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Astronomy / Space Science - History / Archeology - 05.09.2022

Red Giant Betelgeuse was yellow some 2,000 years ago

Chemistry - History / Archeology - 01.08.2022

Researchers study historical developments of the periodic system of chemical elements
In the 1860s, the chemists, Lothar Meyer and Dmitri Mendeleev, independently presented the first periodic system. Since then, the well-known tabular arrangement of the elements has been the guiding principle of chemistry. A team of researchers from the Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences and the Interdisciplinary Center for Bioinformatics at the University of Leipzig provides computational approaches based on extensive data sets from the Reaxys chemistry database that explain the development of the first periodic systems.

Environment - History / Archeology - 01.08.2022

The Bantu expansion took a rainforest route
Early Bantu speakers crossed through the dense Central African Rainforest 4,000 years ago The study used novel computational approaches and linguistic data from more than 400 Bantu languages to reconstruct the historic migration routes. The project was a collaboration between scientists from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, Germany, and researchers at the University of Auckland in New Zealand.

History / Archeology - Earth Sciences - 18.07.2022

In Search of the Lost City of Natounia
Archaeological investigations offer up new findings on the history of Parthian settlements in Iraqi Kurdistan The mountain fortress of Rabana-Merquly in modern Iraqi Kurdistan was one of the major regional centres of the Parthian Empire, which extended over parts of Iran and Mesopotamia approximately 2,000 years ago.

History / Archeology - 22.06.2022

Britains earliest humans
Homo heidelbergensis may have occupied southern Britain between 560,000 and 620,000 years ago Archaeological discoveries made on the outskirts of Canterbury, Kent (England) confirm the presence of early humans in southern Britain between 560,000 and 620,000 years ago. The breakthrough, involving controlled excavations and radiometric dating, comes a century after stone tool artefacts were first uncovered at the site.

History / Archeology - 17.06.2022

New finds at temple city of Heliopolis
During recently completed excavations in northeastern Cairo, an Egyptian-German excavation team of archaeologists has found important evidence from the history of the temple city of Heliopolis. It includes the foundation of a limestone wall, which was discovered running from north to south about 55 metres west of the still-standing obelisk of Heliopolis.

History / Archeology - Life Sciences - 15.06.2022

Origins of the Black Death identified
Multidisciplinary team studied ancient plague genomes The Black Death, the biggest pandemic of our history, was caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis and lasted in Europe between the years 1346 and 1353. Despite the pandemic's immense demographic and societal impacts, its origins have long been elusive.

Life Sciences - History / Archeology - 09.06.2022

Pre-historic Wallacea - a melting pot of human genetic ancestries
The Wallacean islands of present-day Eastern Indonesia have a long history of occupation by modern humans. Notably, the maritime expansion of Austronesian speakers into Wallacea left archaeological traces of a Neolithic lifestyle and a genetic imprint still detectable in Eastern Indonesians today.

History / Archeology - 07.06.2022

How chickens were domesticated
How the chicken came to man and found its way to Europe: Major new international research reveals new evidence about when, where, and how chickens were domesticated New research transforms our understanding of the circumstances and timing of the domestication of chickens, their spread across Asia into the west, and reveals the changing way in which they were perceived in societies over the past 3500 years.

Paleontology - History / Archeology - 07.06.2022

A long history of European geckos
Geckos lived in Europe as early as 47 million years ago, say palaeontologists who have examined a nearly complete fossil gecko skull from central Germany. This previously unknown species was found in a former coalmining area - Geiseltal - and was described by a research team led by Dr. Andrea Villa of the Catalan Institute of Palaeontology Miquel Crusafont in Barcelona and biogeologist Dr. Márton Rabi of the University of Tübingen and Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg.

History / Archeology - Environment - 30.05.2022

A 3400-year-old city emerges from the Tigris River
A team of German and Kurdish archaeologists have uncovered a 3400-year-old Mittani Empire-era city once located on the Tigris River. The settlement emerged from the waters of the Mosul reservoir early this year as water levels fell rapidly due to extreme drought in Iraq. The extensive city with a palace and several large buildings could be ancient Zakhiku - believed to have been an important center in the Mittani Empire (ca. BC).

