What 30 Egyptian mummies and other important archaeological finds of the last decade told scientists

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

The history of mankind keeps many more secrets and mysteries. Its researchers make at least one unique and sometimes even sensational discovery almost every year. In some cases, the research of archaeologists force scientists, if not to rewrite completely, then to make significant adjustments to the textbook history of human civilization. In this article, we will tell you about the 5 most important archaeological finds made over the past decade.

Thirty Egyptian mummies

In early fall 2019, the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities announced one of the largest finds in over a century. During excavations carried out in and around Luxor by groups of archaeologists accredited by the Egyptian government, three dozen wooden coffins were discovered. All of them were brightly painted and perfectly preserved.

Egyptologists, who studied the find, found mummified bodies in coffins belonging to 23 adult men, 5 women and 2 young children. Approximately 3 thousand years - this is, according to preliminary estimates of experts, the age of thirty mummies found in the Egyptian Luxor. Consequently, they all lived in the era of the so-called "Early Kingdom", which was ruled by the pharaohs from the first, Tinis dynasties.

Currently, scientists continue to study the find. Especially Egyptologists were interested in the drawings on the coffins of scenes from the Egyptian "Book of the Dead", as well as images of the gods. Most researchers agree that some of the mummies found are the remains of ancient Egyptian priests and clergy.

Scientists hope that this archaeological find will shed light on a number of questions regarding the ancient posthumous and burial rituals of the Egyptians. Including the features of the burial of people, depending on their status, age or gender.

Abstract rock paintings from Indonesia

In the summer of 2017, in one of the karst caves on the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia, scientists stumbled upon an unusual rock painting. It took researchers almost 2 years to fully decipher and understand the essence of this figurative "artistic canvas" measuring 4 and a half meters.

In early 2019, a group of scientists studying a drawing in an Indonesian cave, applied about 44 thousand years ago with a dark red pigment, published their report. According to him, the ancient people who lived here in those days depicted a mystical scene - 8 strange creatures are hunting for 6 animals. And their strangeness lay in the following: in the appearance of the creatures, both the features of man and wild animals are clearly distinguishable.

The researchers, pointing to these images of "therianthropes", combining human and animal traits, came to a very interesting conclusion. In their opinion, the rock paintings in the cave of the Sulawesi island are the oldest images of mystical beings in the history of mankind - werewolves. This proves the fact that already ancient people could imagine creatures that could not exist in nature.

In addition, the Indonesian find completely refuted the theory of the gradual evolution of Paleolithic art. According to which rock art with images of figures of animals and people - a kind of graphic storytelling, began to appear after the so-called "35-thousand-year redistribution". Indeed, before the discovery of Indonesian rock paintings, the oldest were such images of 21 thousand years old.

Medieval female warriors

Back in 1889, the grave of a noble medieval warrior was found near the Swedish town of Birke. A human skeleton rested next to 2 horses and a lot of expensive weapons. For more than a century, it was believed that the remains belong, if not to the king (leader), then to some noble man. Until in 2017, scientists did not conduct a DNA analysis of the "Viking from Birke".

The study showed that the skeleton found more than a century ago is the remains of a woman. Thus, scientists have once again proved that in the Middle Ages in the Scandinavian tribes, women sometimes fought alongside men. However, after 2 years, in 2019, a group of Polish archaeologists who worked on excavations in Scandinavia made a loud discovery, proving that female warriors in the Middle Ages were not an exception, but rather an everyday pattern. And not only among the Viking tribes.

Researchers have discovered more than 30 burials of medieval "Amazons". The greatest interest among scientists was aroused by one of them - on the island of Langeland in Denmark. Next to the woman's remains in the grave there was a battle ax, which, after examination, was identified as a weapon of origin from the regions of the southern part of the Baltic.

This gave the scientists the opportunity to assume with a high degree of certainty that the female warrior they found was by no means a Scandinavian. Most likely, she belonged to one of the West Slavic tribes who lived at that time on the shores of the Baltic Sea - Lyutichi, Udrichi or Pomorians.

At the end of 2019, British scientists from Dandy University (Scotland) carried out a computer reconstruction of the face of one of the medieval women warriors, whose grave was discovered in the same year in the southern region of Norway. The head of the "Amazon" rested on a wooden shield, and there were many weapons next to the remains. In the frontal part of the skull, scientists have recorded an impressive scar. Experts consider it to be a trace of a wound in battle.

All these findings fully confirm the veracity of the medieval Scandinavian sagas, which tell about the numerous female warriors of that time.

The first homo sapiens in Europe

According to the most recent archaeological finds made by scientists during excavations in Morocco, the modern human species, homo sapiens, has existed on the planet for at least 350 thousand years. People began to leave their "cradle" - Africa, and begin to conquer other continents about 70-55 millennia ago. This was considered until 2018, when scientists identified the find of archaeologists on the Israeli Mount Carmel - a human jaw.

It was dated at about 176-194 thousand years old. But this discovery of the first attempt at the exit of homo sapiens from Africa lasted only a year. In 2019, using modern technologies, scientists were able to virtually reconstruct 2 skulls of ancient people, incomplete fragments of which were discovered by archaeologists in the Greek cave of Apidima in the late 1970s. One of the skulls (dubbed Apidima 2), whose age was 170 thousand years, belonged to the "indigenous inhabitant" of the European continent - a Neanderthal man.

The real sensation was made by the reconstruction of the skull of Apidima 1. Studies have shown that its age is no less than 210 thousand years. And most importantly, this skull belonged to "Homo sapiens." It follows from this that the first attempts of homo sapiens to settle on the planet began more than 200 thousand years ago.

And although they were not successful (later, only Neanderthals lived in the Apidim cave), after 150 thousand years nothing could stop the world expansion of the ancestors of modern people.

Evidence for the biblical story of the destruction of Jerusalem

At the end of the summer of 2019, scientists managed to make one of the largest discoveries in history in the field of biblical archeology. During excavations on Mount Zion in the southwestern part of the Israeli city of Jerusalem, scientists from the United States proved the Old Testament story of the complete devastation of the city, sacred for 3 world religions, by the army of Babylonian King Nebuchadnezzar II.

Archaeologists have discovered several large epicenters of conflagrations with rather thick layers of ash, as well as arrowheads and spearheads. In addition, at the excavation site, scientists found broken lamps and other household items of that era. This fact indicates that any other explanation for such chaos, other than the storming and seizure of Jerusalem by enemy troops, can easily be discarded. After all, all the artifacts that the researchers discovered were within the walls of the city. Consequently, the battle took place inside Jerusalem.

In the Old Testament Book of Kings, this period is described as a rather "dark time" for the holy city - exactly 6 centuries BC, according to biblical stories, the troops of the Babylonian ruler Nebuchadnezzar II, after the siege, took Jerusalem by storm, plundering and almost completely destroying it. The jewels found during archaeological excavations testify that at that time a rich nobility already existed in the city. Which also fully coincides with the biblical texts.

Sometimes even a seemingly insignificant archaeological find can become the beginning for a real scientific discovery or even a sensation. And who knows, maybe with the development of modern technologies, in the very near future, researchers will be able not only to unravel all the secrets of history, but also to completely rewrite it.