- Cyclone death toll in Mayotte rises to 39
- Ecuador vice president says Noboa seeking her 'banishment'
- Leicester boss Van Nistelrooy aware of 'bigger picture' as Liverpool await
- Syria authorities say armed groups have agreed to disband
- Maresca expects Man City to be in title hunt as he downplays Chelsea's chancs
- Man Utd boss Amorim vows to stay on course despite Rashford row
- South Africa opt for all-pace attack against Pakistan
- Guardiola adamant Man City slump not all about Haaland
- Global stocks mostly higher in thin pre-Christmas trade
- Bethlehem marks sombre Christmas under shadow of war
- NASA probe makes closest ever pass by the Sun
- 11 killed in blast at Turkey explosives plant
- Indonesia considers parole for ex-terror chiefs: official
- Global stocks mostly rise in thin pre-Christmas trade
- Postecoglou says Spurs 'need to reinforce' in transfer window
- Le Pen says days of new French govt numbered
- Global stocks mostly rise after US tech rally
- Villa boss Emery set for 'very difficult' clash with Newcastle
- Investors swoop in to save German flying taxi startup
- How Finnish youth learn to spot disinformation
- South Korean opposition postpones decision to impeach acting president
- 12 killed in blast at Turkey explosives plant
- Panama leaders past and present reject Trump's threat of Canal takeover
- Hong Kong police issue fresh bounties for activists overseas
- Saving the mysterious African manatee at Cameroon hotspot
- India consider second spinner for Boxing Day Test
- London wall illuminates Covid's enduring pain at Christmas
- Poyet appointed manager at South Korea's Jeonbuk
- South Korea's opposition vows to impeach acting president
- The tsunami detection buoys safeguarding lives in Thailand
- Teen Konstas to open for Australia in Boxing Day India Test
- Asian stocks mostly up after US tech rally
- US panel could not reach consensus on US-Japan steel deal: Nippon
- The real-life violence that inspired South Korea's 'Squid Game'
- Blogs to Bluesky: social media shifts responses after 2004 tsunami
- Tennis power couple de Minaur and Boulter get engaged
- Supermaxi yachts eye record in gruelling Sydney-Hobart race
- Hawaii's Kilauea volcano erupts, spewing columns of lava
- The Melrose Group Demands Hank Payments Management Facilitate Requisitioned Shareholder Meetings
- MedMira receives Health Canada approval for its Multiplo(R) Rapid (TP/HIV) Test for Syphilis and HIV
- The Glimpse Group Regains Compliance with NASDAQ
- Sokoman Minerals Completes Phase 1 Diamond Drilling Program Fleur de Lys Gold Project, NW Newfoundland
- Canadian Government Provides C$100 Million Financing LOI to Green Technology Metals in Support of Electric Royalties' Flagship Lithium Royalty Asset in Ontario
- Sendero Resources Announces First Tranche Closing of Its Non-Brokered Private Placement
- EVSX Completes Installation of Multi Chemistry Line
- InterContinental Hotels Group PLC Announces Transaction in Own Shares - December 24
- El Salvador Congress votes to end ban on metal mining
- Five things to know about Panama Canal, in Trump's sights
- NBA fines Minnesota guard Edwards $75,000 for outburst
- Haitians massacred for practicing voodoo were abducted, hacked to death: UN
SCS | 0.55% | 11.715 | $ | |
BCE | 0.34% | 22.919 | $ | |
CMSC | -0.68% | 23.74 | $ | |
BCC | 0.91% | 123.36 | $ | |
RIO | -0.11% | 59.165 | $ | |
JRI | 0.74% | 12.19 | $ | |
CMSD | -0.51% | 23.43 | $ | |
GSK | -0.37% | 33.935 | $ | |
NGG | -0.32% | 58.83 | $ | |
AZN | -0.5% | 66.3 | $ | |
RYCEF | 0% | 7.25 | $ | |
BP | 0.18% | 28.801 | $ | |
RELX | 0.53% | 45.835 | $ | |
VOD | 0.71% | 8.43 | $ | |
RBGPF | -1.17% | 59.8 | $ | |
BTI | -0.01% | 36.215 | $ |
Massive trove of ancient artifacts, skeletons found in Brazil
Workers were just starting construction on a new apartment complex in northeastern Brazil when they began finding human bones and pottery shards, their edges worn smooth by time.
Soon, excavations at the site in the coastal city of Sao Luis had uncovered thousands of artifacts left by ancient peoples up to 9,000 years ago -- a treasure trove archaeologists say could rewrite the history of human settlement in Brazil.
The lead archaeologist on the dig, Wellington Lage, says he had no idea what he was getting into when Brazilian construction giant MRV hired his company, W Lage Arqueologia, in 2019 to carry out an impact study at the site -- part of the routine procedure of preparing to build an apartment building.
Covered in tropical vegetation and bordered by the urban sprawl of Sao Luis, the capital of Maranhao state, the six-hectare (15-acre) plot was known as Rosane's Farm, for the daughter of a late local landholder.
Researching the site, Lage learned intriguing vestiges had been found in the area since the 1970s, including part of a human jawbone in 1991.
His team soon found much more: a flood of stone tools, ceramic shards, decorated shells and bones.
In four years of digging, they have unearthed 43 human skeletons and more than 100,000 artifacts, according to Brazil's Institute for National Historic and Artistic Heritage (IPHAN), which announced the discovery this week, calling it "grandiose."
Researchers now plan to catalogue the artifacts, analyze them in detail, put them on display and publish their findings.
"We've been working four years now, and we've barely scratched the surface," said Lage, a 70-year-old Sao Paulo native whose wife and two children are also archaeologists.
- Rewriting history -
The preliminary findings are already grabbing attention in the scientific community.
Lage says his team -- which grew to 27 people in all, including archaeologists, chemists, a historian and a documentary filmmaker -- has found four distinct eras of occupation at the site.
The top layer was left by the Tupinamba people, who inhabited the region when European colonizers founded Sao Luis in 1612.
Then comes a layer of artifacts typical of Amazon rainforest peoples, followed by a "sambaqui": a mound of pottery, shells and bones used by some Indigenous groups to build their homes or bury their dead.
Beneath that, around two meters (6.5 feet) below the surface, lies another layer, left by a group that made rudimentary ceramics and lived around 8,000 to 9,000 years ago, based on the depth of the find.
That is far older than the oldest documented "pre-sambaqui" settlement found so far in the region, which dates to 6,600 years ago, Lage said.
"This could completely change the history of not just the region but all of Brazil," he told AFP.
Scientists have long debated exactly when and how humans arrived in and populated the Americas from Asia.
Lage's find suggests they settled this region of modern-day Brazil at least 1,400 years earlier than previously thought.
- 'Landmark' -
Archaeologists now plan to date the artifacts more precisely using isotopic analysis.
Already, the site "represents a landmark in our understanding of prehistoric Brazil," IPHAN said in a statement.
"It's a testament to the long history of human settlement (in the region), demonstrating it predates what had previously been recorded in Brazil."
Archaeologist Arkley Bandeira of the Federal University of Maranhao, which is building a lab and museum to house the artifacts with funding from MRV, said in a statement the site could provide valuable new insights into the culture and history of ancient peoples lost to the past.
"These finds... play a crucial role in narrating our long history," he said.
Y.Aukaiv--AMWN