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A 2500 year old Persian treasure dubbed the world's 'first bill of human rights' has been branded a piece of shameless 'propaganda' by German historians. The Cyrus cylinder, which is held by the British Museum, is a legacy of Cyrus the Great - the Persian emperor famed for freeing the Jews of ancient Babylon after conquering the city in 539 BC. A copy of the cylinder, which is covered in cuneiform script supposed to detail the ancient charter of rights, also hangs next to the Security Council Chamber in the United Nations headquarters in New York, where it is held...

Jordan handed over nearly 2,500 stolen ancient artifacts to Iraq in a ceremony in Amman on Sunday. The repatriation is latest step in recovering about 15,000 priceless artifacts that were smuggled out of the country by looters during the chaos following the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and have been turning up at art auctions around the world. Many were taken from the national museum in Baghdad, and thousands more were looted from archeolgoical sites. At the ceremony, Maha Khatib, Jordan's minister of tourism, presented the pieces to her Iraqi counterpart, Mohammed Abbas Oreibi. Oreibi told reporters that the...

Ancient stone tools discovered in South Carolina Finds at Savannah River site could rewrite America's history By LIZ MITCHELL McClatchy NewspapersPublished on: 06/17/08 HILTON HEAD, S.C. — A local man has unearthed two ancient stone tools in an archaeological dig in Allendale County, S.C., a rare find that could provide more information about how early Americans lived. And if more evidence proves the artifact is a new type of tool and one archaeologists haven't found before, it could be named after Matthew Carey of Hilton Head Island. The 22-year-old University of South Carolina anthropology major volunteered at the Topper Site...

Historic ‘name trees’ bore thousands of carvingsThe names “Thomas and Dorothy” were carved in the bark of one trunk. Another said “Bob and Carma”. Other trees were marked with soldiers’ home states - Iowa, Maine or Alabama - and several bore hearts and the names or initials of a wife or girlfriend. The beech trees of Saint Pierre de Varengeville-Duclair forest bore a poignant testimony to the D-Day landings for more than six decades. Thousands of American soldiers stationed there after the liberation of Normandy spent their spare hours with a knife or bayonet creating a lasting reminder of their...

Tse-whit-zen artifacts languish in storage By Jonathan MartinSeattle Times staff reporter An arrowhead created by a Lower Elwha Klallam tribal member. One of the Pacific Northwest's most astonishing archaeological finds in a generation has languished for more than a year, lingering on metal shelves in a Seattle warehouse, unseen by the public and unexamined by scientists. No one questions the discoveries — artifacts from a 2,700-year-old Native American village excavated from the Port Angeles waterfront amid great public interest — should be exhibited, analyzed and celebrated. But the 900 boxes of artifacts — such things as spindle whorls carved from...

BAGHDAD - The Iraqi National Museum is welcoming home 701 artifacts stolen during the looting after Saddam Hussein's ouster in 2003. Syrian authorities turned over items ranging from golden necklaces to clay pots that were seized by traffickers in the neighboring country. The antiquities were displayed in a ceremony Sunday at the Baghdad museum. Iraqi officials say Syria is the first country to hand over a large quantity of stolen antiquities. They hope others will follow its lead as Iraq struggles to restore its rich cultural heritage after five years of war. Museums were pillaged of treasures in the chaos...

This elegant gold necklace looks as if it was only made yesterday. In fact the nine inch necklace is four thousand years old and marks the oldest known worked gold artifact ever uncovered in the Americas, also representing the earliest evidence of an elite emerging among the simple people who lived there. Is this gold necklace the first evidence of elite society in the Americas In short, it marks the very early steps towards the appearance of royalty in the region, along with politics and luxury. The nine bead necklace, found near Lake Titicaca in southern Peru, is described by...

Authorities Raid California Museums By GREG RISLING LOS ANGELES (AP) — Federal agents raided several Southern California museums on Thursday in search of Southeast Asian antiquities believed to have been illegally obtained, smuggled into the U.S. and donated so collectors could claim fraudulent tax deductions. Agents also investigated American Indian artifacts at one museum. Search warrants were executed at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the Bowers Museum in Santa Ana, the Pacific Asia Museum in Pasadena and the Mingei International Museum in San Diego, said Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Authorities said no arrests...

