12 MAI 2016 NEWS: Yucatan - İzmir - Machu Picchu - Moscou - Nancy - Palmyre -
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MEXIQUE – 
Yucatan - A Canadian teenager's amazing discovery might go from an archaeological revelation to a cautionary tale in just 48 hours. On Monday, the tabloid newspaper Journal of Montreal reported that 15-year-old student William Gadoury of Quebec had spotted an ancient Mayan city that was previously lost to history. Using a map of Mayan constellations and satellite images in 2014, Gadoury found a correlation between the stars and the locations of 117 known ruins. But one star, he noticed, had no matching city — so he used satellite imagery provided by the Canadian Space Agency and the private company Ikonos to study that location in the Yucatan Peninsula. He discovered a strange geometric shape — a rough square amid the vegetation. So this week Gadoury, geologist Armand LaRocque, and another Canadian scientist announced that it was possibly a complex of 30-odd buildings of Mayan origin. Experts, however, are now voicing skepticism about that idea. George Dvorsky, a contributing editor at Gizmodo, reached out to two anthropologists — and both cautioned against jumping to any conclusions about the site without on-the-ground confirmation. Thomas Garrison, an expert in satellite imagery (also called remote sensing), told Dvorsky it was probably an old cornfield: "I'd guess [the field has] been fallow for 10-15 years. This is obvious to anyone that has spent any time at all in the Maya lowlands." David Stuart, an archaeologist and director of the Mesoamerica Center at the University of Texas at Austin, shared a frank assessment on Facebook. "The whole thing is a mess — a terrible example of junk science hitting the internet in free-fall," he wrote. "The ancient Maya didn't plot their ancient cities according to constellations. Seeing such patterns is a Rorschach process, since sites are everywhere, and so are stars."
http://www.techinsider.io/ancient-mayan-city-may-be-corn-field-2016-5
TURQUIE – 
İzmir - Researchers at Boston University have detected DNA samples in a 5,000-year-old temporal bone discovered during excavations at İzmir’s Yeşilova mound, one of the oldest excavation areas in the history of Anatolia. The DNA sample is expected to provide important clues related to Anatolian history. Excavations head Professor Zafer Derin said the Yeşilova mound excavations, which are backed by the Culture and Tourism Ministry, Ege University, the İzmir Metropolitan Municipality and Bornova Municipality, provided new information to the fields of archaeology, science and education. ;Derin said the excavations first revealed that the history of İzmir dated back to 8,500 years ago, allowing researchers to access important data on the life of the early inhabitants around İzmir and the Aegean by examining their tools. Last year the team found a temporal bone piece from a 5,000 year-old skeleton in the region, which they sent to Boston University in the U.S., where examinations have been carried out on the bone’s DNA sample. “DNA analysis was made on this 5,000-year-old temporal bone that we found last year. They used a method that is used only in four places in the world. The basic goal was to detect the DNA, which they managed to do. This will help us find things like the eye color, height, disease and hair color of a human who lived 5,000 years ago. We will learn if this human was European or Anatolian,” Derin stated.
PEROU – 
Machu Picchu - The first comprehensive LiDAR Mapping project of Machu Picchu is set to begin! Álvarez–Calderón told TV Peru that her office has been working for months with the University of Sydney to bring “sophisticated high-tech equipment and make scientific overflights” of a 100-square-kilometer area around Machu Picchu, as well as a section of the Río Abiseo National Park in northern Peru. The flights could begin as early as May 26, she said. In recent years, archaeological evidence has been mounting that Machu Picchu was not just an isolated 15th century mountaintop retreat for the Inca Pachacutec. Agricultural terraces being cleared on Machu Picchu’s lower flanks beneath Huayna Picchu, the ancient vestiges of corrals for alpacas and the discovery of related sacred sites like Llactapata,suggest that Machu Picchu was the hub of a geographically vast complex. It would take conventional archaeological teams decades to piece that puzzle together.
