Welcome back, everybody!  I’m Rick Pettigrew, delivering our four top news 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!

New analysis reveals that America’s oldest headstone, from Jamestown, Virginia, came all the way from Belgium.  A creature depicted in South African rock art appears to show that the indigenous San people there were familiar with the fossils of a long-extinct animal.  Study of the bones found in a lead coffin beneath the floor of Paris’ Notre-Dame Cathedral points to a famous sixteenth-century poet.  And the imposing Lion of Venice statue atop a granite column in that city of canals surprises researchers by being a product of China.

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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 September 15th through the 21st, 2024.

Our first story this week comes from the first permanent English settlement in America: Jamestown, Virginia.  A new look at the town's oldest known tombstone has revealed the remarkable reach of the Chesapeake Bay colonists' trade network. 

As reported by Phys.org, analysis of the stone was conducted by Professor Marcus M. Key of Dickinson College and geologist Rebecca K. Rossi.  Their findings were published in the International Journal of Historical Archaeology.

The carved black limestone memorial was first placed in the Jamestown Church in 1627 and relocated in the 1640s during construction.  Centuries later, in 1907, the broken tombstone was rediscovered—and in pieces. It was then repaired and installed in the chancel of the present-day Memorial Church.

Clues hint that it might have belonged to a knight.  Carved depressions on the stone may once have held brass inlays, likely destroyed during the first colonial rebellion in America in 1676.  The depressions' shapes include an armored man standing on a pedestal, flanked by protrusions to his right and left that may indicate a sword hilt and shield.  Other inlays include an unfurled scroll and another shield that may have featured a family crest.

Records indicate that only two knights died in Jamestown while the second Jamestown church was active: sirs Thomas West and George Yeardley.  In the 1680s, Yeardley’s step-grandson requested a black tombstone.  He wanted it to bear the same inscription found on the headstone known as "the broken tomb," indicating that the 1627 stone belonged to the latter knight.

English settlers did not yet have the technology or skills to cut and engrave tombstones, and that type of stone was not present on the coastal plain where they lived.  The stone must have been imported—but where from?  To determine the tombstone's origin, the research team set out to analyze the fossils locked inside it.  

Of the six species they identified, none of them had ever been found in North America.  They had, however, been located in Ireland and Belgium.  Historical evidence points to Belgium as the stone’s likely home.  The region has provided much of the world’s Lower Carboniferous black limestone since the age of the Romans.

During Yeardley’s time, the material was popular among the wealthy in England.  He and other affluent colonists would have known of the trends across the pond and sought to emulate them.

According to Professor Key, the extent of trade networks at Chesapeake Bay during colonial times came as a surprise.  It seems that colonists would have ordered black marble tombstones from Belgium just as people purchase items online today—just with much slower shipping.

Next, we journey to the Karoo Basin of South Africa to encounter a mysterious tusked creature that may have gone extinct before dinosaurs appeared—and long before humans emerged.

As reported by Phys.org, a painted figure known as the Horned Serpent appears in a section of 19th century rock art at the La Belle France site in the Koesberg Mountains.  The art depicts animals and other cultural elements associated with the San [Sahn] hunter-gatherers of South Africa. 

The long-bodied creature with downward-turned, walrus-like tusks doesn't resemble any known modern species in the area.  While other tusked creatures are found in San rock art, their tusks always curve upwards.

Julien Benoit, Associate Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand’s Evolutionary Studies Institute, published his study in the online journal PLOS ONE.  In studying the painted figure, he noticed that it resembled the fossils of dicynodonts [dye-SIN-uh-dohnts], members of a species that lived from 270 to 200 million years ago and disappeared long before the dinosaurs went extinct.

Abundant exposed fossils in the Karoo Basin include dicynodont skulls with tusks that curve down and back, like those of the Horned Serpent artwork.  If the figure is in fact an artistic depiction of a dicynodont, it would predate the 1845 discovery and scientific description of this ancient animal by at least ten years.  It would also align with San oral traditions that reference large animals that once roamed the lands but had since gone extinct.  

