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Representational image of an ancient octopus. Source: Ariestia / Adobe Stock

Before the Era of Dinosaurs, There Was a Ten-Legged Octopus

Locked away in a drawer in a museum in Canada, scientists rediscovered a fossil that rewrote the paleontological history of the octopus, revealing its earliest known ancestor. To their surprise, not...
Denisovan fossil, discovered in Laos' Annamite Mountains, redefines their story.  Source: ginettigino / Adobe Stock

Unexpected Denisovan Fossil Location Reveals More (Video)

In a surprising turn of events, Denisovan fossils have emerged in an unexpected location, challenging established notions of their habitat. Archaeologists recently uncovered a 160,000 to 130,000-year...
The fossil fragments in a carbon fiber tube with Professor Lee Berger, Timothy Nash and Mathew Berger.	Source: University of the Witwatersrand

Fossils from Two Ancient Human Ancestors Complete Trip into Space

When Virgin Galactic’s private spaceship, the VSS Unity, was launched into orbit on September 8, it was carrying a most unique cargo. These were two fossilized bones that belonged to two different...
Until they discovered the true location of its tooth-swirl, there were several theories for how Helicoprion once looked. An outdated Helicoprion reconstruction. (public signage, Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, Illinois, USA). James St. John / CC by SA 2.0.

Ancient Sea-Creature Helicoprion Had Terrifying Chainsaw-Like Teeth

Had you lived 270 million years ago, you may have thought twice before taking a dip in the ocean. For one of the most terrifying prehistoric monsters from the underwater world was the owner of a set...
Diver in a cenote in Mexico. Public Domain.

13,700-Year-Old Skeleton in Mexican Cenote Reveals Human Origins (Video)

Deep within Mexico's subterranean realm lies a site of immense archaeological significance. Recent discoveries have reshaped our understanding of the earliest human presence in the Americas,...
Researchers and volunteers with the Florida Museum of Natural History have discovered the ancient remains of several gomphotheres (elephant ancestors) at a fossil site in North Florida. Source: Kristen Grace/Florida Museum

Paleontologists Uncover 6-Million-Year-Old Elephant Graveyard in Florida

While digging along a dried-up riverbed in northern Florida, a team of paleontologists and volunteers from the Florida Museum of Natural History unearthed a collection of bones from an elephant...
Cenote used by the Mayans for offerings (representational). Source: 2ragon / Adobe Stock.

Fossils and Artifacts Found in Belize's Sacred Mayan Pools (Video)

In a recent discovery, a team of researchers has uncovered what appears to be an underwater portal to the Maya underworld . The team had set out to explore the sacred pools of the ancient Maya,...
A reconstruction of Lucy, an Australopithecus afarensis. Source: procy_ab / Adobe Stock.

The Life and Death of ‘Lucy’ on The Prehistoric Savanna (Video)

Imagine a world vastly different from ours, teeming with creatures long extinct, and ancient human ancestors struggling to survive against all odds. That was the African savanna roughly 3.5 million...
The 30,000-year-old ball of preserved fur and bones that has been found to be an Ice Age squirrel. Source: Yukon Beringia Interpretive Centre

Fossilized Fur Ball Turns out to be Frozen Ice Age Squirrel!

In 2018, miners working in northern Canada discovered a small, tannish-brown, grapefruit-sized lump. This mass of claws and limbs appeared to be made of fossilized fur upon examination with the naked...
Representational image of a curious dinosaur. With such curious resident dinosaurs, why don’t we know more about the long-lost continent of Appalachia? Source: simon / Adobe Stock

Long-Lost Appalachia Was Filled with Dinosaurs You’ve Never Heard Of

Believe it or not, but once upon a time, in the area we now know as North America, there existed a forgotten continent which was inhabited by a cast of peculiar dinosaurs you’ve probably never heard...
A replica of the Peking Man skull, because all the originals vanished, from the Peking Man Site, on display at the Paleozoological Museum of China. Source: Yan Li / CC BY-SA 3.0

The Tragic Story of the Peking Man Site at Zhoukoudian

Nothing sparks the human imagination quite like the question, what came before? Philosophers, theologians, and countless religions have spent millennia pontificating on what came before humanity as...
Frog brooch of amber and bronze on a rock, representative of living fossils.	Source: ISliM / Adobe Stock

Mysterious Cases of Living Fossils, Suspended Animation, and Hibernation

We all know that fossils, by their very nature, are dead. Of course, nothing can survive the conditions of pressure, depth and time required to petrify wood, see saplings mature into massive trees,...
Using the latest technology, the researchers were able to examine the Gogo fish fossil (show here) and identify its 380-million-year-old, 3D preserved fossilized heart. (Yasmine Phillips, Curtin University / Western Australia Museum)

Oldest Fossilized Heart Ever Found is 380 Million Years Old

"A mind-boggling, jaw-dropping” 380-million-year-old fossilized heart has been discovered in Western Australia, preserved inside a now extinct prehistoric fish known as the Gogo. The Gogo Station...
The largest ever dinosaur fossil in Europe, from a huge sauropod dinosaur, during excavations. Image: Photo courtesy of Instituto Dom Luiz / Faculty of Sciences of the University of Lisbon.

