News and Notes

ARCHAEOLOGICAL INSTITUTE OF AMERICA--NORTH ALABAMA SOCIETY

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9.11.14

AIA Talk! Thera: Pompeii of Aegean Bronze Age 10 November 2014



Dr. Louise Hitchcock received her PhD from UCLA where she specialized in Bronze Age art and critical theory. Since 2004 she has been teaching at the University of Melbourne in Australia. Dr. Hitchcock’s excavation experience is extensive, having worked in Crete, mainland Greece, Israel, Egypt, and Syria.

Sometimes referred to as the mythical Atlantis, Thera (modern day Santorini) was buried by a volcanic eruption over 1600 years before Pompeii. Dr. Hitchcock's evening talk presents an introduction and overview of the dating, architecture, art and culture of this key site for understanding urbanism in the Bronze Age Aegean.

Just as the economic, political and military systems of the Minoan society have been controversial, the functions of the Minoan “palaces,” dubbed the first labyrinths, have also been debated. Dr .Hitchcock’s day talk will provide an introduction to their unique elements such as lustral basins, horns of consecration, and pillar crypts. Along the way, we will see how new discoveries, artifact distribution, analysis of circulation patterns, and anthropology can shed new light on understanding these enigmatic and sometimes mysterious buildings.

What: Thera: Pompeii of the Aegean Bronze Age
When: 7:30 pm 10 November 2014
Where: Chan Auditorium, UAH Campus

What: Understanding the Minoan Palaces
When: 12:45 pm 11 November
Where: Wilson Hall 168, UAH Campus

Digital archaeology changes exploration of the past

Digital archaeology changes exploration of the past -- ScienceDaily

45,000-Year-Old Bone Pinpoints Era of Human-Neanderthal Sex

45,000-Year-Old Bone Pinpoints Era of Human-Neanderthal Sex

Amazon Warriors Did Indeed Fight and Die Like Men

Amazon Warriors Did Indeed Fight and Die Like Men

Japan's Kamikaze Winds, the Stuff of Legend, May Have Been Real

Japan's Kamikaze Winds, the Stuff of Legend, May Have Been Real

9.10.14

AIA Talk! Were the Hobbits Human? 13 October 2014

Dr. William Jungers, Chair of the Department of Anatomical Sciences at SUNY Stony Brook, is currently associate editor of the Journal of Human Evolution. Throughout his career he has had access to some of the premier collections of specimens in the Yale Peabody Museum, the American Museum of Natural History, the British Museum of Natural History, as well as collections in Madagascar, Austria, Germany, Denmark, France, Belgium, Sweden, Switzerland, Indonesia, and Ethiopia. Dr. Jungers is an expert on the hotly debated topic of the place of Homo floresiensis in human evolution.



Were the Hobbits Human?
When:  7:30 pm, 13 October 2014
Where:  Shelby Center Rm. 107, UAH Campus

What Makes Us Human?
When:  2:30 PM 13 October 2014
Where:  Wilson Hall 168, UAH Campus


Did the Vikings Get a Bum Rap?

Did the Vikings Get a Bum Rap?

In Photos: The World's Oldest Cave Art

In Photos: The World's Oldest Cave Art

Skeleton Couple Still Holding Hands After 700 Years : Discovery News

Skeleton Couple Still Holding Hands After 700 Years : Discovery News

Ancient Rome's Terrorizing Toilets

Ancient Rome's Terrorizing Toilets | DiscoverMagazine.com

7.9.14

AIA Talk! Dog and Animal Domestication 15 September 2014

Monday, September 15, 7:30 pm
Chan Auditorium in the Business Admin. Bldg.
Dr. Greger Larson, Oxford University
“Asking when, where, and how dogs and animals were domesticated”

Tuesday, September 16, 12:45 pm
Wilson Hall Room 168
Dr. Greger Larson, Oxford University
“The difference between how and why: How the questions we ask bias the answers we get”

Excavate! The Newsletter! Volume 29

Tim and Lillian explore our upcoming events and speakers!  Hard to believe they have been doing this since 2000.

Click me!

Neanderthals Died Out 10,000 Years Earlier Than Thought, With Help From Modern Humans

Neanderthals Died Out 10,000 Years Earlier Than Thought, With Help From Modern Humans

Archaeologists Train "Monuments Men" to Save Syria's Past

Archaeologists Train "Monuments Men" to Save Syria's Past

Unique 2000-Year-Old Wooden Toilet Seat Found : Discovery News

Unique 2000-Year-Old Wooden Toilet Seat Found : Discovery News

Viking 'Hammer of Thor' Unearthed : Discovery News

Viking 'Hammer of Thor' Unearthed : Discovery News

19th Century 'Elixir of Long Life' Found

19th Century 'Elixir of Long Life' Found : Discovery News

Scientists begin revealing hull of famous Confederate submarine









Scientists begin revealing hull of famous Confederate submarine - CBS News

30.3.14

AIA Talk: Apollo to Christ: Conversion of Constantine 3 April 2014

Dr. Andrei Gandila of the UAH History Department will discuss Constantine, the first Christian emperor of the Roman empire, and his conversion.  Dr. Gandila is new to UAH and his talk will be based on archaeological and historical sources. 

