Hacker News with Generative AI: Ancient History

Ancient DNA from the green Sahara reveals ancestral North African lineage (nature.com)
Although it is one of the most arid regions today, the Sahara Desert was a green savannah during the African Humid Period (AHP) between 14,500 and 5,000 years before present, with water bodies promoting human occupation and the spread of pastoralism in the middle Holocene epoch1.

Ancient History, Genetics, Africa, Climate Change, Archaeology

52 points by gnabgib 5 days ago | 6 comments

Ancient DNA Unveils the Cosmopolitan Heart of the Phoenician-Punic Civilization (allthathistory.com)
Imagine a bustling port in ancient Carthage, circa 600 BCE, where Phoenician sailors unload fragrant cedarwood from Lebanon, North African potters shape intricate ostrich-egg urns, and Sicilian merchants barter for shimmering Aegean textiles. This was the Punic world—a dazzling crossroads of cultures, united not by conquest but by the restless tides of trade and human connection.

Ancient History, Archaeology, Mediterranean History, Phoenicians, Genetics

25 points by speckx 8 days ago | 3 comments

A 2k-year-old battle ended in fire, and a tree species never recovered (arstechnica.com)
The buried roots and stumps of an ancient forest in southern China are the charred remains of an ancient war and the burning of a capital city, according to a recent study from researchers who carbon-dated the stumps and measured charcoal and pollen in the layers of peat surrounding them.

Ancient History, Archaeology, Climate Change, Environmental Science

7 points by pseudolus 14 days ago | 0 comments

Peru's ancient irrigation systems turned deserts into farms because of culture (theconversation.com)
Seeing the north coast of Peru for the first time, you would be hard-pressed to believe it’s one of the driest deserts in the world.

Ancient History, Agriculture, Peru, Culture, Deserts

158 points by PaulHoule 22 days ago | 78 comments

7k-year-old skeletons from the green Sahara reveal a mysterious human lineage (smithsonianmag.com)
Researchers recently sequenced the genomes of two naturally mummified women found in Libya

Ancient History, Genetics, Archaeology, Africa

96 points by pseudolus 27 days ago | 33 comments

Comparing economic inequality between the Roman Empire and the Han Dynasty (phys.org)
A trio of researchers from Bocconi University, in Italy, the University of Cambridge, in the U.K., and Stanford University, in the U.S., has found that there was more economic inequality under the Han Dynasty than during the Roman Empire.

History, Economics, China, Rome, Ancient History

67 points by gradus_ad 29 days ago | 71 comments

2,200-year-old pyramid filled with coins and weapons found near Dead Sea (livescience.com)

Archaeology, History, Ancient History, Israel

31 points by permo-w 42 days ago | 10 comments

Ancient DNA Shows Stone Age Europeans Voyaged by Sea to Africa (nature.com)
Ancient DNA shows Stone Age Europeans voyaged by sea to Africa

Ancient History, Genetics, Archaeology, Africa, Europe

120 points by gmays 50 days ago | 54 comments

The Siege of Syracuse: A Roman General vs. a Greek Genius (2020) (historynet.com)
The Second Punic War, fought between ancient Rome and Carthage, is most well-known for the clashes of the legendary Hannibal with Roman commanders. An often-overlooked engagement during this war is the Siege of Syracuse, from 213-212 BC, which tested strategic military might against feats of engineering. This contest pitted Marcus Claudius Marcellus, a Roman general renowned for his power in single combat, against the Greek mathematical genius Archimedes.

Military History, Ancient History, Siege Warfare, Greece, Rome

6 points by walterbell 53 days ago | 3 comments

Ostrich Egg-Shell Cups of Mesopotamia, Ostrich in Ancient, Modern Times (1926) (publicdomainreview.org)
In the early 1920s, British archaeological excavator Ernest Mackay unearthed an egg at the Sumerian cemetery of Kish, in modern-day Iraq’s Babil Governate.

Archaeology, History, Mesopotamia, Ancient History, Ostriches

12 points by crescit_eundo 58 days ago | 0 comments

Ancient human DNA recovered from a Palaeolithic pendant (nature.com)
Artefacts made from stones, bones and teeth are fundamental to our understanding of human subsistence strategies, behaviour and culture in the Pleistocene.

Archaeology, Genetics, Ancient History, Paleolithic

44 points by wglb 63 days ago | 2 comments

Woman's DNA discovered in 20k year old deer-tooth pendant (2023) (cbc.ca)
Scientists have discovered a woman's DNA preserved in a 20,000 year old deer-tooth pendant.

Archeology, Genetics, Ancient History, DNA, Prehistoric Artifacts

174 points by pseudolus 63 days ago | 78 comments

Game Theory and Settling the Debts of the Deceased in Ancient Times (blogspot.com)
Humans who lived hundreds or thousands of years ago often get a bad rap.

Game Theory, History, Ancient History

59 points by stevefan1999 66 days ago | 5 comments

Why Vermont farmers are using urine on their crops (bbc.com)
Urine was used as fertiliser in ancient Rome and China. Now farmers in Vermont are bringing this practice back to boost harvests and grow crops in a more sustainable way.

