The Archaeological Discoveries That Changed Our View of History

History is far more complicated that we would like to believe.
Even in our schools today, different versions of events are being taught to students, depending
on the country they’re in and how those events in history affected that country.
“Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past,”
right?
Nevertheless, we also have archaeology, which sometimes helps us to better understand what
happened regardless of what was written down in centuries past.
And sometimes, some such discoveries turn the way we saw history right on its head.
10.
Ancient Fast Food
We generally tend to think that fast food came about fairly recently, right?
And it does make sense, after all, given the faster pace the world is moving nowadays as
opposed to the slower ancient times.
In fact, the first such shops, which were serving fish and chips, opened in Britain
during the 1860s.
Then, in the 1950s in the US, the drive-through restaurants became popular, and… well, you
know the rest.
But taking a quick snack for lunch and then hurrying on your way is not something new
and has been going on since ancient times.
This place was the so-called thermopolium, or “place where (something) hot is sold,”
and it was a common sight all throughout the Greco-Roman world; particularly in larger
towns and cities.
These thermopolia are, in fact, the forerunners of all present-day restaurants.
They usually consisted of a small room that opened onto the street and specialized in
two or three items such as spiced wine, meats, cheese, or lentils.
These establishments were quite tiny and almost never had tables for people to sit at.
There was only a counter with several embedded earthenware jars called dolia where the food
was stored.
These places were frequented mostly by slaves or people who did not have the means or facilities
to cook for themselves.
And as it so happens, these thermopolia were also frequent hangouts for all sorts of shady
characters.
These places were even abolished on several occasions for this exact reason, since they
harbored all sorts of “effeminate Greeks and thieving slaves,” as Plautus, a Roman
playwright from the 3rd century BC, once said.
There were, however, some fancier establishments too, with some tables inside and even some
frescoes painted on the walls.
One such ornate restaurant called the “Thermopolium of Asellina” was discovered in Pompeii and
is one of the best preserved in the world.
9.
War is Older Than We Thought
War was commonly believed to have originated alongside the advent of civilization.
This, of course, doesn’t mean that people weren’t killing each other even before that.
After all, the reptilian part of the brain, which we all have and which pushes us towards
things like hate, envy, aggression, dominance, and territoriality among others, was also
found in people more than 10,000 years ago.
This means that before the discovery of agriculture and animal husbandry, people were only able
to kill each other through the occasional murder or small family skirmishes.
But after people began settling down and growing in number, more organized and coordinated
forms of battle were invented; things like raids or wars, for instance.
The fact that structured hierarchies and slavery also appeared during this time also helped
wars along.
Nevertheless, an archaeological discovery made in 2012 in Kenya seems to indicate that
small scale wars were also taking place even before agriculture appeared there.
On the banks of the Lake Turkana, archaeologists came across 27 skeletons dating back to somewhere
in between 9,500 to 10,500 years ago.
These skeletons once belonged to men, women, and children which archeologists believe were
members of a semi-nomadic tribe that settled close to the lake.
All of the skeletons showed signs of blunt force trauma or wounds from projectile weapons.
One of the women had both of her knees shattered and showed signs that her hands were bound
when she died.
Who attacked them, or what really happened is not known, but no other massacre on this
scale has ever been discovered from so long ago.
8.
Europeans and America
Christopher Columbus and his men are no longer believed to be the first Europeans to discover
the American continent.
Today it is fairly common knowledge that Leif Ericsson, an Icelandic Viking explorer, was
the first European to come across to North America when he was blown off course on his
way to Greenland from Norway almost 500 years before Columbus.
In the Saga of the Greenlanders which talks about Leif Ericsson and his travels to Vinland,
present-day Newfoundland, there is mention of a Bjarni Herjólfsson, who also made it
to a land west of Greenland when he too was blown off course by the wind, even before
Leif Ericsson himself.