Tablets that may reveal El Niño secrets are feared lost in Iraq By Ben Russell, Political Correspondent 09 June 2003 The secrets of El Niño, one of the most mysterious and destructive weather systems, could be unlocked by hundreds of thousands of ancient clay tablets now feared lost or damaged in the chaos of Iraq. Researchers believe the tablets, written using a cuneiform text, one of the earliest types of writing, form the world's oldest records of climate change and could give vital clues to understanding El Niño and global warming. Academics are demanding that ministers act to protect the...

RALEIGH - Harlan “Carolina” Jones was commissioned by Biblical Archeology Review in 1977 to find the long-lost Ark of the Covenant. Three decades of frustration could have been avoided had Craig Newmark, then a 24-year-old fratboy at Wofford College, hurried up and started his nifty Web site for classified ads—Craigslist.org. “Don’t get me wrong, I’m excited and all,” Jones said. “But I feel like a dang fool.” Jones was searching on Raleigh Craigslist for a new Husky toolbox for his pickup truck when he clicked on the following ad: “Funky storage box. Used. Free jar, stick and a couple of...

JERUSALEM – Islamic authorities using heavy machinery to dig on the Temple Mount – Judaism's holiest site – have been caught red-handed destroying Temple-era antiquities and what's believed to be a section of an outer wall of the Second Jewish Temple.

It's one of Minnesota's greatest mysteries. It's something that puts settlers in America well before Columbus. A Minnesota geologist thinks the controversial Kensington Runestone is the real thing and there is evidence that he says backs up the theory. The Kensington Runestone is a rock found near Alexandria a century ago. It's inscription speaking of Norwegians here in 1362. It begs the question. Were Vikings exploring our land more than 100 years before Columbus? Or is it just an elaborate hoax? New research shows that the stone is genuine and there's hidden code that may prove it. It contains carved...

Ooparts ? What are Ooparts? That stands for Out of Place Artifacts. Things that show up where they shouldn't, a piece of gold chain found in a coal seam, what appears to be a sparkplug embedded in rock that is thousands of years old and what appears to be a bullet hole in the skull of a mastodon. These things are ooparts. A Gold Thread Workmen quarrying stone near the River Tweed below Rutherford, Scotland in 1844, found a piece of gold thread embedded in the rock of the quarry eight feet below ground level. A small piece of the...

Artifacts could be from early galleon Mon Feb 26, 11:42 PM ET MEXICO CITY - Archeologists said Monday that porcelain plates and other artifacts found along the Baja California coast could be from the wreckage of a Spanish galleon that sailed between the Philippines and Mexico hundreds of years ago. Seals and other markings on some of the estimated 1,000 fragments of porcelain plates found at the site indicate they were made in China in the late 1500s, said archaeologist Luz Maria Mejia of the National Institute of Anthropology and History. The site, near the port of Ensenada about 50...

Some of the artefacts confiscated may be up to one million years old French customs officials say they have seized more than 650 ancient artefacts smuggled from Mali in one of the largest such finds at a Paris airport. Described as an "archaeological treasure", the objects were thought to be on their way to private US buyers. Experts say most of the items are from the Neolithic period, but some may be up to one million years old. The artefacts are thought to have been taken from archaeological sites on the edge of the Sahara desert. The 669 items...

Shortly before Christmas, electrician Pio DiPofi pried open a 114-year-old box kneeler that ran for 200 feet along the balcony rail of St. Stanislaus Kostka Church in the Strip District. In the hollow where he planned to run wiring for the church's ongoing renovation he saw dirt, soot and something more colorful. He reached in and carefully pulled out two very old holy cards -- images of Jesus and the saints that are often used in Catholic prayer. "When I looked at them, I was amazed," he said. Items found inside the 114-year-old box kneeler include a torn prayer card...

Railway construction unearths ancient artifacts in Germany By Colin Nickerson, Globe Staff | January 21, 2007 COLOGNE, Germany -- Genialinius Gennatus was one fine duck hunter. Alerts In the third century , he recorded his prowess in high Latin on a stone tablet that he dedicated to Jupiter. That and a hefty donation probably ensured that the tablet won display in the temple to the Roman god in the settlement then called Colonia. Five or six centuries later, Cologne's early Christians, perhaps offended by the tablet dedicated to a pantheist god, chucked it into the silting channel between the Rhine...

