Archeology

Sequencing mammoth DNA has already helped scientists map out how these Ice Age giants evolved, migrated, and survived. But there's a hidden layer of history still waiting to be decoded – the microbes that lived inside them.

Large rock-face murals scattered across the desert represent one of the most ambitious – and perilous – creative feats of ancient humans, with researchers arguing the massive carvings acted as visual beacons, guiding people to crucial water sources.

Traces of a psychoactive compound has been found in the dental plaque of a woman buried 4,000 years ago, making it the earliest direct chemical evidence of humans chewing betel nut – the world's fourth biggest drug, after tobacco, caffeine and alcohol.

Millenia ago communities went to great lengths to hunt wild boars, and not just for survival. Archaeologists recently uncovered 19 wild boar skulls. The skulls bore butchery marks, hinting at a feast; however, the real mystery was their origin.

The first known cases of accidental choking have been discovered, dating back 150 million years, when some ambitious fish got more than they bargained for while picking off algae from squid-like carcasses. It's history's oldest mealtime misadventure.

Paleoanthropologists are fascinated by ancient diets; they hold clues to how early humans survived and evolved. A new study reveals Neanderthals were using complex, time-consuming cooking techniques tens of thousands of years earlier than we thought.

Long before the Inka ruled the Andes, the Tiwanaku civilization carved out one of the region’s earliest and most influential societies. Then, about a thousand years ago, it vanished, leaving behind stone ruins and swirling mysteries.

Using new radiocarbon dating on footprints preserved in the gypsum-rich ground in White Sands, researchers have confirmed that humans roamed North America 23,000 years ago. The finding solves a long debate questioning the age of these footprints.

A study published in the journal Antiquity suggested an ancient South American civilization spiked a beer-like drink with psychoactive drugs as a way of maintaining social cohesion and forging new bonds with surrounding communities.

Excavations found that the brain of what seems to be a human male contained dark glass formed during the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE. The effect can't be explained by lava temperatures alone, but rather a different event from the cataclysm.

We know what they look like, and even sound like, but there’s one question you might not have pondered: what do ancient Egyptian mummies smell like? Whether you wanted to know or not, scientists have now given us an answer.

Many of us have had a tooth pulled in the dentist's chair, and even with anesthetic, it's not pleasant. So spare a thought for the people who, for millennia, chose to have good teeth yanked out with no painkillers – all in the name of beauty (mainly).