In the earliest period of international trade in the Mediterranean region, the island of Cyprus was a surprisingly busy trading hub. Its exalted status during the Late Bronze Age (1,500 to 1,150 BC)...
Archaeologists have uncovered rare, printed fabrics dating back around 1,300 years. While the fabrics had originated in the East, they were found in an Israeli dump! It is the first evidence of a...
In a fascinating new study has found that dozens of silver pieces found during excavations in Israel and the Gaza Strip were actually used as currency in ancient times. Since the silver pieces were...
Queen Elizabeth I of England was particularly fond of sugar. This was a time of great conquests and explorations to the New World for the royal houses of Europe, accompanied by expanding trade and...
After a handheld laser “melted” into a collection of ancient gold jewelry a team of scientists discovered microbic evidence of an early Bronze Age trade route extending from Anatolia as far as the...
Some 2,000 years after the Romans established their extensive road network, regions lying along it remain the most affluent, a recent study has found. The Roman road network links contributed to...
Several important archaeological discoveries that shed light on ancient trade settlements in the Oman region have been unearthed by nearly a decade of excavations at a site from the early Bronze Age...
In the recent past, a gem that is thought to be more precious than even gold, the elusive lapis lazuli , has received a bad reputation for being a source of illegal mining by the Taliban in...
Before coinage became common, people in medieval England would pay their rent using an array of everyday items. Amongst these was the remarkably unattractive, and underappreciated, wormlike eel! Few...
Obsidian mines mined by the pre-Hispanic Mesoamerican tribes of Central Mexico, located just 31 miles (49.88 kilometers) northeast of the ancient city of Teotihuacan, were discovered by...
The Silk Road created a convergence of cultures like no other. The route is deemed influential by historians because of the contributions it made to trade and the economy, as well as society in...
An archaeological investigation of maritime remains connected to the Viking Age town of Birka in Sweden carried out since August 2020 has revealed a “first of its kind” Viking shipyard. Birka, also...
Berenice Troglodytica, also known as Baranis, was a fledgling port city on the Red Sea in ancient Egypt. The remains of seven “huddled” skeletons in a tomb complex have been discovered at Berenice...
During the First Crusade, the city state of Pisa, like many other European powers, was moved by the pleas of Pope Urban II, who in 1095 ordered the Christian kingdoms of Europe to launch a holy...
More than 2,100 years ago, Australia’s Aboriginal Mithaka people were likely domesticating plants and quarrying stones on an industrial scale to make seed-grinding implements. The Mithaka stone...
With the accelerated pace of climate change and global warming wreaking havoc on the ice sheets of the world, particularly Greenland, new evidence emerges from the ice-capped country. Greenland was a...