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Transatlantic exploration took place centuries before the crossing of Columbus. Physical evidence for early European presence in the Americas can be found in Newfoundland, Canada 1 , 2 . However, it has thus far not been possible to determine when this activity took place 3 – 5 . Here we provide evidence that the Vikings were present in Newfoundland in ad  1021. We overcome the imprecision of previous age estimates by making use of the cosmic-ray-induced upsurge in atmospheric radiocarbon concentrations in ad  993 (ref.  6 ). Our new date lays down a marker for European cognisance of the Americas, and represents the first known point at which humans encircled the globe. It also provides a definitive tie point for future research into the initial consequences of transatlantic activity, such as the transference of knowledge, and the potential exchange of genetic information, biota and pathologies 7 , 8 . Precise dating of wooden artefacts at a Norse settlement in Newfoundland establishes that the Norse were in the Americas in ad  1021.

In accordance with ancient Egyptian beliefs, the preservation of the body after death was an important prerequisite for the continued existence of the deceased in the afterlife. This involved application of various physical interventions and magical rituals to the corpse. Computed tomography (CT), as the gold-standard technology in the field of paleoradiology, enables deeper insights into details of artificial body preservation. Therefore, CT was applied to investigate age at death, sex, mummification techniques, and the state of soft tissue preservation in 21 child mummies. The specimens are housed in European museums and were found in various archaeological sites. This sample included 12 males, 7 females, and two specimens of unknown sex, all between the ages of one and 14 years. Time periods were determined by radiocarbon dating, and time-related indicators of funerary equipment and decoration. Most of the mummies date from the Late Period to the Roman Period (664 BC–395 AD). Differences were identified concerning techniques of wrapping and embalming and removal of brain and internal organs, depending on age at death, social status and the archaeological site of the individuals. The variety and multifaceted nature of mummification and soft tissue preservation was analyzed in an integrated approach including a large number of specimens. The study highlights the significance of subadult remains as valuable bioarcheological archives to investigate burial customs and religious concepts in past societies.

For millennia, southern Kazakhstan has been at the center of population movements and cultural exchange, hosting numerous tribal unions and confederations. The social structures of the societies that formed these early states have been the subject of extensive research, interpreted primarily from burial structures and funerary rites. In a landscape dominated by kurgans, catacombs, and necropoles, little is known about the disposal of the dead in natural shelters like caves. In this paper, we present the initial results from the newly excavated site of Alpysbaev Cave located in Turkestan Province, southern Kazakhstan. Test excavations yielded several intersecting pits which contained disturbed adult and nonadult human remains (MNI = 4) as well as ceramic sherds, lithics, and by-products of combustion features. We radiocarbon dated material from our five lithostratigraphic units, which come from at least three distinct use phases spanning the Neolithic to early medieval and Iron Age periods. While the earliest lithostratigraphic unit contained human cranial fragments and faunal remains, most skeletal remains come from the Iron Age. We then present an integrated bioarchaeological and genetic evaluation of these remains and show evidence for subsistence practices, physical labour and pathological lesions among our sample.

The transition from the Neolithic to the Early Bronze Age in Central Europe has often been considered as a supra-regional uniform process, which led to the growing mastery of the new bronze technology. Since the 1920s, archaeologists have divided the Early Bronze Age into two chronological phases (Bronze A1 and A2), which were also seen as stages of technical progress. On the basis of the early radiocarbon dates from the cemetery of Singen, southern Germany, the beginning of the Early Bronze Age in Central Europe was originally dated around 2300/2200 BC and the transition to more complex casting techniques (i.e., Bronze A2) around 2000 BC. On the basis of 140 newly radiocarbon dated human remains from Final Neolithic, Early and Middle Bronze Age cemeteries south of Augsburg (Bavaria) and a re-dating of ten graves from the cemetery of Singen, we propose a significantly different dating range, which forces us to re-think the traditional relative and absolute chronologies as well as the narrative of technical development. We are now able to date the beginning of the Early Bronze Age to around 2150 BC and its end to around 1700 BC. Moreover, there is no transition between Bronze (Bz) A1 and Bronze (Bz) A2, but a complete overlap between the type objects of the two phases from 1900-1700 BC. We thus present a revised chronology of the assumed diagnostic type objects of the Early Bronze Age and recommend a radiocarbon-based view on the development of the material culture. Finally, we propose that the traditional phases Bz A1 and Bz A2 do not represent a chronological sequence, but regionally different social phenomena connected to the willingness of local actors to appropriate the new bronze technology.

Local-scale climate reconstruction in arid regions is challenging due to the scarcity of suitably preserved archives. While several well-studied climate proxy datasets exist for southeastern Arabia, including those preserved in speleothems, sedimentary deposits and paleosoils, and occasionally sediment cores collected for pollen analysis, snails have not yet been explored as a potential archive. This study investigates the potential of the terrestrial gastropod Zootecus insularis collected from geoarchaeological sections as new climate archive for arid environments. Isotope analysis was conducted on specimens from Holocene contexts in Oman to reconstruct long-term climate trends. Previously published water temperatures calculated from oxygen isotope data of Melanoides tuberculata , a freshwater gastropod species found in the same geoarchaeological sections as the terrestrial Zootecus shells, were interpolated to the age of the terrestrial snails, allowing for the recalculation of an oxygen isotope signal used to identify wet or dry periods. The resulting dataset showed a strong correlation with existing paleoclimate datasets from speleothems and paleolakes. Additionally, the δ 13 C values of Z. insularis indicated a significant shift towards more negative values over time, which probably suggests a transition from C4 grass-dominated vegetation to mixed C4/C3 xerophilic vegetation. This integrated approach suggests that snails could provide a valuable new archive for paleoclimate studies in arid regions.

