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Smart News / Smart News History & Archaeology

Eight-Year-Old Girl Finds Iron Age Sword in Swedish Lake

She’s no King Arthur, but locals are calling Saga Vanecek the “Queen of Sweden.” To that we say, long live Saga!

New Research

Residue of Opium Poppy Found in Bronze Age Juglet

Whether the opium was consumed or used as oil for perfume or for anointing remains unclear

The contemporary Wolf Hall manor stands on the same property as the lost 16th-century estate

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Unearth Foundations of Wolf Hall, Where Henry VIII Fell for Jane Seymour

The team’s finds include a network of Tudor-era brick sewers, the foundations of two towers and ornate tiles

The institution begins the long road to restoration

Brazil’s National Museum Launches Rebuilding Efforts with Temporary Exhibition of Surviving Collection

Stabilization work must be completed before experts can assess extent of damage to museum’s collection of more than 20 million artifacts

Swedish researchers used phase-contrast imaging to examine the soft tissue of a 2,400-year-old mummified hand

Now We Don’t Have to Unravel Mummies to Study Them at a Cellular Level

Phase-contrast imaging enabled researchers to non-invasively examine a mummified hand’s blood vessels, skin layers and connective tissue

One of the human figures depicted in the newly documented petroglyphs

Cool Finds

An Unknown Ancient Civilization in India Carved This Rock Art

Hikers are cataloging the petroglyphs in the western part of Maharashtra state

Altar Frontal (1741), Isfahan. Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin

Armenia

The Met’s Latest Show Traces Armenia’s Cultural Evolution

Armenia! features more than 140 artifacts, including gilded reliquaries, illuminated manuscripts, textiles

Philip James de Loutherbourg's 19th-century depiction of the Battle of Bosworth Field highlights the chaotic nature of the clash

Local Council Approves Plan to Turn Portion of Battle of Bosworth Site Into Driverless Car Testing Track

The 1485 clash between Richard III and Henry VII precipitated rise of Tudor dynasty

New Research

People Braved Australia’s Western Desert Roughly 45,000 Years Ago

Newly dated artifacts from a rock shelter show humans were in the inhospitable Little Sandy Desert at least 10,000 years earlier than previously thought

Annie Kenney in 1909

Newly Discovered Letter Sheds Light on Overlooked Suffragette

Annie Kenney, who took part in the movement’s first militant act, wrote to her sister after being released from prison

Scientists analyzed 3D scans of entheses, or scars left at points where muscle attaches to bone

Neanderthals Used Their Hands for Precision, Not Just Power

Researchers suggest that the early human ancestors’ hand usage places them in line with tailors, painters rather than brute-force laborers

Two stonecutters at work.

Cool Finds

Ancient Comics Line This Roman-Era Tomb in Jordan

Some of the nearly 260 figures depicted in the paintings are given speech captions reminiscent of modern comics

Smith spotted the elusive creature while searching for rare flowers in the Wondiwoi mountain range

Cool Finds

Elusive Tree Kangaroo Spotted for First Time in 90 Years

An amateur botanist spotted the Wondiwoi tree kangaroo in the remote mountains of West Papua, New Guinea

Michael D’Antuono, "The Talk"

NYC Pop-Up Exhibition Traces Broken Windows Policing’s Toll

The show explores how the policing of minor crimes has caused an uptick in racial profiling, particularly targeting African American and Latino communities

London Stone sat largely unnoticed behind this iron grill for roughly 50 years

London’s Lucky Stone—Referenced by Shakespeare, Blake—Set to Return to Rightful Place

It’s been identified as a remnant of an ancient Roman monument, the altar employed in Druidic human sacrifice, even the stone that yielded Excalibur

The unabashed depiction of violence seen in Caravaggio's "Judith Beheading Holofernes" underscores its creator’s bestial inclinations

Art Meets Science

Caravaggio May Have Died of Infected Sword Wound, Not Syphilis

The Italian Old Master had a notoriously mercurial temperament and was forced to flee Rome in 1606 after killing his rival in a duel

An aerial view of the razed Mackintosh building following the June 2018 fire

Glasgow School of Art Will Be Rebuilt, But Construction Could Last Up to a Decade

In June, an inferno blazed through the Scottish school’s historic Mackintosh Building, which was under renovation following a 2014 fire

Ptil Tekhelet sells tzitzit, or fringes attached to the corners of Jewish prayer shawls, colored with dye from the Murex trunculus snail

Jerusalem Museum Untangles History of the Color Blue, From Biblical Hue to Ancient Royalty

The show inks out the history of the enigmatic sky blue dye known as ‘tekhelet’

This 1860 portrait of Abraham Lincoln, believed to be by John C. Wolfe, depicts the young presidential nominee without his signature beard

More Than 700 Lincoln Collectibles Are Set to Go on Auction

Historian Harold Holzer amassed his extraordinary collection of lithographs, prints and assorted Lincolniana over the course of half a century

Monty, the dog that found the Bronze Age relics, unearthed 13 sickles, two spear points, three axes and several bracelets.

Who’s a Good Archaeologist? Dog Digs Up Trove of Bronze Age Relics

While on a walk outside a small Czech village, Monty the dog and his owner found nearly two dozen 3,000-year-old artifacts

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