2021 Annual Symposium of the Ontario Archaeological Society 
October 20-24, 2021 
Call for Session and Workshop Proposals Information

Les activités de fouilles archéologiques de retour au parc national de Plaisance

L’équipe du parc national de Plaisance, en collaboration avec le  Ministère de la Culture et des Communications, invite la population à participer à de véritables fouilles archéologiques qui auront lieu sur le territoire du parc.
Le site expose les vestiges d’une habitation de la seigneurie de la Petite-Nation datant du début du 19e siècle et possiblement l’emplacement d’un poste de traite datant de la première moitié du 18e siècle. Une expérience unique à vivre dans la région!

Quand : du 7 août au 1er septembre 2013 (les activités se dérouleront du mercredi au dimanche).

Durée : l’activité de fouille encadrée par des archéologues dure 3 heures. Nous formons des groupes de 12 personnes maximum. Horaire des groupes : 9 h à 12 h et 13 h à 16 h.

Pour qui : l’âge minimal est de 12 ans. Jusqu’à 16 ans, le jeune doit être accompagné d’un adulte.

Coût : gratuit (autorisation d’accès au parc nécessaire).

Les places sont limitées. Pour participer, vous devez réserver au 819 775-3529.

Follow me also on Twitter : http://twitter.com/archaeolog

Large petroglyph in Stanley Park, Vancouver, Canada

A little digging around suggests this boulder was discovered in 1923 in the Lone Cabin Creek area of the middle Fraser River, just south of the Gang Ranch. It was moved to Stanley Park in 1926.

Ivory Venus Figurine From The Swabian Jura Rewrites Prehistory

ScienceDaily (May 14, 2009) — The 2008 excavations at Hohle Fels Cave in the Swabian Jura of southwestern Germany recovered a female figurine carved from mammoth ivory from the basal Aurignacian deposit.


This figurine, which is the earliest depiction of a human, and one of the oldest known examples of figurative art worldwide, was made at least 35,000 years ago. This discovery radically changes our views of the context and meaning of the earliest Paleolithic art.

For more information

Just in time for the shopping season

A store that operated in the 1800s has been unearthed at what is now Boyds Corner northeast of Middletown. According to transportation department officials, store owner John Boyd, who emigrated from Ireland to Delaware in 1791, bought the site from his father-in-law, Thomas Read, in 1812.



The officials are not sure when he built and began operating the store, but an 1849 map identifies his shop at that location.


In addition to the child's marble, items that workers have uncovered include a suspender buckle, gun flints, a wrought-iron nail, a sleigh bell, shards from a stoneware milk pan, broken pieces of ceramic pottery and a kettle hook.

Prehistoric human skull found at Isle of Man Airport

A PREHISTORIC human skull dating back 5,000 years together with remains relating to a Neolithic house have been discovered during works on the runway extension project at Ronaldsway. Experts from Oxford Archaeology called in to carry out the excavation have described the finds as being of 'national and possibly European significance'.


More of this -

Ancient Fort Opens New Chapter In First Nations' History

A fortified village that pre-dates European arrival in Western Canada and is the only one of its kind discovered on the Canadian plains is yielding intriguing evidence of an unknown First Nations group settling on the prairies and is rekindling new ties between the Siksika Nation (Blackfoot) and aboriginal groups in the United States.

More of this -

Ancient open-air theatres across Greece are crumbling due to neglect

Ancient open-air theatres across Greece are crumbling due to neglect and need swift government intervention to rescue them.



Greece, where Classical drama was born in the 5th century BC, boasts scores of theatres that form a key part of the country's classical cultural heritage. But while about 30 are in a state to host cultural events, 76 are in need of urgent repair.

The 6th century BC Dionysus theatre

Ancient reptile rises from Alberta oil sands

The fossil was discovered by machine operators Greg Fisher and Lorne Cundal in 1994 during routine mining operations at Syncrude’s Base Mine, about 35 kilometres north of Fort McMurray near the Athabasca River. Amazingly, the specimen was serendipitously exposed by one of Syncrude’s 100-ton electric shovels approximately 60 metres below ground surface. It is complete except for its left forelimb and shoulder blade. It was transported to the Royal Tyrrell Museum, where it was prepared for research observations and exhibit and studied by Druckenmiller and Russell.


Nichollsia borealis is one of the most complete and best preserved North American plesiosaurs from the Cretaceous Period and lived approximately 112-million years ago. Although not classified as dinosaurs, plesiosaurs lived in the seas at the same time that dinosaurs roamed the land throughout the Jurassic and Cretaceous Periods (205 million – 65 million years ago). They were a diverse group of carnivorous aquatic reptiles that reached lengths of over 12 metres. Fossil remains of dozens of plesiosaurs have been recovered around the world since the early 1800s and are among the first fossil vertebrates to be scientifically described. Nichollsia is also very significant because it fills a 40-million-year gap in the plesiosaur fossil record and greatly increases the understanding of the ancient seaway that once split North America in two and whose shores abounded with dinosaurs.