Background Numerous megafauna species from northern latitudes went extinct during the Pleistocene/Holocene transition as a result of climate-induced habitat changes. However, several ungulate species managed to successfully track their habitats during this period to eventually flourish and recolonise the holarctic regions. So far, the genomic impacts of these climate fluctuations on ungulates from high latitudes have been little explored. Here, we assemble a de-novo genome for the European moose ( Alces alces ) and analyse it together with re-sequenced nuclear genomes and ancient and modern mitogenomes from across the moose range in Eurasia and North America. Results We found that moose demographic history was greatly influenced by glacial cycles, with demographic responses to the Pleistocene/Holocene transition similar to other temperate ungulates. Our results further support that modern moose lineages trace their origin back to populations that inhabited distinct glacial refugia during the Last Glacial Maximum (LGM). Finally, we found that present day moose in Europe and North America show low to moderate inbreeding levels resulting from post-glacial bottlenecks and founder effects, but no evidence for recent inbreeding resulting from human-induced population declines. Conclusions Taken together, our results highlight the dynamic recent evolutionary history of the moose and provide an important resource for further genomic studies.

The discovery of human remains from the Lauricocha cave in the Central Andean highlands in the 1960's provided the first direct evidence for human presence in the high altitude Andes. The skeletons found at this site were ascribed to the Early to Middle Holocene and represented the oldest known population of Western South America, and thus were used in several studies addressing the early population history of the continent. However, later excavations at Lauricocha led to doubts regarding the antiquity of the site. Here, we provide new dating, craniometric, and genetic evidence for this iconic site. We obtained new radiocarbon dates, generated complete mitochondrial genomes and nuclear SNP data from five individuals, and re-analyzed the human remains of Lauricocha to revise the initial morphological and craniometric analysis conducted in the 1960's. We show that Lauricocha was indeed occupied in the Early to Middle Holocene but the temporal spread of dates we obtained from the human remains show that they do not qualify as a single contemporaneous population. However, the genetic results from five of the individuals fall within the spectrum of genetic diversity observed in pre-Columbian and modern Native Central American populations.

Shipping radiocarbon samples from the scientist to the laboratories involves packaging and wrapping them with all sorts of bags and materials to make sure the samples arrive safely. Over the years a variety of possible and impossible package materials have arrived at our laboratory, causing problems occasionally but often being the highlight of the day cheering up the people involved. The reality of excavating important, occasionally unexpected, samples during field work sometimes includes taking samples when time is short or package materials could not be prepared. At this point, any kind of package becomes useful. Things like cigarette packets, reused office packets, tissue boxes, or medical packaging can become handy. But sometimes samples are taken, wrapped in aluminum foil, and forgotten in the desks. This article celebrates creativity, giving an overview of the many ways samples can be packed. However, using some of the less-than-ideal choices, drawbacks will be shown and possible problems explained.

We recently started a systematic approach to determine the reservoir age in southeast Arabia and its dependence on mollusk species and their environment. This part of the study concentrates on local reservoir age and stable isotopes of the lagoonal species Terebralia palustris and Anadara uropigimelana at Khor Kalba, Oman Sea. Environmental and nutritive influences on mollusks are reflected in the radiocarbon and stable isotope signal. We found a local reservoir age of A. uropigimelana of about 940 yr and that of T. palustris as 800 yr. Sclerochronological analyses yielded information about seasonality of growth and death in A. uropigimelana. The modern shell of Periglypta reticulata shares food resources and habitat with Anadara sp., of which we did not find a modern specimen. It provided information on response to changes in temperature in the lagoonal system needed for suitability as reflecting climatic conditions. We were interested in carbon pathways of the mangrove in Kalba and a mangrove planted anew on a former mangrove sediment in Ajman. Being an obvious source of charcoal and food of T. palustris makes this information necessary. Further analyses will be performed to interpret changes in reservoir age in complex lagoonal systems as reaction to environmental variability.

Wetland environments, with their excellent conservation conditions, provide geoarchaeological archives of past human activities. However, the subsurface soil is difficult to access due to high groundwater tables, unstable sediments, and the high cost of excavation. In this study, we present a ground-based non- and minimal-invasive prospection concept adapted to the conditions of wetlands. We investigated the Fossa Carolina in South Germany, a canal that was intended in 792/793 AD by Charlemagne to bridge the Central European Watershed. Although the resulting Carolingian banks and the fairway with wooden revetments are very imposing, archaeological traces of off-site construction activities have not been identified hitherto. Based on a geophysically surveyed intensive linear magnetic anomaly parallel to the Carolingian canal, we aimed to prove potential off-site traces of Carolingian construction activities. In this context, we built up a high-resolution cross-section using highly depth-accurate direct push sensing and ground-truthing. Our results showed the exact geometry of the canal and the former banks. Thus, the magnetic mass anomaly could be clearly located between the buried organic-rich topsoil and the Carolingian banks. The thermoluminescence dating showed that the position of the magnetic mass anomaly reflected Carolingian activities during the construction phases, specifically due to heat exposure. Moreover, we found hints of the groundwater supply to the 5-metre wide navigable fairway.