Earlier this week, the police in Philadelphia charged a man in his twenties with theft after apparently he broke off the thumb of a terra-cotta statue, valued at $4.5 million, at the Franklin Institute.
According to the authorities, the man was attending the museum’s after-hours ugly-sweater party on Dec. 21, entered the terra-cotta warrior exhibition room and used his cellphone’s flashlight to view the displays. Then, he put his arm around the statue and took a selfie. The authorities added that the man, later identified as Michael Rohana as reported by the New York Times, then went for a more permanent souvenir. He then grabbed the left hand of the statue, which is valued at $4.5 million, and broke off its thumb. Even though the investigation has taken several weeks, the man was charged last week in Philadelphia with theft of an artwork from a museum, concealment of the artwork and interstate transportation of stolen property. He was released on bail.
New York Times also reports that the FBI agents visited the man’s home and retrieved the finger from his desk’s drawer.
According to several reports, the news of the theft provoked anger in China, where the terra-cotta warriors are national treasures and a major tourist attraction. An official from the Shaanxi Cultural Heritage Promotion Center, which organizes the display of the statues abroad, asked that the thief be given a tough penalty. According to NYT, the Chinese officials offered to send two experts to the United States to repair the statue.
Since the incident the Franklin Institute has reviewed their security procedure and have stated that that a security contractor had not followed “standard closing procedures” the night of the party. Another group of terra-cotta warriors is now on display at the World Museum in Liverpool, England. The museum has reviewed procedures and told security guards that “any lapses are intolerable,” the Shaanxi Cultural Heritage Promotion Center official told the Beijing Youth Daily.
The statue of a cavalryman is one of 10 on display from Sept. 30 to March 4 at the Franklin Institute, along with other ancient artifacts including coins, gold pieces, jade and weapons. According to the historians, the terra-cotta warriors were built for the tomb of Qin Shi Huang, China’s first emperor. He united much of the country under the short-lived Qin dynasty, which is generally considered the origin of the name “China. Many of the statues are on display at the Mausoleum of the First Qin Emperor in Xi’an, China, where they are lined up in vast pits. Many others remain buried. The Xi’an museum and the statues were named a Unesco World Heritage site in 1987.

According ST JOHN’S COLLEGE, UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE A thousand-year-old tooth has provided genetic evidence that the so-called “Taíno”, the first indigenous Americans to feel the full impact of European colonization after Columbus arrived in the New World, still have living descendants in the Caribbean today.

Researchers were able to use the tooth of a woman found in a cave on the island of Eleuthera in the Bahamas to sequence the first complete ancient human genome from the Caribbean. The woman lived at some point between the 8th and 10th centuries, at least 500 years before Columbus made landfall in the Bahamas.

The results provide unprecedented insights into the genetic makeup of the Taíno – a label commonly used to describe the indigenous people of that region. This includes the first clear evidence that there has been some degree of continuity between the indigenous peoples of the Caribbean and contemporary communities living in the region today.

Such a link had previously been suggested by other studies based on modern DNA. None of these, however, was able to draw on an ancient genome. The new research finally provides concrete proof that indigenous ancestry in the region has survived to the present day.

Comparing the ancient Bahamian genome to those of contemporary Puerto Ricans, the researchers found that they were more closely related to the ancient Taíno than any other indigenous group in the Americas. However, they argue that this characteristic is unlikely to be exclusive to Puerto Ricans alone and are convinced that future studies will reveal similar genetic legacies in other Caribbean communities.

The findings are likely to be especially significant for people in the Caribbean and elsewhere who have long claimed indigenous Taíno heritage, despite some historical narratives that inaccurately brand them “extinct”. Such misrepresentations have been heavily criticised by historians and archaeologists, as well as by descendant communities themselves, but until now they lacked clear genetic evidence to support their case.

