ARCHAEOLOGY September/October 2020

Beginning when we are very young, and throughout our lives, we ask people to tell us stories. Whether it’s a childhood bedtime tale to help us fall asleep or a scary Halloween ghost story, a passed-down remembrance of distant relatives or the answer to the age-old question “How was your day?” stories give our lives texture and context. It is no different for archaeologists. Sometimes it is the color and contents of the soil that reveal that a fire burned down a settlement, a volcano erupted, or a particular type of crop was grown. Archaeologists also ask artifacts to tell them stories: What does the presence of a particular type of pottery suggest about the people who lived at a site? What does the ability to import luxury goods say…

On October 17, 2020, and throughout the months of October and November, more than 1,000 events are happening across the United States, Canada, and abroad to connect archaeology enthusiasts like you with local histories and past cultures close to where you live. Ten years ago in October, the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA) launched National Archaeology Day, a grassroots partnership celebrating archaeological discoveries. From some 15,000 participants its first year, Archaeology Day has grown to include more than 250,000 people. Over the last decade, it has involved organizations from all 50 states and some 45 countries, and was thus renamed International Archaeology Day (IAD). The AIA’s most popular program, IAD celebrates archaeological research and discoveries by providing a platform for collaborating organizations to promote their programs and activities. Eighty percent of these…

TRAVELING FROM HOME Thank you for a wonderful “published from home” July/August issue. ARCHAEOLOGY is one of the several science-oriented magazines I receive that I sit down to read as soon as it arrives in the mail. The July/August issue is particularly exciting, with the fascinating description of Maya adornment, the Peruvian Painted Temple, and Hagia Sophia. The article on Normandy Beach evokes other, sadder memories. It happens that I have studied and visited all four subject areas. Stay safe and keep up the good work. I have been a subscriber most of my life, many decades. Phyllis Saarinen Newberry, FL D-DAY CONNECTIONS I was surprised and pleased to read “Letter from Normandy: The Legacy of the Longest Day” in the July/August issue. I first heard the story of Billy McGowan from my father, Ronald,…

It’s hard to imagine that a tiny tree ring could help solve one of the medieval world’s most puzzling mysteries. But by applying the familiar technique of radiocarbon dating in a novel way, scholars have been able to answer the confounding question of why no one ever lived in, or even used, a striking complex of buildings at a site in the Tuva Republic called Por-Bajin. Por-Bajin, or “Clay House” in Tuvan, is located on an island more than 4,000 feet above sea level in southern Siberia’s Lake Tere-Khol. Archaeological explorations of the site started in the late nineteenth century and an extensive research project has taken place there since 2007. It was known from the recent excavations that the 700-by-530-foot complex was constructed by a Uighur khan in a short…

Off of Route 41 in Great Barrington, Massachusetts, a trail leads visitors around the childhood home of W.E.B. Du Bois, the African American author, scholar, activist, and cofounder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. Born in Great Barrington on February 23, 1868, Du Bois witnessed and chronicled the journey of African Americans through Reconstruction, Jim Crow, and the early Civil Rights movement. As editor of The Crisis magazine, he penned essays on politics, race and class disparities, pan-African identity, and the injustices of colonialism. Du Bois died on August 27, 1963, on the eve of the March on Washington. Before he became a public intellectual and world traveler, Du Bois grew up on a small rural homestead belonging to his mother’s family, the Burghardts, who had been…

Archaeologists excavating in the Egyptian royal necropolis of Deir el-Bahari, on the west bank of the Nile, believe they have found the long-sought location of the tomb of the early 18th Dynasty pharaoh Thutmose II (r. ca. 1492–1479 B.C.). Near a chapel dedicated to the pharaoh that was part of the temple of his son and successor, Thutmose III (r. ca. 1479–1425 B.C.), the researchers uncovered a range of items that may have been part of a foundation deposit commemorating the tomb’s construction. Beneath some 10 feet of rubble and slate dust, the team, led by Andrzej Niwińskiof the University of Warsaw’s Institute of Archaeology, discovered a stone chest containing the remains of a goose, a goose egg, and an ibis egg—each wrapped separately in linen. They also uncovered a small…