Welcome back, everybody!  I’m Rick Pettigrew, and here are our four top stories from this past week of Archaeologica.  Send us feedback on The Archaeology Channel Facebook page or post a message on our social networking site, ArchaeoSeek!

A newly excavated Roman ship off the coast of Mallorca dates from the Fourth Century AD and contains an amazingly intact cargo of fish sauce and other Roman delicacies.  A new linguistic analysis points to four separate waves of human migration into the Americas between 24,000 and 12,000 years ago.  A new effort to date early historical Jerusalem has made progress in sorting out the chronology during a period when radiocarbon dating tends to be inaccurate.  And a DNA study of squirrels and people in Medieval England confirms that leprosy spread from squirrels to humans.

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And now, here’s Laura Kennedy with the Audio News from Archaeologica!  We hope you find this to be a valuable part of your day!

Welcome to the Audio News from Archaeologica!  I’m Laura Kennedy, and these are the headlines in archaeological and historical news for the week of May 5th through the 11th, 2024.

Our first story this week comes from the Spanish island of Mallorca [mai-OR-kuh], where researchers found an ancient Roman shipwreck with a full load of fish sauce. 

As reported by Live Science, the wreck, called Ses Fonantelles [SAY FAWN-an-tell], was discovered in 2019.  The shipwreck rests in shallow water near the beach at a resort close to Palma, the capital of Mallorca.  

Previous researchers proposed that the ship originated from or near the Spanish port of Cartagena [car-ta-HAY-na], already an important port to the Romans, known as Carthago Spartania [car-TAH-go spar-TAH-ee-ah].  The cause of the wreck, around 1700 years ago, is unknown. 

The wreck was found buried under sand in shallow waters.  The sediments preserved the shipwreck well, but the turbulence of the water above it, from waves nearing the beach, made the underwater investigation challenging. 

According to Miguel Ángel Cau Ontiveros [meeg-ELL AHN-hel COW ohn-tee-VAIR-ohs], the director of the University of Barcelona’s Institute of Archaeology and lead author of the new report, it’s rare to find such a well-preserved Roman shipwreck.  Ses Fonantelles is one of only a few shipwrecks in the western Mediterranean from the fourth century AD.  

The new study, published in the journal Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, describes the ship’s cargo of 300 amphorae [am-FOR-ee], or sealed pottery jugs.  Many of them contain liquamen [LICK-wa-men], a fish sauce made of anchovies.  

Ancient Romans loved fish sauce and ate several different varieties.  Liquamen was likely made from whole fish, brewed up in the sun in open vats along the seacoast.

The wreck and the cargo were both well preserved under the sand and sediment that buried the ship immediately after it sank.  The cargo, other than the amphorae, includes ropes, shoes, a wooden drill, and grass matting called dunnage, used as padding around the cargo. 

Researchers found that many of the amphorae still held substance residues, and used gas chromatography, residue analysis and archaeozoology to determine the contents and their provenience.  Some amphorae held wine and others an oil, likely olive oil.

The date of the wreck is bracketed by a Roman coin found on deck, tucked into a location suggesting it had been used to bless the ship.  The coin, minted in Siscia [SISH-ee-a] in modern Croatia, bears the portrait of emperor Constantine the Great, meaning that the earliest possible date for the ship is AD 320, the beginning of his reign. 

Next, we go to North America, where a new linguistic model suggests that Indigenous peoples entered North America at least four times from 24,000 to 12,000 years ago.  This model corroborates previously established archaeological, climatological and genetic data.

As reported by Live Science, almost one half of the world’s language families are found in the Americas.  Although many of them are now extinct, historical linguistics can compare the remaining living languages and trace them back through time. 

Historical linguist Johanna Nichols from the University of California Berkeley led the new linguistic study, analyzing the structural features of 60 languages from the United States and Canada.  The results showed that the languages belonged to two main language groups that came to North America across 4 different waves. 

Nichols detailed 16 features of the languages, such as syllable structure, the gender of nouns and the production of consonants, that place the languages into two groups with subgroups within them.  This indicated the four waves of early immigration.  

The first wave of immigration dates to around 24,000 years ago and contains no unique language features.  This suggests that this wave held many diverse peoples and languages.  The second wave dates to around 15,000 years ago and introduces languages that use pronouns differentiated with unique consonants.  The third wave, from around 14,000 years ago, includes languages with simple consonants.  The final wave, around 12,000 years ago, brought languages with complex consonants. 

Previous researchers have assumed that initial American immigration started with a land bridge from Siberia around 13,000 years ago.  However, new archaeological, geological, climatological, and genetic findings have indicated an earlier date.  The current and still fluid consensus is that several waves of people came after 25,000 years ago. 

The new language data help reinforce the belief that North America was populated earlier than previously thought. 

