Newsbriefs, September/October 1996 - Archaeology Magazine Archive


Index of Newsbriefs	Volume 49 Number 5, September/October 1996

Click on the title of a newsbrief to see the full text.

Charlesfort Identified	A reexamination of pottery fragments found more than a decade ago at a site on the southern tip of Parris Island, South Carolina, has led to the identification of Charlesfort, an outpost built in 1562 by French Protestants seeking religious freedom.
Wind-Powered Furnaces	As early as the seventh century A.D. Sri Lankans made steel in furnaces powered by monsoon winds, a previously unknown ancient technology.
Maya King Unearthed	The tomb of a fifth-century A.D. Maya king has been found at La Milpa in northwestern Belize.
Neandertal News	Identification of a 34,000-year-old Neandertal temporal bone found at Arcy-sur- Cure, France, is providing new insight into the relationship between the last Neandertals and contemporary Homo sapiens. Also, a discovery by François Rouzaud of the French archaeological service suggests Neandertals were more sophisticated in their use of fire than previously believed.
Rare Buddhist Writings	A collection of 13 birch-bark scrolls found in pottery jars from the ancient Buddhist kingdom of Gandhara in northern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan are thought to be the oldest manuscripts with Buddhist writings ever discovered.
Israel's Reburial Debate	Archaeologists and ultraorthodox Jewish groups are expected to vie for seats on a committee that will review the excavation of some sites in Israel where human remains are found.
World's Earliest Wine	Residue on a potsherd dating to the time of the first permanent settlements in the Middle East suggests that wine-making began ca. 5,100 B.C., 2,000 years earlier than previously thought.
Getty Gets Fleischman Collection	The Getty Museum is acquiring the $80 million classical antiquities collection of Barbara and Lawrence Fleischman of New York.
Pottery Bonanza	Egyptian, Persian, and Greco-Roman pottery has been found in a workshop at the site of Athribis, modern Benha, 50 miles north of Cairo.
Jewelry Repatriated	Precolumbian gold and turquoise jewelry once for sale at Sotheby's has been returned to Peru by U.S. Customs Service agents.
Oldest North American Mummy	A mummy excavated in 1940 and stored at the Nevada State Museum in Carson City was recently dated to ca. 7420 B.C., making it the oldest mummy ever discovered in North America.
Celtic Masterpiece	A 2,500-year-old life-size statue of a Celtic aristocrat, found this past summer near Frankfurt, Germany, is being hailed as one of Europe's most important archaeological discoveries in recent decades.
The Mummies' Threads	Study of garments worn by 3,000-year-old mummies excavated in western China's Tarim Basin (see ARCHAEOLOGY, March/April 1995) has yielded the world's oldest cashmere threads.
Field Notes	Tut Ale; Park Service Inventory; Middle-Aged Ice Man; Manuscript Repatriated; Raising the Resurgam; Indian Mound Excavation