I saw this and thought I'd share it; by Kevin Gibbs, UofT:
In June and July of 2006, the University of Toronto's Wadi Ziqlab Project resumed excavations on an old terrace in Northern Jordan where there are buried traces of occupation during the Epipalaeolithic, Late Neolithic (c. 5800-5300 cal BC), and Early Bronze Age (c. 3500 cal BC). These follow earlier excavations there in 2002 and 2004 (Banning et al. 2003, 2004, 2005; Maher & Banning, 2001).
Large amounts of Late Neolithic material occur at the site, but architecture and features are rare and generally insubstantial, while apparently outdoor surfaces covered with flat-lying debris are extensive. Cobblestone floors and platforms occur in several places, but they are not associated with walls, suggesting the possibility of tents or other light structures.
Some segments of Late Neolithic stone walls or wall foundations do occur, one of which is curved and may belong to a circular building with a hearth. The distribution of features leaves an overall impression of somewhat extensive, not very dense occupation of the site in this period, although it is possible that more substantial buildings, similar to ones of the same period found at Tabaqat al-Bûma only 7km upstream (Banning et al. 1994), might simply lie in a different part of the site.
Late Neolithic artefacts from al-Basatîn include denticulated sickle elements, including several unfinished ones that indicate that denticulation took place before giving them their final shape (Kadowaki 2005). There are also flint axes, adzes, and chisels made by bifacial flaking, pecking, and battering, followed by grinding and polishing at their cutting edges. A cortical scraper found down slope at site WZ 140, made on a broad, nearly flat flake, is similar to ones from Tabaqat al-Bûma. Projectile points appear to have been rare or lacking at the site, apart from some that, like a few other tools we have found, are probably residual from some earlier Pre-Pottery Neolithic occupation nearby. Most of the grinding stones found at the site are handstones and pounders, although a large basalt quern or lower milling stone was found in the 2002 excavation.
The poorly fired and friable Late Neolithic pottery includes jars and bowls that are only rarely decorated. Some sherds are combed or roughened on the surface, occasionally with wavy or alternating patterns of combing. A few sherds show punctates, sometimes in conjunction with other decorative techniques. Red or black slip is not uncommon, sometimes accompanied by burnishing. A few bases show pebble or mat impressions on the bottom. Both ledge and loop handles occur.
Faunal remains from the Late Neolithic deposits indicate a reliance on sheep and goat supplemented by cattle (Bos taurus), and pig (Sus scrofa), while rarer instances of deer (Cervus sp.) and gazelle (Gazella sp.) indicate much less attention to hunting than in the Pre-Pottery Neolithic. Preservation of plant remains is poor on the site, but sickle elements and grinding equipment survive from harvest and processing of grain.
The overlying Early Bronze I level also seems fairly extensive with not very dense architecture. However, the 2004 excavation did uncover part of one apsidal house and several walls that could belong to others (Banning et al. 2005). The pottery, with many coarsely tempered holemouth and necked jars as well as some finer hemispherical bowls, sometimes shows simple decoration consisting of a row of oblique impressions just below the rim.
Radiocarbon assays on samples collected in 2004 have yielded two dates on organic residues from sherds found on a Late Neolithic surface of 6710±70 and 6650±140 BP. Eight of nine samples of charcoal or olive pits from Early Bronze contexts produced dates ranging from 4790±50 to 4400±60 BP.
Thursday, July 9, 2009
Wednesday, July 1, 2009
Who Came Before The Egyptians?
According to them, the first advanced civilization is the Egyptian, dated back over three thousand years BC. The reason that no preceding civilization is recognized is that no recognized remains of a preceding civilization have been found.
Here comes the importance of the underwater finds to the fore. The most important problem of any archaeological investigation, and certainly of ancient archaeology, is the problem if dating. The underwater remains can be dated roughly, because we have knowledge about the sea levels through time. Regions that are now a few dozens of meters under water, like considerable parts of the Caribbean and in Europe much of the North Sea, were above water some eight to ten thousand years ago. If the Yogaguni remains form part of this unrecognized civilization, this civilization can be dated back to times preceding the rise in sea level from ten thousand years ago. The only way out here is the possibility of lowering of the land itself, but usually these processes play on a much larger timescale than changes in seawater levels.