But whatever the case may be here, some newer archaeological evidence points to the fact
that the Europeans made it to North America even before Europe had a name, or at least
the name of “Europe.”
Several dozen stone tools have been found along the East Coast in six distinct locations.
One in Pennsylvania, three from the Delmarva Peninsula in Maryland, one in Virginia, and
another one was discovered by a scallop trawler some 60 miles off the Virginian coast.
All of these tools bear a striking resemblance to the stone tools used by the prehistoric
Solutrean tribes from present-day western France and northern Spain.
What’s more, all of them were dated somewhere in between 19,000 to 26,000 years ago.
Because of this time period, most archaeologists have rejected the idea of being just a simple
case of coincidence based on the too-similar design.
Furthermore, one of the stone knives discovered in Virginia revealed under chemical analysis
that it actually originated in France.
The reason for the relatively small number of tools found on the East Coast dating from
that period also explains how those Stone Age Europeans got to America in the first
place.
Back in those times, the planet was going through an Ice Age, and like the Native Americans
who crossed into America from Asia over the Bering land bridge, so did these Solutreans
cross over what is now the north Atlantic, Iceland, and Greenland.
As shown by that knife found by the scallop trawler 60 miles off the coast of Virginia,
the sea level was far lower than it is today.
And since these people stayed mostly around the coast, many of their tools are also underwater.
Another archaeological discovery that places Europeans in North America longer ago than
previously believed is an 8,000-year-old skeleton found in Florida.
When subjected to a genetic marker test, this man’s remains revealed high levels of European
markers, not found in Asians.
7.
Australians and America
Another archaeological discovery, this time from Brazil, points to the fact that Australians
also made it to the Americas long ago.
Several human skulls discovered there match the characteristics of those from places like
Australia and Melanesia.
Similarly, some 33 skulls found on the Baja California peninsula in Mexico also point
to this theory.
And according to the stone tools and charcoal discovered at the site in Brazil, these people
could have inhabited the area for nearly 50,000 years.
The theory is that they arrived in the Americas by boat across the Pacific.
Though seemingly impossible for people from 50,000 years ago, cave paintings in Australia
have shown some boats that were actually built to withstand the ocean.
Moreover, in 1947 Norwegian explorer Thor Heyerdahl and a few others made it across
on a balsa wood raft.
Archaeologists also believe that these people died out with the appearance of the Asian
peoples coming in from the north via the Bering land bridge.
This is because the shape of the skulls changes from those with an Australian appearance to
those with a Mongoloid appearance between 9,000 to 7,000 years ago.
The only survivors could be tribes of people who lived in the Terra del Fuego region of
South America.
This is the southernmost tip of the continent, and the people who still live there show hybrid
skull features of both mongoloid and negroid ancestry.
If proven true then Native Australians could be the first Americans ever.
6.
How Old is Our Friendship with Dogs?
There is no debating that wolves were the first animals ever to be domesticated by humans.
Even before animal husbandry became a thing, man and wolves (which then turned into dogs)
were hunting together in a sort of synergy that benefited both species.
But how old is this interspecies collaboration, really?
Common theories place the beginning of this relationship somewhere around 15,000 to 18,000
years ago and it happened separately in both China and the Middle East.
This is without a doubt far older than any other domesticated animal in the world.
Dogs were well established as part of human society around 10,000 years ago, and in Germany
for instance, humans and dogs were sometimes buried together as long as 14,000 years ago.
But the discovery of a canine skull in the Altai Mountains in Siberia pushes this timeline
by at least another 15,000 years.
Radiocarbon dating has placed the skull somewhere around 33,000 years old, and its genetic markers
indicate that it more closely resembled modern-day dogs than actual wolves.
The similarity between modern dogs and this particular skull was also evident thanks to
its shape and size.
Another old canine fossil dates back to around 31,000 years ago and was discovered in Goyet
Cave in Belgium.