Nichollsia borealis is currently on display in the Discoveries Gallery at the Royal Tyrrell Museum

Paharpur site temple

Archaeologists have found another ancient brick-built structure with floor and artefacts under the basement of the main temple at world heritage site Paharpur.
The structure was found in the northeast corner of more than 1,200 years old main temple "Somapura Maha Vihara", which is locally known as Paharpur Monastery.



More infos. news

It's not often I link music, but this one is Great !

Caribou by British Sea Power

Archeolog

Neanderthal conjunctions

This morning's story is from a Canadian. Evidence from studies of deep-sea sediments indicate that temperatures in Europe dropped by nearly 15 degrees Fahrenheit during the period when Neanderthals were flourishing. Eugene Morin of Trent University in Peterborough, Canada, studied the effects of this temperature decline by examining bones and other artifacts from a Neanderthal site at Saint-Cesaire in southwestern France. As temperatures declined, the proportion of reindeer in their diet increased to 87% from 35%. But reliance on reindeer is risky because their populations fluctuate widely. A decline in their numbers would lead to famine and population decline, according to Morin.

Can we get the two researchers together? Possibly the combination of a drop in temperature, a drop in food supply and lack of implements to make warmer clothes are persuasive reasons for the demise of the Neanderthals. Or there is other evidences for the disappearance of Neandertals ?

Marvel at winter solstice sunrise in Newgrange

Eventually, Brú na Bóinne (usually referred to as "the Bend of the Boyne") became an archaeological park, then a Unesco World Heritage Site in 1995. The visitor centre, a symphony of spirals and mounds in wood, glass, stone and concrete, opened 10 years ago on the south side of the river.

Newgrange

A small suspension bridge was thrown across the muscular brown waters, where those who originally settled Newgrange some 5,000 years ago would have speared salmon, and a minibus terminus built, from which visitors are ferried to the tomb or its larger sister at Knowth. In the year 2000, a lottery system was introduced for solstice places; this year, there were 28,000 applications.

More of this: Newgrange, Meath, IE

Layers of mystery -
Archaeologists look to the earth for Minoan fate

SHREWSBURY— They created extraordinary artifacts for hundreds of years, revealing an aesthetic sensibility that influences Western civilization to this day. Then they simply disappeared.

Scholars are seeking answers to one of the great mysteries of the ancient world: What happened to the Minoans of Crete, who controlled a thriving Mediterranean trade network from around 2,200-1,450 BC?




By Judy Powell Correspondent

Post-dig pace to quicken

The National Constitution Center and Independence National Historical Park are close to a new agreement to complete the archaeological work precipitated by excavation on the center's building site more than six years ago.

Widely viewed as the most significant dig in Philadelphia's history, excavation of the center's Independence Mall site in 2000 and 2001 yielded a million artifacts and exposed a largely pristine pre-19th-century neighborhood, including an unusual concentration of households composed of free black families.


Artifacts, like this earthenware, uncovered at the Constitution Center site, is processed at a public archaeology lab.

More on this at:
The National Constitution Center and Independence National Historical Park

Fossils in Kenya Challenge Linear Evolution

Two fossils found in Kenya have shaken the human family tree, possibly rearranging major branches thought to be in a straight ancestral line to Homo sapiens.
Skull

In their report, Dr. Spoor and his colleagues wrote, “With the discovery of the new, well dated specimens, H. habilis and H. erectus can now be shown to have co-occurred in eastern Africa for nearly half a million years.” The fact that the two hominid species lived together in the same lake basin for so long and remained separate species, Meave Leakey said in a statement from Nairobi, “suggests that they had their own ecological niche, thus avoiding direct competition.”

Date Line of Evolution

More on this at:
Fossils in Kenya Challenge Linear Evolution


By JOHN NOBLE WILFORD
Published: August 9, 2007

News is coming up, Very busy times !

Ekain Caves in Zestoa Gipuzkoa, Basque country

ZESTOA –Gipuzkoa: Ekain caves’ replica will have more than 80,000 visits per year A French company is building a replica that will be placed next to the original at the end of year 2006.



Link: Ekain Caves in Zestoa Gipuzkoa

While the men were out hunting, Stone Age women created a future

By Scott LaFee

For generations, archaeologists believed that Stone Age gender roles split neatly in two, like a well-struck piece of flint:



Paleolithic males were hunters of woolly mammoths and other daunting prey. Females stayed behind. They cared for the kids, or maybe gathered seeds and berries.

The image was widely disseminated and quickly popularized in movies, cartoons and museum dioramas. It was also based, contends James M. Adovasio, director of the Mercyhurst Archaeological Institute in Pennsylvania, upon wrongheaded interpretations of scant evidence and some dubious assumptions.

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