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Cool Finds

The tomb's walls are painted and carved with images of objects the doctor might have used.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Discover Intricately Decorated Tomb Belonging to a Doctor Who Treated Egyptian Pharaohs 4,100 Years Ago

The chamber holds a stone coffin engraved with the physician’s name and titles, which include “director of medicinal plants” and “chief dentist”

The coffin was found in a small Roman cemetery.

Cool Finds

Construction Workers Discover Ancient Stone Coffin Filled With Plaster While Expanding Highway in England

The intricately crafted coffin dates back more than 1,500 years. Researchers say it weighs around 1,650 pounds, “comparable to an adult male polar bear”

Paleontologists and volunteers excavate dinosaur trackways in Oxfordshire, England, uncovering the biggest find of its kind in the United Kingdom.

A Quarry Worker Felt Strange Bumps While Digging. They Turned Out to Be the Largest Dinosaur Trackway in the U.K.

The five sets of tracks represent four-legged sauropods and a three-toed carnivore that might have crossed paths on a prehistoric landscape

Experts are currently examining the sword in a lab.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Unearth Early Medieval Sword Engraved With Mysterious Runes in a Cemetery in England

Dating to the fifth and sixth centuries C.E., the burials held a trove of grave goods—but the team was particularly impressed by the sword, which was covered in intricate decorations

This gold ring features an engraving of Venus Victrix, or Venus the Victorious, a Romanized aspect of the goddess associated with imperial power and romantic conquests alike.

Cool Finds

Exceptionally Well-Preserved Gold Ring Featuring ‘Venus the Victorious’ Unearthed on Ancient Road in France

In addition to the 1,800-year-old piece of engraved jewelry, archaeologists discovered a trove of Carolingian coins, medieval pottery and more

The terra-cotta warriors were constructed in the third century B.C.E.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists Discover Rare Clay Commander Among Thousands of Life-Size Terra-Cotta Soldiers in China

The 2,000-year-old military general figurine is the tenth of its kind to be excavated from the emperor Qin Shi Huang’s tomb, which may hold up to 8,000 clay statues

Camille Claudel's famous bronze sculpture The Age of Maturity depicts a young women being left behind by her lover, who walks ahead with an older woman.

Cool Finds

Stunning Sculpture by Camille Claudel Rediscovered in an Abandoned Parisian Apartment

Titled “The Age of Maturity,” the artwork may reflect the sculptor’s turbulent relationship with Auguste Rodin, her mentor and lover

Fascinating finds unveiled in 2024 ranged from a jade Maya funerary mask to a Roman dodecahedron.

Cool Finds

Seventy-Seven Fascinating Finds Revealed in 2024, From a Mysterious ‘Anomaly’ Near the Great Pyramid of Giza to a Missing Portrait of Henry VIII

The year’s most exciting discoveries included musket balls fired in the early days of the American Revolution, a lost composition by Mozart and a medieval chess piece

The bone and tile floor was found in a building in Alkmaar's historic center.

Cool Finds

Archaeologists in the Netherlands Just Uncovered a Centuries-Old Floor Made of Cow Bones

Found beneath a building in the town of Alkmaar, the animal bones had been used to fill in gaps between crumbling pieces of tile

A recently excavated mastodon tooth found in a backyard, still embedded in the jaw

Cool Finds

A Homeowner Found Huge, Fossil Teeth While Mowing the Lawn. Then, Excavations Revealed a Complete Mastodon Jaw

The new discovery is the first of its kind in New York state for at least 11 years and appeared in a county rich with mastodon remains

The carved boulder, which weighs about 60 pounds and measures less than a foot across, “may have represented a totem or a mythological or spiritual figure,” says archaeologist Omry Barzilai.

Cool Finds

A Mysterious Boulder Carved to Look Like a Tortoise Shell May Offer Evidence of the Middle East’s Earliest Ritual Ceremonies

The 35,000-year-old rock was found in Manot Cave, which was inhabited by both prehistoric humans and Neanderthals

Our most-read stories of the year featured photographer Vivian Maier, underwater caves in the Yucatán Peninsula, auroras and more.

Ten Top Smithsonian Stories of 2024, From a Mysterious Underground Chamber to Dazzling Auroras

The magazine’s most-read articles of the year included a close-up look at the adorable yet venomous pygmy slow loris, a profile of a little-known 20th-century street photographer and a majestic journey with divers into Mexico’s underwater caves

Last week, scientists conducted the first-ever dissection of a spade-toothed whale, the rarest whale species on Earth.

Scientists Just Dissected the World’s Rarest Whale in New Zealand. Here’s What They Found

Only seven spade-toothed whales have ever been identified, and the species has never been seen alive. After one washed ashore last summer, researchers have made new discoveries—including that the animal had nine stomach chambers and vestigial teeth

Charles de Gaulle talking to reporters in 1945

Cool Finds

A Forgotten Collection of Charles de Gaulle’s Personal Letters, Speeches and Manuscripts Has Been Discovered in a Safe

Most of the documents are heading to the auction block, where they could fetch more than $1 million. They were found in a bank vault owned by the French statesman’s son

Artist Jean Charles Blais and his contractor discovered the engraving behind a layer of plaster on his studio wall.

Cool Finds

An Artist Noticed a Leak in His Studio. The Repairs Revealed a Mysterious Ancient Engraving Hidden Inside the Walls

Jean Charles Blais had no idea that his studio in southern France was hiding a Roman funerary inscription dating to the first or second century C.E.

Micro-CT scans of the bone needles and the other examples of bone they were compared against

New Research

These Delicate Needles Made From Animal Bones May Have Helped Prehistoric Humans Sew Warm Winter Clothing

Researchers have discovered 32 needle fragments made from the bones of smaller animals. The tiny tools may have been used to sew insulated garments during the last ice age

While roughly three dozen of the stolen coins have been recovered, 13 are still at large.

A Trove of Gold Coins Stolen From 300-Year-Old Florida Shipwrecks Has Been Recovered by Investigators

Contracted divers found 101 gold coins from the wreckage of a Spanish fleet in 2015, but they only reported 51 to authorities. Now, 37 of the stolen coins have been found

The hand ax, seen here beside a 20-pence coin, is between 40,000 and 60,000 years old.

Cool Finds

A Little Boy Found a Strange Stone on the Beach. Archaeologists Told Him It Was a Neanderthal’s Hand Ax

The artifact is now on display at a museum in southern England. Experts say the find is “so rare that most qualified archaeologists would never find one themselves”

The temple's north tower, which holds a newly discovered chamber

Cool Finds

Hidden Entrance to a Mysterious Ancient Temple Found Tucked Away in an Egyptian Cliff Face

Researchers have been carefully excavating the artifacts and decorative reliefs found at the 2,100-year-old site in the ancient city of Athribis

Thessaloniki's Venizelou subway station contains the ruins of a Roman-era thoroughfare.

Cool Finds

A New Subway System in Greece Is Decorated With the Artifacts Unearthed During Its Construction

An ancient marble thoroughfare and shards of classical pottery are on display in the city of Thessaloniki’s new underground “archaeo-stations”

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