Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Audio News from Archaeologica!  I’m Laura Kennedy.  Rick Pettigrew is away on our tour of Iran, so I’ll be telling you about four of the best stories posted online this past week by our archaeology news website, Archaeologica.org!  Here are the headlines in archaeological and historical news from March 30th through April 6th, 2025.

This week’s first story comes from Kach Kouch, Morocco, near the Gibraltar Strait, where a new study evinces Bronze Age habitation there.  This result challenges previous assumptions that the region was unoccupied before Phoenicians arrived in 800 BC. 

As reported by The Conversation, researchers from Morocco’s National Institute for Archaeology and Heritage have determined that Kach Kouch hosted three phases of occupation, from 2200 to 600 BC.  

The study, published in the journal Antiquity, details results of the team’s excavation there in 2021 and 2022.  These excavations utilized state-of-the-art technology, including drones, 3D models, differential GPS, and  radiocarbon dating, to locate samples of fossilized seeds and charcoal.  

Kach Kouch was first discovered in 1988, and first excavated in 1992.  Archaeologists had presumed the site was active only between the eighth and sixth centuries BC, after Phoenicians arrived there from the Middle East.

The team dated the first phase of settlement from 2200 to 2000 BC.  Remains from this period include three undecorated pottery sherds, a flint flake, and a cow bone.  They suggest that erosion, later building on the site, and habitation by others may be responsible for the relative lack of first phase artifacts. 

They dated the second phase, beginning after a period of absence, from 1300 to 900 BC.  The community then lived on the Kach Kouch hill, likely numbering around 100 people.  Evidence suggests that they cultivated wheat, barley, and legumes, while raising sheep, goats, cows, and pigs.  

During the second phase, the community used the wattle and daub technique to build circular homes out of reeds, mud, and wooden poles.  Inhabitants also dug silos to store their harvested crops, used grinding stones and flint tools, and decorated pottery.  Archaeologists also found a scrap of metal – the oldest known bronze object in North Africa outside Egypt. 

The team dated the third phase to the Mauretanian period, between the eighth and seventh centuries BC.  By this point, the Kach Kouch community was exchanging with nearby Phoenician settlements.  They grew grapes and olives, used wheel-made Phoenician ceramics, and erected square buildings of stone, wattle and daub.  Around 600 BC, Kach Kouch was likely abandoned in favor of other settlements in the region. 

The evidence indicates that the early Bronze Age inhabitants of Kach Kouch are immediate ancestors of the Mauretanian communities of north-west Africa, still archaeologists remain uncertain about their communal organization.  They may have grouped themselves by kinship, while later populations organized as tribes.

This study challenges previous assumptions that the Maghreb of north-west Africa was empty of human population before Phoenicians arrived.  These new Kach Kouch discoveries demonstrate the presence of people in the region before 800 BC and their relationships with other Mediterranean communities, and may thus also revise the narrative of northern Africa’s history. 

Next we go to southwest China, where an international team of researchers found stone tools from the Middle Paleolithic period of designs that were previously believed to exist only in Europe and the Middle East. 

As reported by The Conversation, a team led by Hao Li of the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, and Qijun Ruan of the Yunnan Provincial Institute of Cultural Relics and Archaeology, unearthed Quina scrapers and other stone tools from the Longtan archaeological site. 

Quina scrapers, well known from European and Middle Eastern sites, are typically thick and asymmetrical with broad, sharp cutting edges, periodically resharpened after long use.  Researchers believe that hunters in dry, cool climates invented such tools to scrape and cut both soft materials like meat and medium-hard materials like wood. 

The team dated the sediments containing the Longtan artifacts via optical luminescence.  The analysis dated those sediments to 50,000 to 60,000 years ago, the same period in which European Neanderthals used Quina similar tools. 

This analysis firmly places the discovery within the Middle Paleolithic period, from 250,000 to 30,000 years ago.  The period is notable for the innovation of many new types of stone tools.  Researchers previously believed that populations in East Asia used only basic tools, while those in Europe and Africa made more advanced innovations. 

Other researchers compared the Chinese scrapers to European examples, inspected their markings, and analyzed pollen grains to determine the tool’s environments.  They found that the Longtan inhabitants lived in open forest-grassland environments similar to the Quina sites in Europe. 