The conclusion can only be that with the Yonaguni finds we do have the remains of a preceding civilization. The remaining question is: if these remains are of the introduced earth spanning civilization, why aren't there much more signs from it?
This problem is the one for which Hapgood's investigations are essential. The natural disasters described in Cataclysm strike anything on earth, but especially a possibly existing civilization. The coastal residences, often the most important, will be wiped out by the tidal waves, and all others will lose all of there buildings and much of their population due to the earthquakes. When this has passed, the sudden change in climate will ruin their harvests, and the quick rise in sea level will flood all what remains of their coastal settlements.
If this description is correct, it is clear that relatively little will remain of this suggested civilization, and the less will remain the more this civilization was concentrated on living near the sea. Subsequently, what remained of the civilization has to survive through about ten thousand years, in order to be found by us. This rules out organic material and normal metals, will leaves stone and precious metals. If the latter had no value to the civilization, the only possible remains are stones.
Almost all of the remarkable finds described here have been of features made in stone. They are from under water and from above, and from the latter we have indications of damage by Hapgood-like disasters, and/or the knowledge of these disasters.
So the position of regular history and archaeology, that no remains of a preceding civilization have been found, is under pressure from the growing number of remains that is being found.
The investigation of scientific progress has found a rule for how such a process develops: at first the data that doesn’t fit is ignored, when it gets a bit more it is suppressed by disqualifying its sources, and when finally the amount of data gets too much or some decisive fact is found, the overall community changes its opinion in the sense in that they say that they always silently supported the new view, but it was the collegues who held them back. This process is so widespread, that there is has gotten its own name: paradigm shift.
This shift is the recognition of a civilization preceding the Egyptian one, from antediluvian times.
http://www.altarcheologie.nl/
Here comes the importance of the underwater finds to the fore. The most important problem of any archaeological investigation, and certainly of ancient archaeology, is the problem if dating. The underwater remains can be dated roughly, because we have knowledge about the sea levels through time. Regions that are now a few dozens of meters under water, like considerable parts of the Caribbean and in Europe much of the North Sea, were above water some eight to ten thousand years ago. If the Yogaguni remains form part of this unrecognized civilization, this civilization can be dated back to times preceding the rise in sea level from ten thousand years ago. The only way out here is the possibility of lowering of the land itself, but usually these processes play on a much larger timescale than changes in seawater levels.
The conclusion can only be that with the Yonaguni finds we do have the remains of a preceding civilization. The remaining question is: if these remains are of the introduced earth spanning civilization, why aren't there much more signs from it?
This problem is the one for which Hapgood's investigations are essential. The natural disasters described in Cataclysm strike anything on earth, but especially a possibly existing civilization. The coastal residences, often the most important, will be wiped out by the tidal waves, and all others will lose all of there buildings and much of their population due to the earthquakes. When this has passed, the sudden change in climate will ruin their harvests, and the quick rise in sea level will flood all what remains of their coastal settlements.
If this description is correct, it is clear that relatively little will remain of this suggested civilization, and the less will remain the more this civilization was concentrated on living near the sea. Subsequently, what remained of the civilization has to survive through about ten thousand years, in order to be found by us. This rules out organic material and normal metals, will leaves stone and precious metals. If the latter had no value to the civilization, the only possible remains are stones.
Almost all of the remarkable finds described here have been of features made in stone. They are from under water and from above, and from the latter we have indications of damage by Hapgood-like disasters, and/or the knowledge of these disasters.
So the position of regular history and archaeology, that no remains of a preceding civilization have been found, is under pressure from the growing number of remains that is being found.
The investigation of scientific progress has found a rule for how such a process develops: at first the data that doesn’t fit is ignored, when it gets a bit more it is suppressed by disqualifying its sources, and when finally the amount of data gets too much or some decisive fact is found, the overall community changes its opinion in the sense in that they say that they always silently supported the new view, but it was the collegues who held them back. This process is so widespread, that there is has gotten its own name: paradigm shift.
