Roman engineers strengthened their mortar with a specific type of volcanic ash. “Although the presence of the high-quality stratlinglite cements does not ensure protection from concrete cracking and failure from earthquake ground shaking, it shows the very well bonded nature of the wall concrete,” said one of the scientists on the project, Marie Jackson of Northern Arizona University.

Prehistoric fishing tackle, sewing tools, and bone jewelry were unearthed near Egypt’s Fayoum Oasis. “The most important item is an awl made of animal bone and granite, which shows that prehistoric man devised many ways to sew leather,” said lead archaeologist Khaled Saad.  

A 3,000-year-old farming settlement with an extensive canal system has been uncovered at a wastewater treatment plant in Arizona. “This has completely revised our understanding of when irrigation agriculture was introduced,” said James Vint of Desert Archaeology, Inc.  

The new visitor center at Stonehenge will be placed a mile and a half away, at a site that is “sustainable and affordable,” according to England’s culture secretary, Andy Burnham. A nearby road will also be closed.  

A government building project in Sacramento, California, yielded 157 boxes’ worth of nineteenth-century artifacts, all of which were reclaimed from privy holes. “Some would say it is junk, but it tells us about consumerism and tracks the development of an area,” explained Marcia Eymann, manager of the Sacramento Archives & Museum Collection Center.  

In New Zealand, archaeologists digging ahead of road construction uncovered a wooden boat thought to be about 100 years old. “After a few hours it became evident that the framework was not in fact a coffin, but a small wooden dinghy much like a punt,” said archaeologist Amanda Young.  

Archaeologists have uncovered one of the oldest streets in Sydney, Australia, in The Rocks. “Early records indicate that when the First Fleet arrived in 1788, this was the track that they walked up, because it was one of the only places that you could come ashore at Sydney Cove at the time,” said archaeologist Wayne Johnson. The road is thought to have been paved in 1860.  

Students at MIT recreated a balsa-wood raft from drawings and descriptions left by Spanish, Portuguese, and Dutch explorers who saw the rafts used by Andes and Mesoamerican cultures. They tested their craft on the Charles River.  

A National Historic Landmark, the 2,000-year-old Miami Circle is scheduled to reopen to the public in September, but it will remain encased in protective limestone.  

Has someone used a pressure washer to hose down the Great Hunt Panel in Utah’s Nine Mile Canyon? Be sure to watch the video at the head of this article – it will give you a better sense of the canyon’s rock art and the impact industrial equipment has on it.

The latest technology will be used to map the Bronze Age town of Pavlopetri, which now lies underwater off the coast of southern Laconia in Greece. The town’s 3,500-year-old buildings, courtyards, streets, tombs, and artifacts have been damaged by anchors, souvenir-hunting snorkelers, and marine organisms.  

Stone Age people living in what is now South Africa must have experimented with different ingredients to improve the quality of their glue, conclude researchers from the University of Witwatersrand. “Their technology was a lot more competent than we have given them credit for,” said team member Lyn Wadley.   

A bag of 100 silver coins dating to the twelfth century was unearthed in a fourteenth-century grave in southern Sweden.  

Construction workers in Izmir, Turkey, struck a rock and discovered the grave of a king. They promptly called the police.  

In Ephesus, the marble wall-veneers of a room in the palatial house of city consul Gaius Flavius Furius Aptus are slowly being put back together. “What we are going to do here now is an effort to complete a puzzle composed of 120,000 pieces,” said excavator Sabine Ladstatter.  

Construction work at a London train station stopped after workers uncovered human bones. Government officials are concerned that the bones may represent some of the more than 600 people who died from anthrax in 1520, and who were then buried in the area. “We take every precaution,” said Nick Bateman of the Museum of London Archaeology.  

Some 200 sets of human remains have been excavated from the site of Waco’s Texas Ranger Museum and Fort Fisher Park. The National Park Service is asking the city to dedicate the area as a State Archaeological Landmark.  

Aboriginal bones found in the English home of a retired university professor and former Aboriginal Rights Association president will be handed over to two Ngarrindjeri elders today and returned to Australia.   

Here’s more information on the new analysis of Hobbit feet.  

Egypt’s archaeology chief Zahi Hawass has reportedly responded to the claim made by Swiss art historian Henri Stierlin that the famed bust of Nefertiti is a fake.    Here’s some more background information on the Nefertiti controversy from art critic Martin Gayford.