A mass grave containing the remains of 1,800 people killed at the end of World War II has been uncovered in Malbork, Poland, once Marienburg, Germany.  Some had died of gunshot wounds, but many are thought to have died of hunger and cold.

California’s state archaeologist E. Breck Parkman is investigating the Burdell Mansion, also known as “the White House of hippiedom.” The house burned down in 1969. “The ‘60s were a very interesting and tumultuous decade, and in 50 to 100 years it will be a very important decade for historians to talk about and study,” said Parkman.  

High school students on St. Maarten are excavating a twentieth-century bridge that had silted up. “Only a few people even know the bridge structure still exists. We want to measure the bridge dimensions and make artifact collections from the fill sand under the bridge, sealed there from the 1950s,” said archaeologist Jay Haviser.  

Here’s more information on the oldest building in New Zealand, a 700-year-old Maori home that was discovered while bones excavated decades ago were returned to the earth.  

The new study of Nazca trophy heads published in the Journal of Anthropological Archaeology is also still in the news. Analysis of tooth enamel from the heads, and Nazca mummies, has shown that the heads and the mummies came from the same population. “We argue that transforming local Nazca individuals into trophy heads highlights their ritual role,” concluded researchers Ryan Williams of Chicago’s Field Museum of Natural History, and lead author Kelly Knudson of Arizona State University in Tempe.  

Weapons are the subject in this article combining rehashed news on MSNBC, including an anatomy study suggesting that Neanderthals lacked spear-throwing technology; the discovery of the use of bitumen on stone points by Neanderthals; and the earliest use of bows and arrows.

More than 100 pre-Columbian artifacts smuggled out of Panama by an Oregon man were returned yesterday. He had illegally dug up the artifacts while working at a U.S. military base in Panama in the 1980s.

A fourteenth-century oven used to bake animal bones has been uncovered in Spain. The bones were used as an ingredient in the protective coating on the walls surrounding Granada.  

The Archaeology Research Institute of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences released a list of the country’s most important archaeological discoveries of 2008.  

In Iran, archaeologists are studying the water system of the ancient city of Parsa, located near Persepolis.

Here’s another article on the evidence for chemical warfare at Dura-Europos, Syria. An army of the Sasanian Persian empire laid siege to the Roman garrison there in 256 A.D.   

Umberto Broccoli’s plan to bring gladiators back to Rome’s Colosseum is still in the news. Broccoli is head of archaeology for the city of Rome. “Less sacredness and more showmanship,” he explained.