Along with recently discovered Levallois tools in Guanyindong Cave in the Guizhou Province in south-central China, the Longtan Quina tools support the use of Middle Paleolithic technologies in East Asia. 

Planned further excavations target discovering more about the origin of Quina scrapers in China.  Archaeologists hope to uncover additional artifacts, to help determine whether these tools were invented locally or introduced from elsewhere.  Given the lengthy duration of the Middle Paleolithic period, these tools may have been created by Neanderthals or Denisovans – extinct human species – or by modern humans, or even by an as yet unknown extinct human species.  

The study was published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Our third story turns to West Texas, USA, where archaeologists unearthed what might be the oldest known weapon system in North America. 

As presented by The Greek Reporter, researchers from the Center for Big Bend Studies, collaborating with the Odyssey Archaeological Research Fund of the University of Kansas, found these weapons in the San Esteban Rockshelter cave system.  They are about 6,500 years old. 

The most interesting find is an atlatl [AHT-laht-l], an ancient spear-throwing device.  The weapons system also includes a straight-flying boomerang, six stone-tipped foreshafts that connected darts to the atlatl, and four hardwood foreshafts that could administer poison.  The weapons are in good condition, with only a few pieces missing or deteriorated. 

According to weapons expert, and Center for Big Bend Studies Professor Devin Pettigrew, while the atlatl lacks its handle, archaeologists can reconstruct what it how it likely looked.  The incomplete state of the weapon complicates the task, but researchers can visualize how the complete weapon system was likely used. 

The darts would fit into the spur of the atlatl, to maintain a straight flight when thrown, maximizing power and accuracy.  Technical details suggest how indigenous hunters used complex, reusable tools for tracking and hunting.   

Because the weapon parts appear to have been positioned deliberately, the weapon system may have had symbolic or ritual meanings.  Caves were deeply significant for many Indigenous American cultures.  Many believed that hunted prey could be reincarnated.  

The team also found human coprolites and a tanned pronghorn hide.  As common among Plains Native groups, the hide is punctured, with holes spaced to tie it into a frame. 

According to Byron Schroeder, Director of the Center for Big Bend Studies, this entire discovery is of major significance.  It may help suggest answers to many questions about the lives of these early indigenous communities. 

Archaeologists have hypothesized that Indigenous groups in the region used atlatls, but this discovery confirms those conjectures.  The integrity of the undisturbed cache provides an intimate picture of prehistoric technology that the team expects will influence North American archaeology for years to come.

We complete this week’s archaeological news in England, where the discovery of a Danish bronze stamp indicates that the iconic Sutton Hoo helmet may have originated in Scandinavia. 

As reported by Live Science, the stamp was unearthed about two years ago on Taasinge, a Danish island, in the ruins of a metals workshop there.  Its imagery features a warrior on horseback, closely resembling motifs of horse-and-rider on the Sutton Hoo helmet. 

According to archaeologist Peter Pentz, a curator at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen, the stamp is connected to elite warriors, who rode horses into battle.  This discovery confirms that the horse-and-rider motif was widespread in Northern Europe.  Researchers have previously conjectured that artifacts with similar motifs from early-medieval Sweden and Germany indicate the origin of the Sutton Hoo helmet as an heirloom or diplomatic gift. 

The motif on the bronze stamp is not identical to the helmet’s, but strikingly similar to it.  Not only is the stamp’s motif similar in size to the motifs on the helmet, but the horse images share similar features.  

Archaeologists originally discovered the Sutton Hoo helmet in 1939, during excavation of an Anglo-Saxon burial ship in east England.  The ship was filled with grave goods – musical instruments, jewelry, tableware, weapons, armor, etc.  The helmet was broken into hundreds of shards, so archaeologists had to reconstruct it carefully.  It now resides in London’s British Museum.

The helmet, with its iconic face mask, is emblematic of Anglo-Saxon culture.  The Anglo-Saxons lived in eastern Britain in the early medieval period.  They descended from German and Danish immigrants. 

Archaeologists infer that the helmet was likely crafted during the late sixth or early seventh century in southern Scandinavia, or was influenced by that area’s artistic conventions.

Per Helen Gittos, an Oxford University medieval historian, and not a participant in this study, this discovery suggests close connections among military elites of the Anglo-Saxon era in north-western Europe. 

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 video-streaming platform, Heritage Broadcasting Service, at heritagetac.org!

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