Nashville police are looking for clues in the shooting death of Vanderbilt University anthropology professor Pierre Colas. His sister, Marie Colas was wounded. Graduate student Danielle Kurin told the press, “He went above and beyond what a professor is expected to do. He was like a friend and mentor, really a role model. In that way, he affected so many people’s lives.”  

A new five-year project will use infrared technology to photograph the Dead Sea Scrolls and post the images online. “This will ensure that the scrolls are preserved for another 2,000 years,” said Pnina Shor of the Israeli Antiquities Authority.  

The foundation of George Washington’s boyhood home in Virginia will be backfilled next month.  

Ground-penetrating radar indicates that rectangular holes had been dug in an unmarked section of an Iowa cemetery, suggesting that local tales of the area being used to bury those who died while fleeing slavery on the Underground Railroad could be true. “It’s the most unusual cemetery I’ve ever seen,” said Steve De Vore of the National Park Service.  

“Professional looting has ended, although just like anywhere in the world there may be some occasional digging by children,” according to Abbas al-Husseini, who is currently a professor at Iraq’s Al Qadisiyah University, and former chairman of the state board of antiquities.  

Human and animal bones were uncovered during the excavation of a septic system on the Hawaiian island of Molokai. All of the bones were reburied at the site.  

University of Witwatersrand paleoanthropologist Lee Berger responds to the new study of Palauan bones in PLoS ONE, which disagrees with his interpretation that the island’s ancient residents were dwarfs, for National Geographic News.  

National Geographic News also has video of the mummies being removed from the intact Wari tomb discovered in Peru.  

Details of the new management plan at the Giza Plateau are available at Al-Ahram. “We are making it much nicer for the tourists,” said Shaaban Abdel-Gawad, head of the ancient Egyptian department at the secretary-general’s office.

This entry was posted by Jessica E. Saraceni on Thursday, August 28, 2008. Discussion of this blog entry is now closed.

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