Archaeological evidence shows that the San did find and transport fossils over long distances.  According to Benoit, this finding supports the idea that the first inhabitants of southern Africa discovered fossils and understood them, integrating them in their rock art and belief system.

Our third story takes us beneath the nave of the Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris, where the occupants of a pair of lead coffins that were recovered during a preparatory dig have been identified.  Crews were preparing to repair the cathedral's spire in the aftermath of the devastating 2019 fire.  

As reported by Smithsonian Magazine, because the coffins were made out of lead—an expensive, top-rated material for preservation—the sarcophagi likely held high-profile members of French society.  The identity of the first individual was confirmed in 2022, when inscriptions on one of the coffins pointed researchers to Antoine de la Porte, a notable and wealthy priest who died in 1710 at 83.  

The occupant of the second coffin remained a mystery.  At first, the only clue was a skeletal deformity that suggested the man spent much of his time riding horses.  Two more years of research led the team from the University of Toulouse III to Joachim du Bellay, a prominent French Renaissance cavalier and poet credited with popularizing French sonnet writing.  Compelling clues included du Bellay's well-documented equestrian abilities, including a famous ride from Paris to Rome.  

The poet, who died in 1560, was in poor health all his life.  The skeleton in the coffin showed not only a riding deformity, but signs of chronic meningitis caused by bone tuberculosis—both rare diseases at the time.

According to official records, du Bellay was interred in Notre-Dame’s Saint-Crépin chapel near a relative, a French cardinal, following his death at about 37 years of age.  Excavations in 1758, however, failed to uncover his bones.  Scholars suspect his remains were moved to the crossing of the transept at a later date—perhaps in 1569, after the publication of his complete works, or in a shift that was supposed to be temporary.

According to Eric Crubézy, a biological anthropologist at the University of Toulouse III and member of the research team, the skeleton and the poet's description are well matched.  du Bellay was an accomplished horseman, both of his health conditions are mentioned in some of his poems, and his family belonged to the royal court and the pope’s close entourage.

Our final story takes us high above the Piazzetta San Marco in Venice, where the symbolic bronze winged lion that's proudly surveyed his city for centuries has been given a new origin story.  

As reported by ArkeoNews, weighing well over 6,600 pounds, the statue symbolizing Saint Mark the Evangelist was first thought to have been created in Anatolia during the early Hellenistic era in the 4th century BC.  However, a new analysis of the lead isotopes in its metal alloy and the statue’s design has revealed that the colossal figure is most likely an elaborate reassembly of a tomb guardian originally cast in China.

A multidisciplinary team of experts in geology, chemistry, archaeology, and art history from the University of Padua, the Ca’ Foscari University of Venice, and the International Association for Mediterranean and Oriental Studies took a fresh look at the statue.  Their advanced metallurgical analysis found that a significant portion of the lion’s bronze came from the Yangtze River basin in southeastern China.

St. Mark’s lion shares a number of stylistic elements with Chinese tomb figures sculpted during the Tang Dynasty, which ran from AD 609 to 907.  These include wide nostrils, an upturned mustache, a wide-open mouth with prominent canines, and truncated orbital sockets where horns or antlers were once mounted.  The latter features appear to have been removed to make the statue seem more like a lion and less like a creature of fantasy, despite its wings.

Already installed on the column when Marco Polo returned from his travels in 1295, the statue made its journey to Venice under mysterious circumstances.  It likely traveled west along the Silk Road, a trade route that connected China with Europe for centuries.  Its arrival may be connected to the travels of Polo’s father and uncle, who visited the Mongolian court in Beijing between 1264 and 1266.

Over the centuries, the lion has undergone several restorations.  In the 1790s, Napoleon looted it and transported it to Paris.  Damaged during its return to Venice in 1815, it was restored by Venetian sculptor Bartolomeo Ferrari and has reigned over the storied piazzetta ever since.

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!