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DANEMARK – Tastum Lake - A pair of old friends have found the largest flint axes in Danish history in a drained bog area near Tastum Lake just south of Skive in Jutland. Archaeologists at nearby Viborg Museum theorise that the axes were placed in the bog as part of a ritual sacrifice sometime during the early Stone Age around 3800-3500 BC. “It’s fascinating that they could master the flint and produce such a perfect axe,” said Mikkel Kieldsen, an archaeologist and curator at Viborg Museum. “A lot of effort has been put into the axes, so the sacrifice must have really meant something.” One of the axes, where are being exhibited at Viborg Museum for the next three weeks, measures a Danish-record 50.5 centimetres. The axes are considered a national treasure and will be sent to the National Museum of Denmark next month.
http://cphpost.dk/news/historic-flint-axes-found-in-denmark.html
ROYAUME UNI - Hinkley Point - This month one of the most extensive archaeological investigations undertaken in the South West reaches its conclusion in the shadow of Hinkley Point nuclear power station. The survey at the proposed Hinkley Point C site will be complete at the end of April, having provided a wealth of information about how people have lived and worked in the Somerset landscape for more than 5,000 years. The work has revealed an impressive Bronze Age enclosure which has now been fully excavated. Its exact purpose is uncertain but its shape and size suggests that it may have had a ceremonial function as a meeting place. A spokesman said: "There is only one entrance and evidence that feasting was going on. Cow and deer bones have been found throughout the site." He added: "Excavations have uncovered a wealth of archaeological evidence ranging from prehistoric farmsteads and Roman buildings to an important Dark Age cemetery site. It has also been possible to investigate post-medieval farmsteads that occupied this part of Somerset."
http://www.westerndailypress.co.uk/Remarkable-history-site-comes-light/story-29180682-detail/story.html
TURQUIE – Akkale - Officials have pushed the button on a project for the restoration and environmental arrangement of the ancient city of Akkale, an olive oil production and exportation center in the late Roman era in the southern province of Mersin’s Erdemli district. The ancient city of Akkale was a seafront city and home to a water cistern, a three-story grave and a port. Mersin University Archaeology Department academic Associated Professor Ümit Aydınoğlu said he worked as a consultant for the environmental arrangement project in Kanlıdivane and continued: “In Kanlıdivane, nearly one-kilometer-long walking routes and visitor centers were established. Also, paths for the handicapped were built. This place was an important olive oil production center of the region in the ancient era. The ancient city was cleaned and restored to its original. The places where olives were cracked and pressed were unearthed,” Aydınoğlu said, adding that the same project would be made for Akkale if approved by the ministry.
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/ancient-akkale-to-be-restored-.aspx?pageID=238&nid=98425
USA – Detroit - Low water levels in Oregon’s Detroit Lake revealed a wooden cargo wagon and a concrete pit near what had been a Forest Service ranger station before the area was flooded in 1953 by the Detroit Dam. U.S. Forest Service archaeologist Cara Kelly interviewed locals who lived in the area, known as Old Detroit, and learned that at one time, the pit in question may have been lined with rocks and filled with goldfish. “It really was the beginning of full administration and protection of the forest reserves. Guard stations during this time served as backcountry living quarters where forest rangers were stationed during the summer, constructing trails, installing telephone lines, and patrolling land on horseback in search of smoke from wildfires,” she said in a report in the Appeal Tribune.
http://www.statesmanjournal.com/story/news/local/silverton/2016/04/27/information-surfaces-detroit-artifacts/83413242/*
ROYAUME UNI – Bowland - Five years of excavation and research by the University of Central Lancashire are helping to give an insight into the Forest of Bowland’s prehistoric past. The aim of the project is to investigate evidence of human activity found in the limestone caves and rock-shelters typical of this part of Bowland. Buckets of earth have been meticulously shifted layer by layer, from marked pits dug into a grassy plateau on the side of the valley. Together with magnetometer surveys (which map small changes in the earth’s magnetic field) and other archaeological techniques, the digs have provided a wealth of data – a month’s work on-site producing enough research material for a year.
http://www.clitheroeadvertiser.co.uk/news/local/archaeologists-uncover-forest-of-bowland-s-prehistoric-past-1-7878850
FRANCE – Toulouse - Il faut croire que lorsqu’on creuse à Toulouse, on trouve. Cette fois, c’est sous un ancien garage automobile des allées Charles de Fitte qu’un mur un peu particulier, datant de 1785, a été retrouvé. Le responsable du service, Pierre Pisani, avait en effet connaissance de la présence d’un mur grâce aux écrits. Lorsque le rempart médiéval de Toulouse, qui se trouvait autrefois sous les allées, fut détruit, un mur a été reconstruit à quelques mètres. Reliant Saint-Cyprien au Fer à cheval, cette ceinture empêchait la moindre marchandise d’entrer en ville. Avant d’y avoir accès, les commerçants devaient s’affranchir d’une taxe d’importation appelée l’octroi et qui était reversée aux Capitouls, les membres de l’ancêtre du conseil municipal, abolis avec la Révolution. En revanche, l’archéologue ne s’attendait pas à de telles dimensions pour un mur dont la vocation n’était pas celle d’un rempart. Cela montre selon lui qu’« il y avait de gros enjeux […] même si à cette époque ce secteur était peu urbanisé ». Eriger un mur de cinq mètres de haut, sur presque deux de larges et d’une longueur de 800 mètres, c’est excessif pour faire payer un impôt à des commerçants.
http://www.20minutes.fr/toulouse/1835487-20160428-toulouse-sous-ancien-garage-auto-fouilles-revelent-mur-1785
ESPAGNE – Séville - An ancient fortune containing over 600 kilos of Roman bronze coins was found buried in a Sevilla park on Wednesday April 27. The hoard was uncovered by machines during construction work on the interior road in Zaudin Park in the city’s Tomares district. A total of 19 Roman amphorae, which appear specifically designed to hold money, were recovered, with the coins having been dated to the fourth century AD. They have a figure of an emperor on one side with various Roman allegories on the reverse, and do not appear to have been circulated. Archaeologists are calling the find “unique” in Spain and possibly the world due to the sheer number of coins and the fact that they are relatively uniform in design. Initial theories suggest that the money was stashed away for payment of imperial taxes or army levies. The artefacts were immediately deposited in the Sevilla Archaeology Museum.
http://www.euroweeklynews.com/3.0.15/news/on-euro-weekly-news/spain-news-in-english/138301-hidden-treasure-trove-discovered-in-sevilla