And even though its mtDNA (mitochondrial DNA) indicates that it does not share its matriline
with any extant wolves or dogs, its skull morphology is more similar to a dog than an
actual wolf.
5.
The Oldest Writing in the World
Three inscribed tablets that were found in what is now present day Romania may contain
the oldest writing system in the world.
Each of them is about two and a half inches wide, each has markings on it, and all of
them are dated back to around 5300 BC.
They were found in 1961 in a ritual pit, alongside other clay and stone offerings and the bones
of an elderly woman, probably a sort of priestess.
The Tartaria Tablets, as they are known, are thought to have belonged to the Turdas-Vinca
culture that inhabited the area during that period.
But despite the importance of the discovery and what they stand to represent if proven
to be the real deal, the tablets are still shrouded in some controversy.
For instance, Mesopotamian experts disregard the Tartaria Tablets by saying that the symbols
on them are not actually writing, but only decorations.
Other experts believe that these tablets actually contain an early form of Sumerian script since
some of the symbols found here are identical to pictograms found in Jemdet Nasr in Iraq.
A German linguist and Mesopotamian script specialist by the name of Harald Haarmann
strongly believes that the symbols on the tablets are an early form of writing.
He bases his assumptions on the many other symbols that are part of the so-called Danube
script found throughout the region on various other ceramic objects and which number roughly
the same as the Egyptian hieroglyphs.
A more recent discovery from 2009 has brought to light a Neolithic workshop that was once
manufacturing clay tablets.
Another 120 similar tablets were found at the site, some containing symbols similar
to the ones at Tartaria.
If these symbols are ever proven to be authentic and part of an actual ancient script, then
the cradle of civilization could be moved from the Middle East to Eastern Europe.
4.
The City of the Sun in North America
Native Americans usually lived in tepees, right?
Well, yes… at least, some of them did.
But in fact, many Native North Americans lived in large cities before the arrival of the
Europeans to the continent.
One notable example is Cahokia, or the City of the Sun.
It is located in in the state of Illinois, close where the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers
merge.
This area is one of the most fertile on the continent and here one Native American culture,
the Mississippians, made it their home.
But they didn’t just live in tepees, but rather in grand cities of some 20,000 people
strong.
Cahokia was at its peak between 1050 and 1200 AD, and during this time, it was bigger than
any other European counterpart.
And here is where this tepee misconception comes into play.
It was so ingrained into white people’s imaginations that when they came across some
earthen mounds in the region, they initially attributed them to retreating glaciers.
When they did eventually realize that these were actually man-made, they attributed their
construction to Phoenicians, Vikings, and even a lost tribe of Israel.
Pretty much anyone other than the Native Americans themselves.
And Cahokia is big.
It spans over an area of about six square miles and had a total of 120 earth mounds.
The city was carefully planned and organized, with plazas, residential areas, and elite
compounds.
The largest of the earth mounds found here is about 100 feet tall and contains more than
25 million cubic feet of earth, carried here in willow baskets 50 pounds at a time.
Known as the Monks Mound, this is the largest earthen structure in the Western Hemisphere.
Fairly little is known about the civilization that built it, however.
We do know that their trade network was vast, reaching from the Rocky Mountains to the Appalachians
and from the Great Lakes to Florida.
They practiced human sacrifice and relied heavily on corn for nourishment.
Today, however, only 70 of the original 120 earth mounds have survived and there is a
four lane highway running right through the historic site.
3.
Cambodia’s Medieval Cities
The Khmer Empire was one of the most powerful in Southeast Asia, and probably in the world
at the time.
It existed in between 802 AD to 1431 AD and extended over what are now Cambodia, Laos,
Thailand, and Vietnam.
They ruled over the region including where the temple complex of Angkor Wat is located.
The temple complex itself is one of the most important archaeological sites in Southeast
Asia and consists of many architectural marvels besides the obvious temples found there.