This shift is the recognition of a civilization preceding the Egyptian one, from antediluvian times.
http://www.altarcheologie.nl/
Some Things Never Change
June 16, 2009--Inside France's 25,000-year-old Pech Merle cave, hand stencils surround the famed "Spotted Horses" mural.
For about as long as humans have created works of art, they've also left behind handprints. People began stenciling, painting, or chipping imprints of their hands onto rock walls at least 30,000 years ago.
Until recently, most scientists assumed these prehistoric handprints were male. But "even a superficial examination of published photos suggested to me that there were lots of female hands there," Pennsylvania State University archaeologist Dean Snow said of European cave art.
By measuring and analyzing the Pech Merle hand stencils, Snow found that many were indeed female.
-------------
June 24, 2009
A vulture-bone flute discovered in a European cave is likely the world's oldest recognizable musical instrument and pushes back humanity's musical roots, a new study says.
Found with fragments of mammoth-ivory flutes, the 40,000-year-old artifact also adds to evidence that music may have given the first European modern humans a strategic advantage over Neanderthals, researchers say.
The bone-flute pieces were found in 2008 at Hohle Fels, a Stone Age cave in southern Germany, according to the study, led by archaeologist Nicholas Conard of the University of Tübingen in Germany.
With five finger holes and a V-shaped mouthpiece, the almost complete bird-bone flute—made from the naturally hollow wing bone of a griffon vulture—is just 0.3 inch (8 millimeters) wide and was originally about 13 inches (34 centimeters) long.
Flute fragments found earlier at the nearby site of Geissenklösterle have been dated to around 35,000 years ago.
The newfound flutes, though, "date to the very period of settlement in the region by modern humans ... about 40,000 years ago," Conard said.
The mammoth-ivory flutes would have been especially challenging to make, the team said.
Using only stone tools, the flute maker would have had to split a section of curved ivory along its natural grain. The two halves would then have been hollowed out, carved, and fitted together with an airtight seal.
Music as a Weapon?
Music may have been one of the cultural accomplishments that gave the first European modern-human (Homo sapiens) settlers an advantage over their now extinct Neanderthal-human (Homo neanderthalis) cousins, according to the team.
The ancient flutes are evidence for an early musical tradition that likely helped modern humans communicate and form tighter social bonds, the researchers argue.
For about as long as humans have created works of art, they've also left behind handprints. People began stenciling, painting, or chipping imprints of their hands onto rock walls at least 30,000 years ago.
Until recently, most scientists assumed these prehistoric handprints were male. But "even a superficial examination of published photos suggested to me that there were lots of female hands there," Pennsylvania State University archaeologist Dean Snow said of European cave art.
By measuring and analyzing the Pech Merle hand stencils, Snow found that many were indeed female.
-------------
June 24, 2009
A vulture-bone flute discovered in a European cave is likely the world's oldest recognizable musical instrument and pushes back humanity's musical roots, a new study says.
Found with fragments of mammoth-ivory flutes, the 40,000-year-old artifact also adds to evidence that music may have given the first European modern humans a strategic advantage over Neanderthals, researchers say.
The bone-flute pieces were found in 2008 at Hohle Fels, a Stone Age cave in southern Germany, according to the study, led by archaeologist Nicholas Conard of the University of Tübingen in Germany.
With five finger holes and a V-shaped mouthpiece, the almost complete bird-bone flute—made from the naturally hollow wing bone of a griffon vulture—is just 0.3 inch (8 millimeters) wide and was originally about 13 inches (34 centimeters) long.
Flute fragments found earlier at the nearby site of Geissenklösterle have been dated to around 35,000 years ago.
The newfound flutes, though, "date to the very period of settlement in the region by modern humans ... about 40,000 years ago," Conard said.
The mammoth-ivory flutes would have been especially challenging to make, the team said.
Using only stone tools, the flute maker would have had to split a section of curved ivory along its natural grain. The two halves would then have been hollowed out, carved, and fitted together with an airtight seal.
Music as a Weapon?
Music may have been one of the cultural accomplishments that gave the first European modern-human (Homo sapiens) settlers an advantage over their now extinct Neanderthal-human (Homo neanderthalis) cousins, according to the team.
The ancient flutes are evidence for an early musical tradition that likely helped modern humans communicate and form tighter social bonds, the researchers argue.
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