Ramses VI faced a smelly challenge when he became Egypt’s king in 1145 B.C. The new pharaoh’s first job was to rid the land of the stench of fish and…
Category: Anthropology
How ancient, recurring climate changes may have shaped human evolution
Recurring climate changes may have orchestrated where Homo species lived over the last 2 million years and how humankind evolved. Ups and downs in temperature, rainfall and plant growth promoted…
North America’s oldest skull surgery dates to at least 3,000 years ago
A man with a hole in his forehead, who was interred in what’s now northwest Alabama between around 3,000 and 5,000 years ago, represents North America’s oldest known case of…
Social mingling shapes how orangutans issue warning calls
Human language, in its many current forms, may owe an evolutionary debt to our distant ape ancestors who sounded off in groups of scattered individuals. Wild orangutans’ social worlds mold…
One forensic scientist is scraping bones for clues to time of death
In a quiet laboratory beyond the decomposing remains on a body farm in Huntsville, Texas, Noemi Procopio works carefully with her drill. With each cut she makes into human bones,…
Africa’s oldest human DNA helps unveil an ancient population shift
Ancient Africans in search of mates traded long-distance travels for regional connections starting about 20,000 years ago, an analysis of ancient and modern DNA suggests. That shift occurred after treks…
Homo sapiens may have reached Europe 10,000 years earlier than previously thought
Stone Age Homo sapiens began migrating into Europe much longer ago than has typically been assumed. Discoveries at a rock-shelter in southern France put H. sapiens in Europe as early…
Homo sapiens bones in East Africa are at least 36,000 years older than once thought
Fossils from the oldest known Homo sapiens individual in East Africa are more ancient than previously thought. A partial H. sapiens skull and associated skeletal parts found in 1967 in…
‘Origin’ explores the controversial science of the first Americans
OriginJennifer RaffTwelve, $30 Scientific understanding of the peopling of the Americas is as unsettled as the Western Hemisphere once was. Skeletal remains, cultural artifacts such as stone tools and, increasingly,…
Clovis hunters’ reputation as mammoth killers takes a hit
An amateur archaeologist exploring a dried-out, ancient stream channel called Blackwater Draw near Clovis, New Mexico, made a startling discovery in 1929. He came across chiseled stone points strewn among…