Back in 2012, a team of archaeologists made use of state of the art laser technology called
LiDAR.
This technology has the ability to see through dense vegetation and map the topography under
the jungle canopy.
What they discovered was amazing, to say the least.
They used LiDAR again in 2015, in a project that became the most extensive airborne survey
used for archaeological purposes ever.
Some 734 square miles of terrain was scanned and it revealed an unimaginable network of
roads, water ways, and densely populated cities, unrivaled anywhere in the world at the time.
Lead archaeologist on the project Damian Evans had this to say about the discovery: “We
have entire cities discovered beneath the forest that no one knew were there – at
Preah Khan of Kompong Svay and, it turns out, we uncovered only a part of Mahendraparvata
on Phnom Kulen [in the 2012 survey] … this time we got the whole deal and it’s big,
the size of Phnom Penh big.”
Phnom Penh is the current capital city of Cambodia.
This survey has shown that the Khmer Empire was able to design and implement an elaborate
water system on a grand scale, centuries before archaeologists believed the technology even
existed.
This new discovery also disproves the theory on how the Khmer Empire eventually collapsed.
Up until 2015, it was believed that they were invaded from the north and people fled south.
But the lack of any cities in that direction disproves this theory.
In any case, Angkor is now, without a shadow of a doubt, the most extensive urban settlement
in the world prior to the Industrial Revolution.
This is, of course, if LiDAR technology doesn’t discover any others.
2.
The Gold Crucifix of Denmark
One beautiful afternoon in 2016, an amateur metal detector in Denmark came across a gold
crucifix in a field near the town of Aunslev, Østfyn.
After he posted his discovery on social media, some people advised him to take it to a local
museum, which he did.
Here, the curator dated the Birka crucifix to somewhere in the first half of the 10th
century AD.
It is made out of finely articulated goldthreads and small filigree pellets, and has a loop
through which a chain once went.
What is really interesting about this find is that it’s dated between 900 and 950 AD,
leading historians to believe that the Danes were converted to Christianity earlier than
previously believed.
Prior to this discovery, the earliest representation of Jesus on a cross in Denmark came in the
form of the Jelling Stones – two large rune stones dated to 965 AD, and which are located
in Jutland.
These stones commemorate Harald Blåtand, or Harald Bluetooth, for his role in converting
the Danes to Christianity.
What this tiny cross does is push back the period when these Vikings became Christians
by several decades, at a minimum.
1.
The Appearance of Agriculture
It’s a common belief that agriculture started off in what are now Armenia, eastern Turkey,
Syria, Palestine, Israel, Jordan, and Iran around 11,000 years ago.
Then it spread to the rest of the Old World.
And while this is still true, new archaeological evidence shows that agriculture actually developed
in two distinct parts of this particular region, known as the Fertile Crescent, and each then
spread to different parts of the world independently.
Genetic evidence has proven that there are stark differences between people living in
the southern Levant, like Israel and Jordan, and those from across the Zagros Mountains
in western Iran.
Each of these groups of people developed their own style of agriculture and animal husbandry,
favoring different plants and animals for domestication.
They lived in complete isolation from each other for centuries or even millennia before
they actually met.
And it is believed that they only came in contact in eastern Turkey when both groups
were in search of obsidian needed for all sorts of tools.
It’s also believed that these people met, intermingled, exchanged agricultural techniques
and ideas, and then migrated westward into Europe.
Those who remained behind, however, went their own separate ways, spreading their distinct
forms of agriculture to other parts of the world.
Those living in the southern Levant eventually travelled to East Africa, going through present-day
Egypt and down the Nile and the Red Sea coast, while those living in western Iran made their
way north into the Eurasian steppe and then eastward into present day India and Pakistan.
While this discovery doesn’t seem like much given that both of these populations emerged
from the Fertile Crescent region, it does change our perspective of how history and
the start of civilization actually played out.
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The Archaeological Discoveries That Changed Our View of History

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