A slab of basalt engraved with an Egyptian hieroglyph was uncovered near Damascus. Archaeologists estimate the carving to date to around 1,300 years B.C., from the reign of Rameses II. [Editor’s note: Title of linked article is incorrect. It should read, “Syria unearths 3,300-year-old pharaonic engraving.”]

Egyptian authorities recovered a second carving, but this one was discovered at Bonhams auction house in London. The limestone slab had been removed from a tomb in Luxor.

Mechanical engineer Roberto Velazquez creates replicas of pre-Columbian instruments and tries to figure out how to play them. “We’ve been looking at our ancient culture as if they were deaf and mute. But I think all of this is tied closely to what they did, how they thought,” he said.

Field school students excavated an eighteenth-century Indian village in northern Oklahoma, uncovering post holes, fortification ditches, iron and pottery pieces, and decorative ornaments. The site was once a center of trade between the Wichita and the French.

In Montreal, PhD candidate Julie-Anne Bouchard-Perron is studying the way French colonists ate. “The few seeds of native corn and sunflower we found on the site seem to indicate that the colonists weren’t interested in integrating new elements into their diet. Maybe they were afraid of being poisoned. Or maybe they just preferred their own food,” she said.

Beirut’s traditional neighborhoods, made up of Ottoman-style mansions with lavish gardens, are being razed to make way for high-rises with sea views. “Every time an old house goes, a green pocket goes and with it go trees that are often hundreds of years old,” said architect Mona Hallak of the Association for the Protection of Sites and Old Buildings.

This entry was posted by Jessica E. Saraceni on Monday, June 30, 2008. Discussion of this blog entry is now closed.

Comments posted here do not represent the views or policies of the Archaeological Institute of America.