Archeology

December 1, 2014

Post-Medieval Poles Used Special Burials to Keep Fellow Villagers From Rising as Vampires

Shawn Hopkins Archeology, Disease, Science, vampires 0

Scientists from the University of South Alabama studied several unique burials from 17 and 18th century Poland, showing that when villagers suspected their deceased neighbors would rise from their grave, they took special precautions when burying them like placing a sickle over their neck. Six bodies buried with sickle neckwear or with large rocks stuffed under their chins were found when a cemetery in Northern Poland was excavated. The researchers wanted to determine if the bodies were local to the area or got the unusual post-mortem suspicion because they were immigrants or outsiders. To to do this they took molars from 60 individuals from the excavated cemetery, including the weird burials, and studied the radiogenic strontium isotope ratios from their dental enamel. Comparing this to the strontium isotopes of local animals showed that most of the “vampires” were in fact probably local Joes. So why the otherworldly suspicion? It probably had more to do with the social identity or manner of death of the suspected bloodsuckers. Specifically, the researchers point

August 5, 2014

The ‘Hobbit Human’ Was Probably Just Someone With Down Syndrome, Scientists Say

Shawn Hopkins Archeology, Hobbit, Human, The Lord of The Rings 0

The late archaeologist Mike Morwood made history in 2003 when he and his team discovered what seemed to be an entirely newly discovered species of extinct human on the island of Flores in Indonesia. The 15,000-year-old 3.5 foot-tall remains were dubbed Homo floresiensis, but quite quickly nicknamed “Hobbit” man, in reference to a movie that was popular at the time. Unfortunately for whimsy, a new study seems to show that Hobbit man was not a new type of human at all, but a human suffering from the effects of the common genetic condition Down Syndrome. The diagnosis rests on skeletal remains of a former Flores dweller now dubbed LB1, the only remains found in Morwood’s excavation of the Ling Bua Cave on Flores to have a complete skull and thighbones. A team of researchers including Robert B. Eckhardt, professor of developmental genetics and evolution at Penn State, Maciej Henneberg, professor of anatomy and pathology at the University of Adelaide, and Kenneth Hsü, a Chinese geologist and paleoclimatologist did an in-depth study of the remains, and