figurine in the shape of a dove and other ritual items such as perfume. It also appeared some of the lower vaults in the buildings would have been associated with other Greco-Roman rituals. The period of Roman rule in Greece began following the destruction of Corinth, when the Roman Empire annexed the Greek heartlands and crushed the Peloponnesians, the Greek peoples living in the southern part of the country.