COLUMBIA, Mo. - A man hunting for American Indian artifacts with his sons along a gravel bar on the Missouri River has uncovered an ancient fishhook that is making collectors envious. "The first thing I thought is, 'I hope this isn't metal,'" said Eric Henley, who found the hook last month near McBaine. "When I picked it up, there was a pretty good jump for joy and a couple of 'whoops' and yells. It's the cream of the crop." The hook is made of bone and covers his entire palm, making it much larger than most bone hooks. Joe Harl,...

Field Museum scientists solve riddle of mysterious faces on South Pacific artifactsDecipher their hidden meaning and religious significance John Terrell, Regenstein Curator of Pacific Anthropology at the Field Museum, and Esther M. Schechter, a Research Associate in the Department of Anthropology at the Field Museum, have pieced together... CHICAGO—The strange faces drawn on the first pottery made in the South Pacific more than 3,000 years ago have always been a mystery to scientists. Now their riddle may have been solved by new research done by two Field Museum scientists to be published in the February 2007 issue of the Cambridge...

Last update - 09:31 19/10/2006 First Temple artifacts found in dirt removed from Temple Mount By Nadav Shragai, Haaretz Correspondent The project of sifting layers of Temple Mount dirt has yielded thousands of new artifacts dating from the First Temple period to today. The dirt was removed in 1999 by the Islamic Religious Trust (Waqf) from the Solomon's Stables area to the Kidron Stream Valley. The sifting itself is taking place at Tzurim Valley National Park, at the foot of Mount Scopus, and being funded by the Ir David Foundation. Dr. Gabriel Barkai and Tzachi Zweig, the archaeologists directing the...

BAY ST. LOUIS, Miss. — Archaeologists believe they have uncovered evidence of an ancient village, possibly dating back to the time of Christ, that once thrived along the shores of this Gulf Coast community. The artifacts were unearthed during recent efforts to rebuild a thoroughfare and major bridge heavily damaged last year by Hurricane Katrina. Marco Giardino, an archaeologist acting as the city's liaison on a dig to preserve the ancient remains, said as many as 400 people may have lived in the village. "That area was very strategic and would have allowed them to travel, fish and hunt," he...

< img src = http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/shared/spl/hi/pop_ups/06/uk_enl_1155824432/html/1.stm> An ancient Peruvian headdress which was looted from an archaeological site almost 20 years ago has been found by police in London. It is considered a national treasure and disappeared in 1988 after a tomb in northern Peru was raided and its contents sold on the black market. It was handed to a firm of solicitors in central London by one of its clients who did not know it was stolen. The headdress, depicting a sea god, dates back to 700AD. It is an example of ancient Peruvian Mochica civilisation art and is regarded by...

SAN FRANCISCO – Previously hidden writings of the ancient Greek mathematician Archimedes are being uncovered with powerful X-ray beams nearly 800 years after a Christian monk scrubbed off the text and wrote over it with prayers. Over the past week, researchers at Stanford University's Linear Accelerator Center in Menlo Park have been using X-rays to decipher a fragile 10th century manuscript that contains the only copies of some of Archimedes' most important works. The X-rays, generated by a particle accelerator, cause tiny amounts of iron left by the original ink to glow without harming the delicate goatskin parchment. “We are...

RICHMOND, Va. - Sometime around 1610, archaeologists figure, a thirsty colonist in Jamestown set his brass pistol on the side of a well as he pulled up some water and accidentally knocked the weapon in.

A fire in a 1,000-year-old Buddhist temple in a remote valley of Himachal Pradesh has reduced the pinewood-structure to ashes and also destroyed a number of scriptures, artefacts and murals, officials said. The fire at the temple in Ribba in Kinnaur valley, about 200 km from Shimla, started late on Friday and caused losses of nearly Rs 125 million, they said. Besides, 170 Buddhist scriptures written over centuries by monks on birch paper rolls, many murals of Lord Buddha, antique jewellery and other artefacts have been reduced to ashes. Himalayan pinewood planks that were used to construct the temple only...

