Ancient mystery code was probably Sargon II’s name
King Sargon II was a big fan of seeing his name around town—at least, that’s what one expert believes after...
archaeology
Ancient, mysterious 12-sided object still baffles archeologists
With a hollow center, 12 sides, and no known uses, Roman dodecahedrons remain one of the great enigmas in archeology....
Plants detected in ancient Mayan ‘ballcourts’ point to a sacred spot
Archeologists have found evidence that ancient Mayans may have made ceremonial offerings during the construction of the ballcourts they used...
A ‘bionic eye’ scan of an ancient, scorched scroll points to Plato’s long-lost gravesite
A research team’s “bionic eye” deciphered thousands of new words hidden within an ancient scroll carbonized during the eruption of...
Read the last letters by George Mallory, who died exploring Mt. Everest in 1924
Letters written by famous British mountaineer and Mount Everest explorer George Mallory are now digitized and freely available to the...
Enormous snake in ancient India was longer than a school bus
Another day in science, another massive, ancient snake discovery. Paleontologists in India have unearthed fossilized vertebrae from a snake that...
Lasers provide clues to an early medieval money mystery
Human-made currency such as coins and paper bills have certainly evolved over time. Small pieces of precious metals or paper...
Why chickens probably crossed the Silk Road
The mystery of what came first, the chicken or the egg has generally been solved–it was the egg. However, some...
Scientists recreate the face of an ancient Chinese emperor
A team in China used ancient DNA to reconstruct the face of an emperor who reigned 1,500 years ago. Emperor...
Bronze Age village was ‘pretty cozy’—until Britain’s Pompeii
It was once a small and seemingly cozy late Bronze Age village. A settlement of five circular dwellings was built...
Ancient Greece’s biggest port is older than we thought
This article was originally featured on Hakai Magazine, an online publication about science and society in coastal ecosystems. Read more stories like...
The mysterious ‘star dune’ in the Sahara is on the move
The desert’s enormous star dunes are mysterious structures. These sand dunes are found in some of Earth’s largest modern deserts,...