Agriculture, Sustainability, Vermont, Fertilizer, Ancient History

118 points by rmason 68 days ago | 122 comments

First pharaoh's tomb found in Egypt since Tutankhamun's (bbc.com)
Egyptologists have discovered the first tomb of a pharaoh since Tutankhamun's was uncovered over a century ago.

Archeology, Egypt, History, Ancient History

4 points by below43 78 days ago | 1 comments

Seeing Through the Spartan Mirage (worldhistory.substack.com)
If you’re American, you’ve probably seen it on the rear window of a car or perhaps on a too-tight T-shirt on a muscly guy: two Greek words, “ΜΟΛΩΝ ΛΑΒΕ.”

Ancient History, Greece, Culture

103 points by crescit_eundo 79 days ago | 101 comments

Who carved South America's mysterious ancient tunnels? [pdf] (unesp.br)

South America, Archaeology, Ancient History, Mysteries

100 points by Qem 81 days ago | 45 comments

Major discovery of a pre-Roman necropolis in Trento (heritagedaily.com)
Archaeologists in Trento, Italy, have discovered a monumental pre-Roman necropolis containing high-status tombs and associated grave goods.

Archaeology, History, Italy, Ancient History, Necropolis

4 points by meraxes 86 days ago | 0 comments

Ancient Celtic tribe had women at its social center (npr.org)
Ancient DNA reveals that during the Iron Age, women in ancient Celtic societies were at the center of their social networks — unlike previous eras of prehistory.

Ancient History, Archaeology, Genetics, Celtic Culture, Women's History

11 points by rbanffy 108 days ago | 0 comments

Derveni Papyrus (wikipedia.org)
The Derveni papyrus is an Ancient Greek papyrus roll that was discovered in 1962 at the archaeological site of Derveni, near Thessaloniki, in Central Macedonia.

Ancient History, Greece, Archaeology

13 points by Hooke 108 days ago | 0 comments

2,100-year-old Alexander the Great mosaic analyzed for restoration (phys.org)
In 333 BCE, near the small Pinarus River along the modern-day borders of Turkey and Syria, a fierce battle took place between the forces of Alexander the Great and the Persian king Darius III.

History, Archaeology, Ancient History, Restoration

47 points by pseudolus 109 days ago | 9 comments

Byzantine-Sassanian War (602-628 CE): The Last Great War of Antiquity (2023) (thecollector.com)
After many years of conflict, the Sassanians and Byzantines fought one last great war that nearly destroyed both empires.

Byzantine Empire, Sassanid Empire, Military History, Ancient History, War

136 points by teleforce 112 days ago | 83 comments

Ancient DNA may rewrite prehistory in India (bbc.com)
New research using ancient DNA is rewriting prehistory in India - and shows that its civilisation is the result of multiple ancient migrations, writes Tony Joseph.

Ancient History, India, Genetics, Archaeology, Migration

4 points by akbarnama 123 days ago | 1 comments

Reading the Unreadable: Seales and Team Reveal Dead Sea Scroll Text (uknow.uky.edu)
LEXINGTON, Ky. (July 23 2020) — It’s a 25,000-piece puzzle that researchers have longed to solve. That’s because the 25,000 fragments represent the Dead Sea Scrolls, and inside are ancient secrets — mysteries that have been locked away for 2,000 years.

Archaeology, History, Ancient History

3 points by handfuloflight 129 days ago | 0 comments

Storing 3D scans in a grain of wheat (wafaabilal.com)
Splicing ancient Mesopotamian civilization with post-cultural planetary futures through a poetic act of preservation, my latest work, In a Grain of Wheat, is an interdisciplinary artwork that archives the 3,000 year-old Winged Bull of Nineveh inside the DNA of Iraqi wheat seeds.

Art, Biotechnology, Archaeology, Ancient History

20 points by whoisstan 133 days ago | 4 comments

Ancient Indus Valley Script Deciphered (indusscript.net)
The official Indus inscriptions repository

Ancient History, Archaeology, Linguistics, India

8 points by samagra14 134 days ago | 2 comments

Ancient clay remedy may have potential to boost modern gut health (phys.org)
A team of scientists has discovered that an ancient medicinal clay known as Lemnian earth (LE) could inspire new understanding of how to support present-day gut health.

Ancient History, Gut Health, Medicine, Science

11 points by pseudolus 142 days ago | 2 comments

Study reveals mammoth as key food source for ancient Americans (uaf.edu)
Scientists have uncovered the first direct evidence that ancient Americans relied primarily on mammoth and other large animals for food.

Archaeology, Food, Ancient History, North America, Paleontology

108 points by stevenwoo 148 days ago | 75 comments

Precursors of Copernicus' heliocentric theory (wordpress.com)
Sometime between 410 and 420 AD, Martianus Capella came out with a book saying Mercury and Venus orbit the Sun, while the other planets orbit the Earth!

Astronomy, History, Science, Ancient History

54 points by chmaynard 153 days ago | 21 comments

Ancient texts reveal how Mesopotamians experienced emotions in their bodies (phys.org)
From feeling heavy-hearted to having butterflies in your stomach, it seems inherent to the human condition that we feel emotions in our bodies, not just in our brains. But have we always felt––or at least expressed––these feelings in the same way?

Ancient History, Anthropology, Psychology, Emotions

16 points by arto 156 days ago | 0 comments