Diver Dennis O'Neil of Plattsburgh, N.Y., poses with a piece of a cannon muzzle which he discovered during a dive Friday, June 30, 2006, in Peru, N.Y. Divers have spent the last seven years combing the bottom of Lake Champlain in search of 'battlefield scatter' from the crucial 1776 Battle of Valcour near Peru. O'Neil has made about 100 dives during the project. PERU, N.Y. - Gen. Benedict Arnold led a "wretched, motley" crew of sailors on Lake Champlain against a far superior British fleet near here on Oct. 11, 1776. The rebels lost. But their dogged fight delayed...

The altar was old. It was ornate. And it was on the gambling floor of the Hard Rock Hotel and Casino in Las Vegas.James Lang was startled when he saw it there. Lang, vicar of parishes for the Roman Catholic diocese in Syracuse, had a chat with the manager about desecration. The altar eventually was removed."They thought it looked cool," Lang remembers.It also looked like part of a growing phenomenon: Religious artifacts are migrating as America's shifting population leaves empty churches across the Midwest and Northeast. This March, New York City's archdiocese recommended shutting 31 metro parishes, and Boston has...

Iraq Antiquities Find Sparks Controversy By Sue Biggin and Andrew Lawler ScienceNOW Daily News 10 April 2006 TRIESTE, ITALY--Italian researchers in Iraq claim to have stumbled upon an important cache of ancient clay tablets in one of the world's oldest cities. But others dispute the claim, and Iraqi authorities say the scientists have been acting illegally. No archaeologist has been given permission to do excavations since the U.S. invasion in March 2003 toppled Saddam Hussein. But last month, Italy's National Research Council announced that it had discovered some 500 rare tablets on the surface of Eridu, a desert site in...

Artifacts in Ancient Chinese City Reveal Superb TechnologySuperb drilling technology and the world's earliest stone drill bits were found at site Epoch Times Staff Apr 01, 2006 A worker looks over an excavation site. (Frederic J. Brown/AFP/Getty Images)In Lingjiatan, Hanshan County of Anhui Province in China, archaeologists have discovered a primitive tribal site that was inhabited 5,000 years ago. Superb drilling technology and the world's earliest stone drill bits were found at the site. Archaeology professor Zhang Jingguo said there are still many mysteries in the Lingjiatan ruins waiting to be solved. The Lingjiatan ruins are located in Lingjiatan Village,...

The Jesus Dynasty Excerpt: 'The Jesus Dynasty' by James D. Tabor New Book Challenges Christian Philosophy April 7, 2006 -- James Tabor is the chairman of religious studies at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. His book challenges many of the beliefs that Christians hold dear, maintaining that Jesus is neither the son of God nor the son of Joseph but most likely the child of a Roman soldier named Pantera. Jesus, Tabor maintains, became the head of the household when Joseph died and looked after his six half-brothers and sisters. When Jesus died, his brother James took over...

Qasr'e Shirin's 6,000-Year-Old Mystery Feb 26, 2006 Discovery of some clay relics from Obeid Site (an ancient site in Mesopotamia and current Iraq belonging to the 4th Millennium BC) in the city of Qasr'e Shirin has laid the origin and destination of this city’s migrants about 6,000 years ago under ambiguity. Archeologists want to know whether these migrants came to this region from Mesopotamia or they were traveling among different regions of Zagros Mountains. "Continuation of the surveys and identifications in this city led to the discovery of 75 ancient sites most of which belong to the Obeid Site," said...

THESSALONIKI, Greece - A Greek hiker found a 6,500-year-old gold pendant in a field and handed it over to authorities, an archaeologist said Thursday. The flat, roughly ring-shaped prehistoric pendant probably had religious significance and would have been worn on a necklace by a prominent member of society. Only three such gold artifacts have been discovered during organized digs, archaeologist Georgia Karamitrou-Mendesidi, head of the Greek archaeological service in the northern region where the discovery was made, told The Associated Press. "It belongs to the Neolithic period, about which we know very little regarding the use of metals, particularly gold,"...

Anglo-Saxon gold coin leaves British Museum out of pocket By Nigel Reynolds, Arts Correspondent (Filed: 09/02/2006) A gold coin lost 1,200 years ago on a river bank in Bedfordshire became the most expensive British coin when it was bought by the British Museum for £357,832 yesterday. A little smaller than a pound coin in diameter and much thinner, the glittering mancus, the value of 30 days' wages for a skilled Anglo-Saxon worker, now ranks among the museum's most valuable artefacts. Anglo-Saxon coin depicting Coenwulf, King of Mercia Experts described the coin as "the find of the last 100 years". But...

