The week in all things ancient

The wrap-up for this week is a little early with Christmas two days away.  The week began with the announcement by Discovery News that the body of a tall, muscular Roman had been discovered in York, England.  In fact, the body was located 12 inches under the grass of the Yorkshire Museum garden.  Very convenient for them and the archaeologists.  York is a very old town, built on what was a very important Roman and then before that druid settlement.  Needless to say, there will be important findings under York for a long, long time to come. This recent discovery appears to be a gladiator, or at least that’s the story The Discovery News is running with, as indicated from 6 stab wounds at the time of death.  There is speculation that where this body was found could be the spot of the Roman Amphitheater, but that is not confirmed yet.  Also, the body was located with bits of pottery of animal bones, which Discovery used as evidence for their statement “The bones of a Roman man, who was stabbed to death and left to rot with the rubbish..”.  Andrew Morrsion, head curator of the Yorkshire Museum, appears to have made some statement affirming this idea, “The physical evidence reveals he was a swordsman and that his body was literally dumped with the rubbish –- there was no hint that he had been buried in a ceremonial way.”  But the context of his statement is unknown.  With what little evidence has been in found in regards to this site, it seems premature to jump to the conclusion that he was just “dumped out with the trash.” It’s a strong statement to make with so little evidence. It would be key to know the relationship of the body to the bits of bone and pottery and surrounding and earlier archaeological layers.  At this time all that can be truly said is that a very large Roman man who trained as a swordsman and may have been a gladiator (though I’m curious to whether a soldier’s body would indicate the same osteoarchaeological evidence), was unearthed surrounded by bits of bone and pottery.  He does not appear to be buried in the traditional Roman manner.

On Tuesday, The New York Times ran the findings by paleoarchaeologists in Spain who discovered the bones of a family of Neanderthals who had been killed and then eaten.  Yes, cannabilism again from the Neanderthals.  DNA evidence indicated that the 12 individuals discovered were related.  Through bone and teeth analysis scientists concluded that there were 3 men, 3 women, 3 teenage boys and 3 children (1 an infant).  The bones contained cut marks similar to those left on bones when cutting meat from the bone.  And the long bones had been snapped out.  From this evidence, scientists concluded that cannabilism by other Neanderthals or Homo Sapiens had occurred.  Whether this is an isolated instance or a common affair back then still remains unknown.  If future archaeologists only uncovered 7 Homo Sapien sapien (us) sites and one was the Donner party, one was a Polynesian island where they shrunk heads and practiced cannabilism and one a French Revolution site, they would probably assume today’s humans were violent, warring, head shrinking cannibals.  It’s always important to remember that with paleoarchaeology, the number of sites found is very small and not be a true representation of what was going on back when early hominids walked the earth.

On Wed 22nd, we got to wish Champollion a very happy birthday. His claim to fame was deciphering the Rosetta Stone and contributing much to the understanding of Ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics.

And that is your week in all things ancient in a nut shell.

~ by Genevieve Hathaway on December 23, 2010.