While the new evidence aligns with discoveries from other fields, the method still has limitations.  The statistical classification doesn’t always match up with known language families.  Linguistic relationships can also be obscured through influence from neighboring languages.  Finally, the study indicates how languages entered and evolved in North America, but the origins of these languages remain unknown. 

Our third story takes us to the city of Jerusalem in Israel, where new methods have dated several archaeological events described in the Bible.  These events include the settling of the city, a major earthquake, and the city’s destruction by Babylonians.

As reported by Live Science, the city has been hard to date within the period from 770 to 420 BC, the Hallstatt Plateau, a stretch of lower solar activity that produced less of the radioactive isotope carbon-14.  The lower levels of C14 make radiocarbon dates in this period less accurate.  The Hallstatt Plateau is one major factor explaining why the majority of Jerusalem has not been radiocarbon-dated.  Instead, archaeological chronology has been based on stratigraphy, pottery comparisons, and dates from ancient written chronicles from Israel and Babylon.  

According to Elisabetta Boaretto, archaeology professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science and senior author of the new study, analyzing new materials has yielded a chronology of Jerusalem that is unprecedented in its precision.

The new study analyzed sediment from human occupations and radioactive-carbon concentrations in charred seeds.  The researchers used 103 seed samples and other remains from across five sites in the ancient neighborhood of the City of David, near the Temple Mount. 

The new method used both radiocarbon dating and a group of precise analytical methods collectively termed “microarchaeology.”  Researchers applied the method to the layers of sediment connected to the seeds.  They confirmed the dates with measurements of atmospheric radiocarbon taken from the growth rings of trees that grew between 624 and 572 BC. 

The dating was further secured with evidence of the Babylonian destruction in 586 BC.

The study revealed new evidence for the dating of the settlement of Jerusalem between the twelfth and tenth centuries BC.  The study also shows that the city underwent westward expansion in the ninth century BC.

An earthquake mentioned in the Bible has never been firmly dated.  Researchers found a layer of fallen stones and damaged materials that indicated it occurred in the mid-eighth century BC.

The team found evidence of the continued use of some of the sites after the earthquake and before the invasions.  This shows that occupation in this period was relatively stable.

The stability ended with fires caused by the Babylonian invasions.  These events are recorded in both Neo-Babylonian records and the Bible.

While this study presents new methods used for uncovering important historical information, the results are currently under debate, since they come from limited samples and less than ideal archaeological contexts. 

Our last story this week brings us to Winchester, England, where a new DNA study reveals how red squirrels served as hosts for the bacteria that induces leprosy in people.

As reported by Heritage Daily, leprosy is one of humanity’s oldest recorded diseases.  Leprosy is still widespread throughout areas of Asia, Africa and South America.  It is mainly caused by the bacteria Mycobacterium leprae [my-co-bak-TEE-ree-uhm LEP-ree].   Leprosy can become a chronic infection leading to blindness, nerve damage and distinctive lesions on the skin.  Even now, researchers understand very little about how the disease is transmitted between people, and between people and animals. 

One previous suggestion about how leprosy was transmitted in Medieval Europe looks at the extensive trade in red squirrel fur.  The fur of the red squirrel was highly valued in Medieval times for its color, warmth, widespread availability, and ease of use.

In the new study, published in the journal Current Biology, an international team of researchers analyzed samples from 25 humans and 12 squirrels, taken from two Medieval sites in Winchester.  Winchester was strongly involved in the fur trade, and also rife with leprosy. 

The first site was Saint Mary Magdalen’s leprosarium, a hospital for leprosy patients active between the early eleventh and late fifteenth centuries.  The second site was Staple Gardens, a street dating back to the twelfth century that held at least one furrier shop.  At Staple Gardens, excavations had uncovered two pits with foot bones from many different small mammals, such as cats, foxes and squirrels—the leftovers from processing these animals for their fur. 

According to Verena Schuenemann, a researcher from the University of Basel in Switzerland, genetic analysis showed that red squirrels were an animal host of leprosy.  The genetic analysis combined evidence from historical sources and archaeological material. 

The study found that medieval red squirrel strains of the bacteria were more closely related to human strains in Winchester than to modern English squirrel strains.  This suggests that Mycobacterium leprae independently circulated among squirrels and was transferred back and forth from red squirrels to humans.

According to Sara Inskip, co-author and researcher from the University of Leicester [LESS-ter], this study demonstrates the importance of involving archaeological material in the study of zoonotic diseases, infections that spread between humans and animals.  Direct comparison of ancient human and animal strains can allow for reconstructions of potential transmission events. 

That wraps up the news for this week!

For more stories and daily news updates, visit Archaeologica on the World Wide Web at www.archaeologica.org where all the news is history! Also, be sure to check out our growing subscription platform, Heritage Broadcasting Service, at heritagetac.org!

I’m Laura Kennedy and I’ll see you next week!