Archaeology Actually

Kia ora, In my last post to this blog I wrote a bit about the Harbin skull, a remarkable fossil find made more than 80 years ago in the city of Harbin in China's Heilongjiang province and that was first announced to the scientific community last year in three papers  published in the same issue of the scientific journal 'The Innovation' ( Qiang Ji et al. 2021 ;  Qingfeng Shao et al. 2021 ;  Xijun Ni et al. 2021 ) . The cranium is almost complete, but with only one tooth - a huge second molar - and is massive in size, with an endocranial volume of about 1420 ml (larger than the average for modern Homo sapiens - our own species !). Other morphological traits include a prominent  supraorbital torus (brow ridge), a very  broad (wide) yet orthognathic (flat) face  with large, almost  square  eye sockets, a large nasal opening and delicate zygomatic (cheek) bones, and a  cranial vault that   is low and elongated  when viewed side on...

Kia ora, It's hard to believe that another year has drawn to a close. With regards to the contemporary world, 2021 was certainly a year that presented many challenges as the global COVID-19 pandemic continued. However, I don't want to continue to dwell on all of that in today's post - but instead provide a brief and hopefully interesting respite by looking back to hundreds of thousands of years ago. As I have previously mentioned on this blog a keen area of interest of mine is the study of human origins and despite global restrictions on travel and fieldwork last year, there was a whole heap of relevant research reported in 2021. What would I pick as my favourites? It really is hard for me to go past what I consider to be an outstanding technological and methodological achievement - a " 'game changer' in the field" as I described it in a post back in April 2021 - the successful extraction and analysis of nuclear DNA from a number of species, including h...

Kia ora,   New Zealand Archaeology Week 2021 (April 24 - May 2) is underway!  New Zealand Archaeology Week, now into its fifth year, is an  annual week of nation-wide public talks, exhibits, and other events aimed at increasing public awareness and appreciation of archaeology and of New Zealand's own archaeological record. These events are run by a range of amazing individuals and organizations  and coordinated by the New Zealand Archaeological Association  (NZAA).   As I have noted on more than one occasion on this blog,  the archaeological record in New Zealand is something that people in New Zealand are often either not aware of, or tend to dismiss as not important.  "Real" archaeology is often perceived as something done overseas and not here in our little country in the corner of the South Pacific. Well, needless to say, New Zealand's archaeological record is as real as the archaeological record of anywhere else in the world. Of course,...

Kia ora, This past weekend I took advantage of a quiet Saturday and headed along to ' Our Evolutionary Past: Branches through Time ', a new temporary exhibit that had just opened at the local Otago Museum.  ( Note: In this blog post I have included a number of hyperlinks that you can follow for more information, including links to original research papers. Unfortunately, however, many of the research papers I refer to are behind paywalls! ) This free exhibit, scheduled to run until June 10 2021,  focuses on some key themes in human evolution, such as the emergence of uniquely human traits like obligate bipedalism (walking on two legs as our primary method of getting around) and manual dexterity (the ability to use our hands to preform extremely fine movements such as writing or threading a needle by precisely grasping and manipulating objects). Highly accessible educational content combined with some great artwork by Dunedin artist Bruce Mahalski is showcased on massive floor-...

Kia ora, I have previously mentioned on this blog  that the study of human origins is a keen interest area of mine. So, with the recent publication of a couple of relevant research papers, I couldn't resist the opportunity to come back to the topic! The papers in question are on the subject of the Denisovans - an enigmatic group of hominins presently known only from a few very fragmentary fossils recovered from sites in Siberia (Denisova Cave, after which they are named) and on the Tibetan Plateau. These fossils are so fragmentary in fact that no physical description of the Denisovans exists and they have yet to be given a proper species classification like Homo sapiens (the classification of our own species). The presence of hominins distinct from both Homo sapiens and Neanderthals ( Homo neanderthalensis ) at Denisova Cave, in the Altai Mountains in southern Siberia, ca. 50,000 - 30,000 years ago was brought to light thanks to the sequencing of genetic material (DNA) ex...

Kia ora, Due to recent work schedules, it has been difficult for my partner and I to take full advantage of New Zealand's post COVID lockdown freedoms and travel very far beyond Dunedin. Fortunately, within less than an hour's drive of where we live there are plenty of scenic walking tracks, opportunities to view local wildlife, and some fascinating heritage sites! Ross Creek Reservoir I mentioned the Ross Creek Reservoir when I talked about the Silverstream Water Race in my last post . This reservoir was created in the 1860s to meet the need for a reliable water management system for the then rapidly growing settlement of Dunedin, becoming New Zealand's first major urban water supply. Built and initially managed by the privately owned Dunedin Waterworks Company (backed by a provincial government guarantee), construction began in August 1865 and was completed in November 1867. The facility was taken over by the Dunedin City Council in 1875. The Ross Creek Earth Dam and Va...