http://www.peruviantimes.com/10/lidar-mapping-project-of-machu-picchu-coming-soon/26374/
RUSSIE – Moscou - Archeologists who are doing excavation work on the site of the demolished 14th unit of the Moscow Kremlin have found some artifacts dating back to the 12-14th centuries have suspended their work for several weeks, the press service for the presidential property department has reported. "The dismantling of the 14th unit provided a unique and unexpected perspective for the archeological research of the eastern part of the Kremlin Hill, where the Chudov and Voznesensky Monasteries and the Small Nikolayevsky Palace, which were destroyed in 1929, were located," the presidential property department told Interfax. The report says that "archeologists have found artifacts dating back to the 12-14th centuries, which indicate the development of the eastern part of the Kremlin no later than the 12th century and intensive city life." The finds (glass bracelets, pieces of glass vessels, metal decorations for women's costumes, ceramics) are common to ancient Russian cities of the second half of the 12-13th centuries, but the incrustations of that time have not been studied in the Moscow Kremlin until Moscow Kremlin. "Among the most expressive objects are a writing stylus, of which not a lot have been found in the cities of Northeastern Russia," the press service said. The scientists have dug done holes between the Ivanovskaya Square and the Spasskaya Tower. The presidential property management office said the archeologists "managed to find some parts of the Small Nikolayevsky Palace (whose foundation was laid down in 1775 according to M. Kazakov's project), the Yekaterinskaya Church of the Voznesensky Monastery (1817), the monastery canteen joined to the Annunciation Church and the Alexeyevskaya Church of the Chudov Monastery (late 17th century)."
FRANCE – 
Nancy - Des fouilles archéologiques ont démarré sur le site de l'ancienne prison Charles III, dans le cadre du projet Nancy Grand Coeur. Elles se font sur un espace de 9.000 m², par l'INRAP, Institut national de recherches archéologiques préventives. Les fouilles se font sur une surface de 9.000 m². Elles servent à enrichir les connaissances des archéologues sur le positionnement des remparts, comment ils ont été construits puis démolis. Les archéologues espèrent affiner leur savoir sur l'ancien bastion avec ces fouilles qui démarrent cent à deux cents mètres plus loin. Ils ont déjà pu constater que le mur, d'une épaisseur de 3 à 4 mètres, a été miné à la poudre noire. Des fouilles ont dejà été réalisées l'année dernière dans la zone de l’ancien grand parking situé devant la caserne Joffre. Ils y ont reconstruit un mur de l’ancien bastion de Saurupt, construit au début du XVIIe siècle, en 1630, sur décision de Charles III, et détruit par Louis XIV en 1697. La durée du chantier est relative à l'importance des vestiges à fouiller mais deux mois et demi ont été prévus ainsi qu'une fin en début juin.
SYRIE - 
Palmyre - Daesh a infligé un revers à l'armée syrienne, moins d'une semaine après les célébrations par le régime et son allié russe de la reprise de la ville antique. Après avoir perdu Palmyre (centre) le 27 mars, les djihadistes sont parvenus mardi «à couper la route entre Homs et Palmyre près de l'aéroport militaire de Tiyas après une attaque lancée à partir de l'est de Homs», selon l'Observatoire syrien des droits de l'homme (OSDH). Les villes de Homs et Palmyre, cité antique inscrite par l'Unesco au patrimoine mondial de l'humanité, sont contrôlées par le régime de Bachar al-Assad. La coupure de cette route représente l'attaque la plus importante de Daesh depuis la reconquête de Palmyre par le régime avec l'appui de l'aviation russe, a déclaré le directeur de l'Observatoire, Rami Abdel Rahmane, faisant état de «violents combats» entre régime et djihadistes. Daesh «encercle Palmyre de tous les côtés sauf au sud-ouest», selon lui.
https://fr.news.yahoo.com/syrie-daesh-encercle-ville-palmyre-024232194.html
