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USA – Logan- Ohio University students excavating a ridge top have found two sites — one dating back about 1,000 years and the other about 3,000 — that are believed to have been used by ancient peoples. The 20 students are in an archaeology field class and have been working the past few weeks in the Wayne National Forest outside Logan. The location was selected in part because is on a ridge top, where archaeological excavations take place less often, according to Paul Patton, an OU assistant professor of anthropology who is teaching the class. The two sites are believed to have been temporary locations used for specific purposes, not permanent settlements. At the location utilized about 1,000 years ago, the students have found flint, a few broken tools and storage pits. They also found an outline of what appears to have been a circular house, which Patton said may have been temporary housing for people who were there to make stone tools. There are indications that flint was quarried on the ridge. In the area that was used about 3,000 years ago, very early pottery fragments have been found, as well as a large platform made of stone. What could have been the purpose of the platform? Perhaps roasting of chestnuts that were being gathered for food, Patton said. Carbon dating was done on charcoal found at the two sites to determine how long ago they were used.
http://www.athensmessenger.com/news/ohio-university-students-glimpse-thousands-of-years-into-the-past/article_906b085a-63bd-587f-b219-06e37b5650d7.html
ALGERIE – Biskra - Un site de vestiges romains a été fortuitement découvert par un citoyen dans une broussaille à l’écart de zones urbaines dans la commune de Loutaya, au nord de la wilaya de Biskra, a-t-on appris mardi auprès de la direction de la culture. Le site qui semble être une ancienne ferme oléicole loin de toutes routes contient un pressoir d’olives, des poteries, des pièces de monnaie, des murs et portes de bâtisses en ruine, a précisé Rabéâ Hebba, chef du service du patrimoine culturel à cette direction. Il s’agit d'"un site archéologique de grande importance datant du 4ème siècle" de l’avis de l’experte dépêchée par le Centre national de recherche en archéologie (CNRA) d’Alger, ajoute la même source.
http://www.lexpressiondz.com/linformation_en_continue/243235-des-ruines-romaines-decouvertes-au-nord-de-biskra.html
EGYPTE – Gizeh - Après avoir montré leur efficacité dans la pyramide rhomboïdale, les détecteurs à muons de la mission ScanPyramids sont désormais braqués sur Kheops à la recherche de vides méconnus. Avec un premier succès pour le CEA. rois télescopes d’un tout nouveau type ont été mis spécialement au point pour la campagne. Bien à l’abri sous des tentes climatisées, deux d’entre eux scrutent désormais la face Est de Kheops, le dernier la face Nord.Ces données viendront compléter celles obtenues par une autre technique développée par l’université de Nagoya. L’équipe du professeur Kunihiro Morishima vient de déployer dans Kheops 80 films plastiques enduits d’une émulsion chimique sensible aux particules cosmiques. Ces films ont déjà montré leur efficacité en obtenant une radiographie précise de la pyramide rhomboïdale de Dahchour au mois d’avril 2016. Tandis que les télescopes du CEA observeront plus particulièrement les arêtes du monument depuis l’extérieur, les plaques des Japonais radiographieront notamment les zones placées au dessus de la chambre souterraine et de la chambre de la Reine. Jamais un monument n’aura été exploré avec une telle batterie de technologies
http://www.sciencesetavenir.fr/archeo-paleo/archeologie/20160607.OBS2058/scanpyramids-kheops-scrutee-par-les-muons.html
ROYAUME UNI – Bradgate - Archaeologists hope to find more traces of Ice Age hunter-gatherers as they take advantage of special permission to investigate a medieval moat at Bradgate Park in Leicestershire, the 850-acre Charnwood Forest expanse where Lady Jane Grey was born. A late Upper Palaeolithic flint scatter, leading towards an open flood plain, is one of the areas being prioritised by a University of Leicester team in a park where an incredible collection of prehistoric finds were made during the first season of excavations in 2015. Creeping erosion has given a particular urgency to the work. Dr Richard Thomas, the co-director of the project, says the medieval moated site contains a stone building which could have been a hunting lodge in a prehistoric enclosure near the 16th century Bradgate House
http://www.culture24.org.uk/history-and-heritage/archaeology/art556381-bradgate-park-leicester-ice-age-hunters
NORVEGE - Trondheim - Excavations in Trondheim of a well from the 1100s have allowed archaeologists to confirm the story behind a saga from the time. Excavation leader Anna Petersén of the Norwegian Institute for Cultural Heritage Research (NIKU) says she’s overwhelmed by what she and her team have found. The project involved a well from the Middle Ages at Sverresborg in Trondheim, a fortress in an important city through all of Norway’s long history. “Now the original well construction from the 1100s has been revealed, and what we found makes it possible to confirm that the events in the saga have occurred just as it was written,” Petersén said. The saga involves the story of warriors who seized the fortress of King Sverre in 1197. According to the so-called Sverres saga, they reportedly threw the body of a rival so-calledBirkebeiner fighter into the well, and then threw stones on top of him, plugging the well as they also plundered the fortress, burned all houses inside it and burned all of King Sverre’s ships. In 2014, the archaeologists found the remains of an 800-year-old body in the well, believed to be a man in his 30s or 40s. Now, after removing large quantities of dirt and stones in recent weeks, they have found the stones that were thrown after him, and can see how his skeleton has been lying through the years. “It’s a fantastic picture from when the body was thrown into the well,” Petersén told NRK. “I don’t think there’s any other known example of the discovery of an individual who can be tied to an event from as far back as 1197.” She thinks it’s unique that written sources can now be confirmed through archaeology, and that it’s now possible to understand how the fortification itself functioned. While some of the body’s bones were recovered in 2014, archaeologists had to give up extracting all of them. The rest of the skeleton’s remains were due to be brought out of the well on Thursday.
http://www.newsinenglish.no/2016/06/08/archaeologists-confirm-a-saga/