History / Archeology - Innovation - 25.05.2022

Early urbanism found in the Amazon
Archaeologists reveal pre-Hispanic cities in Bolivia with laser technology LIDAR Several hundred settlements from the time between 500 and 1400 AD lie in the Bolivian Llanos de Mojos savannah and have fascinated archaeologists for years. Researchers from the German Archaeological Institute, the University of Bonn and the University of Exeter have now visualized the dimensions of the largest known settlement of the so-called Casarabe culture.

History / Archeology - 17.05.2022

Spectacular ceiling paintings discovered in the temple of Esna
German and Egyptian researchers have uncovered a series of colourful ceiling paintings in the temple of Esna in Upper Egypt. As Professor Christian Leitz of the University of Tübingen reported, the relief-like images of the central ceiling section are a total of 46 depictions of the Upper Egyptian crown goddess Nechbet and the Lower Egyptian crown goddess Wadjet.

History / Archeology - 17.05.2022

Spectacular ceiling frescoes discovered in the Temple of Khnum at Esna
In the Temple of Khnum at Esna, Upper Egypt, German and Egyptian researchers have uncovered a series of vibrantly-colored ceiling frescoes. The relief images in the central section of the ceiling, Professor Christian Leitz from the University of Tübingen reports, make up a total of 46 depictions of the Upper-Egyptian vulture goddess Nekhbet and the Lower-Egyptian serpent goddess Wadjet.

History / Archeology - Life Sciences - 03.05.2022

Spread of black rats was linked to human historical events
New research reveals how the black rat colonised Europe in the Roman and Medieval periods New ancient DNA analysis has shed light on how the black rat, blamed for spreading Black Death, dispersed across Europe - revealing that the rodent colonised the continent on two occasions in the Roman and Medieval periods.

Environment - History / Archeology - 26.04.2022

Neanderthals of the North
A multidisciplinary research team from the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig, the Friedrich Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg, the Leuphana University Lüneburg, the Leibniz Institute for Applied Geophysics and other partner institutions investigated whether Neanderthals were well adapted to life in the cold or preferred more temperate environmental conditions.

History / Archeology - Life Sciences - 01.04.2022

Origins of the Avars elucidated with ancient DNA
Multidisciplinary research team sheds light on the 1,400-year-old mystery about the genetic origins of the Avar elite Less known than Attila's Huns, the Avars were their more successful successors. They ruled much of Central and Eastern Europe for almost 250 years. We know that they came from Central Asia in the sixth century CE, but ancient authors and modern historians debated their provenance.

Environment - History / Archeology - 01.02.2022

Reconstruction of the history of mankind Early human settlement on the Arabian Peninsula less influenced by climate than previously thought
Research team detects early Stone Age settlement during dry periods 210,000 years ago An international team of researchers from the Sharjah Archaeology Authority/United Arab Emirates (UAE) and the Universities of Tübingen and Freiburg as well as Oxford Brookes/England led by Dr. Knut Bretzke from the University of Tübingen and Frank Preusser from the Institute of Earth and Environmental Sciences at the University of Freiburg has uncovered

History / Archeology - Social Sciences - 07.01.2022

Tracing the origins of human remains from colonial contexts
A scalp from Namibia and skulls from Tanzania and Papua New Guinea: these are examples of human remains from University of Jena collections that found their way to Germany during the colonial period. Extensive research has been necessary to uncover the precise origins and history of these human remains, as identification is nearly always difficult and labour-intensive.

History / Archeology - 28.10.2021

Team of archaeologists finds monumental antique temple: Münster researchers investigate a previously unknown sanctuary from the Roman era
Last summer, archaeologists from the University of Münster discovered a previously unknown sanctuary from the Roman era during excavation work in the ancient town of Doliche in south-eastern Turkey. Over a period of nine weeks, the team - headed by Prof. Engelbert Winter and Prof. Michael Blömer from the Asia Minor Research Centre -uncovered parts of a large temple notable not only for its size but also for its unusual form.