New Discoveries in Jiroft May Change History of Civilization Jan 26, 2006 Latest archeological excavations in Jiroft, known as the hidden paradise of world archeologists, resulted in the discovery of a bronze statue depicting the head of goat which dates back to the third millennium BC. This statue was found in the historical cemetery of Jirof where recent excavations in the lower layers of this cemetery revealed that the history of the Halil Rud region dates back to the fourth millennium BC, a time that goes well beyond the age of civilization in Mesopotamia "One of the reasons the archeologists...

An encounter with a Bedouin robber in a desert valley has led to what one Israeli archaeologist described as one of the most important biblical finds from the region in half a century. Professor Chanan Eshel, an archaeologist from Bar Ilan University in Tel Aviv, said yesterday that the discovery of two fragments of nearly 2,000-year-old parchment scroll from the Dead Sea area gave hope to biblical and archaeological scholars, frustrated by a dearth of material unearthed in the region in recent years, that the Judean desert could yet yield further artefacts. "No more scrolls have been found in the...

MACHU PICCHU, PERU – The Incas built this mysterious city here, it is told, to be closer to the gods. It was placed so high in the clouds, at 7,700 feet, that the empire- raiding Spaniards never found, or destroyed, it. Today, visitors to Machu Picchu see well-preserved ruins hidden among the majestic Andes: complete with palaces, baths, temples, tombs, sundials, and agricultural terraces, and also llamas roaming among hundreds of gray granite houses. But they won't find too many bowls, tools, ritual objects, or other artifacts used by the Incas of the late 1400s. To see those, they have...

JERUSALEM -- Israeli archaeologists, screening tons of rubble scooped out of this ancient city's sacred Temple Mount, have discovered hundreds of artifacts and coins, as well as jewelry, some with biblical links dating back more than three millennia. Most of the stones and earth originally were taken to an organic garbage dump in nearby Bethany, the New Testament town known in Arabic as Al-Azariya, and could not be retrieved. But a substantial portion was diverted to the Valley of Kidron, mentioned in the Old Testament and located just outside the Old City's massive walls. This ambitious archaeological project, known as...

One day in a spring, an elderly man walked alone on a stone road lined by young willows in Xuzhou in East China's Jiangsu Province. At the end of the road was a museum that few people have heard of. A Chinese theology professor says the first Christmas is depicted in the stone relief from the Eastern Han Dynasty (AD 25-220). In the picture above a woman and a man are sitting around what looks like a manger, with allegedly "the three wise men" approaching from the left side, holding gifts, "the shepherd" following them, and "the assassins" queued...

HONOLULU, Hawaii (AP) -- Using radar equipment along a wall of a landmark building, military specialists Saturday quickly found a time capsule buried more than a century ago by King Kamehameha V. Historians knew the capsule contained priceless pieces of the islands' history, including photos of royal families dating back to Kamehameha the Great and a constitution of the Hawaiian Kingdom. But until now the capsule's exact location was unknown. "We found it within the first 10 minutes we were here," said Larry Conyers, a University of Denver professor who used ground penetrating radar to find the hollow spot in...

Seeks to retrieve relics taken from Machu Picchu LIMA -- Peru is preparing a lawsuit against Yale University to retrieve artifacts taken nearly a century ago from the Inca citadel of Machu Picchu, a Peruvian cultural official said yesterday. Peru in recent years has held discussions with Yale seeking the return of nearly 5,000 artifacts, including ceramics and human bones that explorer Hiram Bingham dug up during three expeditions to Machu Picchu in 1911, 1912 and 1914.

A lead seal from the sixth century depicting Jesus was recently discovered in excavations by the Antiquities Authority in the Old City of Tiberias. The other side of the seal has a cross with an abbreviation of the name “Christos.” This is the first time a seal with the image of Jesus has been discovered in excavations in Tiberias. A number of similar seals have been found in Caesaria, which in ancient times was the capital of the province.