According ST JOHN’S COLLEGE, UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE

Remains of a 2,600-year-old statue with an inscription written in Egyptian hieroglyphics has been discovered in a temple at Dangeil, an archaeological site along the Nile River in Sudan.

Found in an ancient temple dedicated to the Egyptian god Amun, the statue depicts Aspelta, who was the ruler of the Kush kingdom between 593 B.C. and 568 B.C. Some of Aspelta’s predecessors had ruled Egypt, located to the north of Kush. Though Aspelta didn’t control Egypt, the inscription says (in translation) that he was “King of Upper and Lower Egypt” and was “Beloved of Re’-Harakhty” (a form of the Egyptian sun god “Re”) and that Aspelta was “given all life, stability and dominion forever.”

“Being ‘Beloved of a god’ confers legitimacy on a ruler,” wrote archaeologists Julie Anderson, Rihab Khidir el-Rasheed and Mahmoud Suliman Bashir, who co-direct excavations at Dangeil, in an article published recently in the journal Sudan and Nubia. The “Kushite kings were closely tied to Re,” they noted.

Read more:

https://www.livescience.com/61801-ancient-statue-nubian-king.html

Youngsters have probably been playing their way into cultural competence for at least tens of thousands of years. So why are signs of children largely absent from the archaeological record?

A cartoon that Biblical scholar Kristine Garroway taped up in her college dorm helps to explain kids’ invisibility at ancient sites: Two men in business suits stare intently at an unidentifiable round object sitting on a table. “Hey, what’s this?” asks the first guy. “I dunno, probably a toy … or a religious object,” says the second.

Archaeologists have long tended to choose the second option, says Garroway, now a visiting scientist at Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion in Los Angeles. Ambiguous finds, such as miniature pottery vessels and small figurines, get classified as ritual or decorative objects. Some of these artifacts undoubtedly were used in ceremonies. But not all of them, Garroway argues.

Read more:

https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ancient-toys-kids-archaeological-record

Archeologists have found characters older than oracle-bone scripts in the city of Chifeng in North China’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region.

National Museum of China experts confirmed the 4,000-year-old marks were three or four characters left by animal-fur brush with ink, said Lian Jilin, a staff member at the regional research institute of cultural heritage and archeology institute.

They were found on a pottery piece unearthed by the institute and Jilin University at Gaojiataizi, an area of over 10,000 square meters of ruins from the Lower Xiajiadian Culture. The words, written smoothly, are believed to be connected with sacrificial activities. Pottery scripts, together with oracle bones and bronze objects, are known for their longevity.

“The oracle bones, scripts from some 3,000 years ago in the Shang Dynasty [C.1600-1046 BC], may have originated with pottery scripts,” Li said, adding the discovery has offered new evidence to trace the origin. Animal bones, pottery and stone articles were also unearthed at the ruins.

The Lower Xiajiadian Culture, a branch of the northern bronze culture during the Xia (C.2070-C.1600 BC) and Shang dynasties, dates back to 3,500-4,000 years ago, between the late Neolithic Age and the Bronze Age.

The Lower Xiajiadian site in Chifeng was listed as one of the top archeological discoveries in China in 2009.

Local media in Pakistan reported human rights champion Asma Jahangir has died. She died in a hospital on Sunday morning after suffering from cardiac arrest.

Asma Jilani Jahangir was a Pakistani human rights lawyer and social activist who co-founded and chaired the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan

The pro-democracy activist championed women’s rights throughout her career. Asma Jahangir was also UN special rapporter on human rights in Iran.

Peru’s Nazca Lines, an ancient archaeological site and UNESCO World Heritage site, were damaged after a driver plowed a cargo truck through the sand, officials announced on Tuesday. 

The driver left “deep prints in an area approximately 100 meters long,” and damaged part of three geoglyph lines, according to a statement given to Agence France-Presse. 

He ignored warning signs that tell drivers not to enter the area, and drove over the lines on January 27, AFP reported. The man was detained and had charges filed against him.