Criticism of the excavation of Egypt’s Sphinx-lined ceremonial route joining the temples of Luxor and Karnak is mounting. Local residents have reportedly been evicted from their homes, and a joint World Heritage Center/ ICOMOS mission found that several historic buildings were demolished and some stone blocks were damaged by heavy machinery in the rush to get the site ready for tourists. 

Anthropologist Kenneth Brown of the University of Houston thinks he and his students have discovered clear links between enslaved African Americans and the beliefs and practices of their diverse African ancestors at the Levi Jordan plantation. “There are over 2,000 cultures in west Africa, not just one,” he explained.  

Human ancestors may have been preyed upon by a newly discovered large crocodile, Crocodylus anthropophagus, or “man-eating crocodile.” Scientists found a partial skeleton and skull of the horned beast at Olduvai Gorge, along with hominid leg and foot bones bearing crocodilian tooth marks.  

This article by science editor Robin McKie for The Guardian introduces “one of the more provocative hypotheses” to explain Homo floresiensis, the tiny hominids from the Indonesian island of Flores.   

Here are a few more photographs of the Bronze Age shipwreck discovered off Britain’s southern coast.  

Small dogs may have first been bred in the Middle East, according to a new genetic study.   

A high school teacher arrested last year in Utah’s federal American Indian artifacts sting is accusing federal agents of misconduct.  

Was Thomas Jefferson the first to build an octagon-shaped house in the United States? Archaeologists have uncovered an octagonal foundation, which may date to the eighteenth century, in South Carolina.

This entry was posted by Jessica E. Saraceni on Wednesday, February 24, 2010. Discussion of this blog entry is now closed.

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