Rosetta stone By Nevine El-Aref The Rosetta stone The black basalt Rosetta stone was found in 1799, a year after the French expedition to Egypt began, in a fortress located on the outskirts of Rashid by a young French officer named Pierre-François Bouchard. It measured 113cms tall, 75.5cms long and 27cms thick, and contained three distinct bands of writing. The most incomplete was the top band containing hieroglyphics; the middle band was written in the demotic script and the bottom was in Greek. Studies carried out on the stone by scholars revealed that the stone was a royal decree which...

Before sentencing a Whitefish Bay art dealer on her second conviction stemming from an initial crime, a federal judge said Monday he hadn't really seen a "clear portrait" of the defendant and that what he did see was "impressionistic." But U.S. District Judge Charles N. Clevert Jr. said he had enough perspective to throw the book at Marilyn Karos, concluding that she had once more thumbed her nose at the law in the case that comprised a Libyan businessman, Renaissance-era astronomical devices, a hidden-camera videotape made at the Pfister Hotel and a Mob-style beat-down in the North Shore. Clevert sentenced...

Stone Age Cemetery, Artifacts Unearthed in Sahara Brian Handwerk for National Geographic News October 21, 2005Archaeologists have excavated a trove of Stone Age human skeletons and artifacts on the shores of an ancient lake in the Sahara. The seven nearby sites include an extensive cemetery and represent one of the largest and best preserved concentrations of ancient skeletons and artifacts ever found in the region, researchers say. Harpoons, fishhooks, pottery, jewelry, stone tools, and other artifacts pepper the ancient lakeside settlement. The objects were left by early communities that once thrived on the former lake's abundant fish and shellfish. "They...

WATCH THE VIDEO HEREThe video is about the recent "Forgotten Empire" exhibition at British Museum in London

LONDON: Much of Ancient Persia's history is known to us only through the sophisticated literary culture of the Greeks. They often represented Persians as the barbarian "other," an image formed in the wake of the Greek defeats during the wars of 490 to 480 B.C. Later, the Greek picture of Ancient Persia and its history is drawn from the perspective of the conqueror, following Alexander's capture of Persepolis in 330 BC. The West inherited that Greek narrative as the Persians themselves seem to have been too busy living and creating an empire to write self-consciously about their own history or...

Statues of Ancient Goddesses Discovered By NICHOLAS PAPHITIS, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 42 minutes ago ATHENS, Greece - The life-sized marble statues of two ancient Greek goddesses have emerged during excavations of a 5,000-year-old town on the island of Crete, archaeologists said Friday. The works, representing the goddesses Athena and Hera, date to between the second and fourth centuries — during the period of Roman rule in Greece — and originally decorated the Roman theater in the town of Gortyn, archaeologist Anna Micheli from the Italian School of Archaeology told The Associated Press. "They are in very good condition,"...

Tehran, 28 September 2005 (CHN) -- Archaeological excavations in Gohar Tepe, in Mazandaran province in Iran, has led to the discovery of the remains of the statues of some cows which were most probably used in religious ceremonies. The discovery of these sculptures indicates that the people of the region worshiped cows 3000 years ago. Mazandaran is one of the most ancient provinces in Iran. Archaeological excavations indicate that the province has been inhabited by human beings since 400,000 years ago until the present time, and that around 5000 years ago, urbanization flourished in the area. Gohar Tepe is a...

Customs officials in Florida have seized more than 300 ancient Peruvian artefacts smuggled into the US. The artefacts include a clay vessel thought to be 3,500 years old. The operation was one of the largest of its kind and was launched after officers received a tip-off. One person has been arrested. This pre-Columbian collection will now be returned to Peru, but customs officers say many other artefacts have not been found. Transit point The 322 objects recovered in Florida include decorated pottery, burial shrouds and gold jewellery - all dating from civilisations which flourished hundreds of years before the arrival...

The Kensington Runestone, one of Minnesota’s most debated artifacts is not a hoax — according to geologist Scott Wolter. Wolter spoke to a Minnesota History class at Anoka Ramsey Community College - Cambridge Campus Monday, Sept. 12. He has been researching the Runestone for five years along with Richard Nielsen, an engineer from Houston. Wolter, a geologist by education and profession works for Twin Cities Testing, performing detailed examinations on concrete and rock to determine if there are flaws in concrete projects. Wolter explained the Runestone was found by Olof Ohman in 1898 while clearing trees off his land in...