The New York Times has more information on the damage done to Aleppo and its Old City during the continuing conflict between Syrian government forces and the insurgents. Within the Old City’s walls, a medieval Citadel rests on top of Bronze Age and Roman remains, and a 5,000-year-old structure known as the Temple of the Storm God. For more information on this ancient temple and pictures of the reliefs mentioned in the Times, read “Temple of the Storm God,” right here at ARCHAEOLOGY.

Squatters have built some 50 shacks along Peru’s 1,500-year-old Nazca lines, where they are living and raising pigs in corrals. Reports also indicate that a Nazca-era cemetery has been destroyed. In Peru, when squatters occupy land for more than a day, laws intended to protect the poor and landless give them the right to a judicial process before eviction. “The problem is that by then, the site will be destroyed,” said Blanca Alva, director of Peru’s culture ministry.

An Egyptian man was arrested by the Tourism and Antiquities Police at Cairo International Airport for attempting to leave with 11 artifacts, including terra cotta statuettes depicting Egyptian and Roman deities, two painted lamps, and three amulets made of faience and copper. He claimed that the objects were replicas. They were taken to the Egyptian Museum where scholars will try to determine their origins.

The excavation of an area surrounding a small shed at an historic home in Plymouth, Massachusetts, has uncovered more than 30,000 artifacts dating back 1,000 years. Records at the Massachusetts Historic Commission indicate that the shed was used as a slave quarters in the early eighteenth century. “There is very good evidence of slaves at the site [such as a tamarind jar and colonoware]…but I would need a lot more evidence of African folkways and African-influenced material culture artifacts,” said archaeologist Craig Chartier. The shed may also have been used as an outhouse or as a debt-collection office for Colonel George Watson, the merchant who lived on the property with his slaves.

The construction of a watch factory in Jura, Switzerland, uncovered a major archaeological site. Because archaeologists had not been consulted at the planning stage, they were forced to work side-by-side with the construction crew in order to maintain the project’s tight schedule. This article discusses how the regulations requiring archaeological assessments ahead of construction projects vary with local Swiss governments. “Discussions about who finances archaeology need to be resolved at the federal level. But to defend their profession, archaeologists also need to become lobbyists,” said Marc-Antoine Kaeser, director of the Laténium archaeological museum.

This entry was posted by Jessica E. Saraceni on Thursday, August 16, 2012. Discussion of this blog entry is now closed.

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