Where:  Wilson Hall Theatre, UAH campus
When:  7:30 pm  3 April 2014

The talk is free and open to the public.  Please come and bring a friend!

Student deciphers 1,800-year-old letter from Egyptian soldier

Student deciphers 1,800-year-old letter from Egyptian soldier -- ScienceDaily

Black death was not spread by rat fleas, say researchers

Black death was not spread by rat fleas, say researchers | Science | The Observer

13.2.14

AIA TALKS: Andean Gold 17 Februrary 2014

Dr. Mark Aldenderfer first spoke to our society in February of 2003 on the topic “Silk Route and Diamond Path: the Archaeology of Tibetan Buddhism.” Dr. Aldenderfer has expanded his research interests to a second continent—South America. He is drawn to remote sites at high altitudes! Some of his current work focuses on a comparison of high altitudes cultural and biological adaptations.

In his evening talk on the 17th we get to look at lots of gold! Dr. Aldenderfer will review the ways in which golden objects were used by four cultures in the ancient Andes: the hunters and gatherers of the Titicaca basin at 2000 BC, the Chavin culture of the central Andes (900 BCE), the Moche (400 CE), and the Chimu (1200 CE). Gold served as personal adornment that also had social meaning, and through time, became identified with power and religious ideology.

The next day he will speak on Mustang, a site closed to the world until the 1990s. It is now home to a small but thriving Tibetan Buddhist community that was once part of a much larger world with connections westward into Central Asia and to the east into China and beyond via the famous Silk Road. Their origins are very much unknown. The earliest inhabitants are variously described as Aryans, Mongolians, Tibetans, and others. Archaeologists, historians, bio-archaeologists, archaeological scientists, including specialists in DNA analysis, along with a crack team of Alpinists and climbers, are recovering important new data that speak to the origins of the people of Upper Mustang and the ways in which the polity grew and changed over the past 3000 years.

Monday, February 17
4,000 Years of Andean Gold
7:30 PM
Wilson Hall Theatre, UAH

Tuesday, February 18
Ancient Mustang: The Origins of a High Himalayan Kingdom in Nepal

12:45 PM
Wilson Hall 168 (the art history lecture hall), UAH

Please feel free to forward our information to friends. Our events are always free and open to the public.

Neanderthal Genes Hold Surprises for Modern Humans

Neanderthal Genes Hold Surprises for Modern Humans

Domesticated Camels Came to Israel in 930 B.C., Centuries Later Than Bible Says

Domesticated Camels Came to Israel in 930 B.C., Centuries Later Than Bible Says

Genome of American Clovis skeleton mapped: Ancestor of most present-day Native American populations -- ScienceDaily

Genome of American Clovis skeleton mapped: Ancestor of most present-day Native American populations -- ScienceDaily

Cultural construction of nudes in Roman mosaics examined

Cultural construction of nudes in Roman mosaics examined -- ScienceDaily

16.1.14

AIA Talks! First Humans in the Americas 21 January 2014

Kathleen Holen, who did her MA in Archaeology at Exeter University in Devon, UK, will explore how early hominins in Africa learned how to break large animal limb bones with hammerstones to extract marrow at least 2.5 million years ago. Early hominins also learned to flake bone into expedient and patterned bone tools by 1.2 million years ago. Video of experimental breakage of elephant and cow limb bones shows how breakage patterns found on animal limb bones from archaeological sites were produced. Patterned bone breakage and flaking of limb bones at numerous late Pleistocene mammoth sites in the Americas provide evidence of human technology and behavior at least 30,000 years ago.

Dr. Steven Holen, the former Curator of Archaeology at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, will address a controversial topic that we have explored with several of our visiting AIA lecturers—the peopling of the Americas. He will open his talk with a history of debate and then offer new evidence and ideas about the date when humans first entered the Americas and by what routes and methods.  

Tuesday, Jan. 21 
  Kathleen Holen
When People Broke Bones: Early Human Technology and Experimental Archaeology
12:45 PM
Wilson Hall 168

Tuesday, Jan. 21
Center for American Paleolithic Research
Early Humans in the Americas: When, Where and Why
7:30 PM
Wilson Hall Theatre

All events are free and open to the public.  Please come and bring a friend!

Excavate! The Newsletter! come and get it! 28th edition!

Thanks Tim and Lillian!  Issue number 28--hard to believe!  Click HERE!