Largest Ever Dinosaur Fossil Emerges from Portuguese Jurassic Backyard

The skeleton of a ginormous 82-foot (25-meter) long late-Jurassic dinosaur skeleton was found in central Portugal, which was accidentally unearthed in a man’s backyard in the city of Pombal back in...
Fossilized bones of the largest pterosaur or flying reptile ever found in South America, about the size of a yellow school bus, have been found in the western mountains of Argentina.		Source: warpaintcobra / Abobe Stock

Argentina’s ‘Dragon of Death:’ South America’s Largest Pterosaur!

A team of paleontologists have discovered the fossilized remains of a new species of airborne reptile in the Andes Mountains of western Argentina. Dubbed the “Dragon of Death” by its discoverers,...
Representational image of an Egyptian Cobra.	 Source: Ghorayr / CC BY-SA 4.0

Oldest Fossils of Egyptian Cobra Ancestors Found in Fayoum Depression

A team from Mansoura University Vertebrate Paleontology Center (MUVP) has found the oldest fossils of Egyptian cobra ancestors dating back 37 million years to the Eocene Epoch. The team, which...
The Cradle of Humankind visitors’ complex in Maropeng, South Africa.	Source: Olga Ernst / CC BY-SA 4.0

Denizens of South Africa’s Cradle of Humankind: The First Walking Apes

The human story begins in Africa. Of the many fascinating fossil sites in Africa, an important one is the Cradle of Humankind outside of Johannesburg, South Africa. The many caves and rock outcrops...
Blaine Maley, from the Idaho College of Osteopathic Medicine, works alongside Prabhat, Fannin, and Montgomery Fellow Charles Musiba at site A in Laetoli where the archaic footprints were found. 	Source: Shirley Rubin / Trustees of Dartmouth College

Ancient ‘Bear’ Footprints in Laetoli Tanzania Belonged to Human Ancestor

While exploring the Laetoli fossil site in the foothills of northern Tanzania in 1978, a team of anthropologists led by the renowned Mary Leakey discovered the oldest footprints of a human ancestor...
Denisovan fossils look a bit unremarkable, but these bone fragments, mostly from animals, were perfect for Zooarchaeology by Mass Spectroscopy and DNA analysis, which were used in the recent study.		Source: Samantha Brown / Nature Ecology & Evolution

New Denisovan Fossils From Siberian Cave Are The Oldest Ever Found

Researchers from the Max Planck Society and the Universities of Vienna and Tübingen have found new fossilized human-like remains mixed in an assortment of bone samples taken from Siberia’s famed...
The Anubis four-legged whale as depicted by palaeontologist Robert W. Boessenecker, a professor at the College of Charleston, Charleston, South Carolina, USA.		Source: Robert W. Boessenecker / College of Charleston

Four-Legged Whale Found in Egypt Named after Egyptian God Anubis

Egyptian paleontologists have identified a new four-legged whale species that walked on land more than 43 million years ago. The fossilized partial skeleton of this exotic creature was discovered in...
A flock of adult and hatchling flamingo-like pterosaurs, known as Pterodaustro guinazui, take flight in early Cretaceous-period Argentina.            Source: Dr Mark Witton / Nature

Pterosaurs, the First Flying Dinos, Could Fly as Babies, Says Research

A new study published in the journal Scientific Reports has revealed that baby pterosaurs could most likely fly almost as soon as they hatched from their eggs. Pterosaurs were flying reptiles that...
Study analyzed genus Homo fossils, some of which are shown in this image. Source: Dr. Manuel Will / Nature

New Findings On How Climate Affected Body and Brain Size in Genus Homo

A new study of fossils from the genus Homo from all over the world has concluded that human body size is linked to differences in climate and temperature. In essence they have found that cold...
An artist's (Dimtry Bogdanov) depiction of a dead Hadrosaur claosaurus dinosaur floating in the Western Interior Sea of Kansas during the Cretaceous period with two Squalicorax sharks circling around it. The shark teeth found in the City of David (Jerusalem) and also in other Middle Eastern deserts, like those in Morocco, were from this very species!

80-Million-Year-Old Shark Teeth Found in the City Of David, Israel

A stash of 29 “out of place” 80-million-year-old shark teeth have been discovered at a 2,900-year-old site in the City of David neighborhood in Jerusalem, Israel. The find has challenged scientists...
Dinosaur in Mexico: New “Talking” Species Used Low Frequency Sounds

Dinosaur in Mexico: New “Talking” Species Used Low Frequency Sounds

The National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH), Mexico, a part of the Ministry of Culture, along with the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), launched a project in 2013, to “...

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