Archeology

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If materials are sourced from various natural sources, I'd think there would be a mix of ages hidden in such a wall: ancient rocks, young rocks, dirt (old bio material), bacteria/fungus/skin cells/hair (fresh bio). Could moss roots, fungus, or dirty water have seeped deep into the stones just 1000 years ago leaving behind less aged material? I've never been convinced of the accuracy of methods for dating old things. If it's in the Bible that the wall of Jericho fell, then it can be sourced to the original Jewish texts, which I don't think go back nearly 8000 years, and it seems very unlikely for the wall to have lasted even 1000 years without fresh material added for maintenance let alone several thousand years until it fell.
 
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AJ Redwood Icon
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It Hasn't Always Been This Way​

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Just this week, archaeologists announced an incredible find. In the sands of the Zambian desert, they uncovered logs used to build structures almost 500,000 years old. These weren’t just sticks—some logs were even larger than the archaeologists working on the project. They had notches and tapered ends, clearly meant for connecting the pieces into something larger. A walkway, perhaps a wall—nobody yet knows. This completely blows apart our understanding of when woodworking first appeared in human history. Until now, the oldest confirmed use of wood for structure making came from a lake in England, dating to about 9,000 years ago.

Modern humans don’t appear in the fossil record until about 100,000 years ago. It’s likely the woodworkers were Homo heidelbergensis, a species known to have inhabited Zambia half a million years before Homo sapiens appeared. Homo heidelbergensis arrived some two million years after the first human ancestors showed up. We know almost nothing about what these early Homo species were capable of; flaked tool assemblages more than two million years old have been found, but any wood or bone artifacts typically break down long before scientists can get hold of them.

This is the thing about paleoarchaeology—you could fit almost every hundreds of thousands of years old artifact ever found inside one Sprinter van. We’ve found so little. At almost any point on the earth’s surface, you could be standing on some buried tool or boat remains or fossil that could completely reshape what we know about human history. It’s still wild to consider Aboriginal Australians arrived by boat, over huge oceanic distances, to populate Australia more than 60,000 years ago, but then you learn people were making log structures 400,000 years before that, and pretty much anything seems possible.

There’s something comforting about pushing the timeline of human consciousness back even further into the past. We’ve been here a really, really long time, with largely the same capabilities, similar capacity for thought and reason, and thirst for adventure we have now. Other Homo species maybe just as smart and resourceful as our own walked the earth for millennia. It’s nice to realize our current obsession with poisoning the planet and unlimited consumption and growth is a new development, historically speaking. That means it can change. For most of human history, we lived peacefully with the rest of the planet. We can do that again.

- Justin Housman​
 
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6 mile wide asteroid does a job on the earth

www.nytimes.com

The Dinosaur Age May Have Ended in Springtime (Published 2022)

A new study examining fossils of fish suggests animals were wiped out by a massive meteor at a time when they were just emerging from hibernation and having offspring.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com

www.nytimes.com

Dust Might Have Snuffed Out the Dinosaurs

A simulation suggests that fine particles played a stronger role in cooling the planet and stalling photosynthesis after an asteroid impacted the Earth.
www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
 
Archeologists have uncovered a cluster of lost cities in the Amazon rainforest that was home to at least 10,000 farmers around 2000 years ago.

Recent mapping by laser-sensor technology revealed those sites to be part of a dense network of settlements and connecting roadways, tucked into the forested foothills of the Andes, that lasted about 1000 years.

The settlements were occupied by the Upano people between around 500 BC and 300 to 600 AD — a period roughly contemporaneous with the Roman Empire in Europe, the researchers found.


www.9news.com.au

2000-year-old lost cities discovered in Amazon jungle

www.9news.com.au www.9news.com.au
 
gf beranek said:
Speaking of Archeology. Paleo-archeology. This is pretty good. Amazing even.


Click to expand...

I'm still watching it, but myvtheory on the bone structures is religious or proto religious. Perhaps they worshipped, in some way, the main source of food for their community.

Mind you, I'm thinking of the Comanche as something of a modern analog, so my assessment is likely well off the mark.
 
Kind of the same theory here.
Ones with out fire are refridgerators for meat/cold storage and protect food from preditors.
Outside fires for rendering and possibly cooking.
Inside fires for keeping their asses warm.
Possibly mixed with ceremony thanking elements for the kills and blessings.
 
No way they were houses. It's not an easy task to clean a bone to the point where it don't stink. Far easier to process a hide into a teepee like structure, or build of wood or sod.

Plus there where gifts among the bones, that all but sealed it for me.

Onward to more of that cat's content...

 
They just found some mammoth hunters man cave. I know several man caves that in a few thousand years will baffle somebody. “ we found 80 deer skulls that were arranged on wooded boards” “ truly baffling” “ what was primitive man thinking?”
 
From my life experiences most hunters I've known, old-school and new, have a deep respect the habitats and game that they hunt. It appears universal.

And with that said, there's always those that tarnish that universal respect.

And by the way, Kaveman, that was a good vid you posted. Thank you.
 
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I wonder how you tell the difference?

The method for creating century eggs likely came about through the need to preserve eggs in times of plenty by coating them in alkaline clay, which is similar to methods of egg preservation in some Western cultures.[3] The clay hardens around the egg and results in the curing and creation of century eggs instead of spoiled eggs.

en.wikipedia.org

Century egg - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

I'd starve to death if I ever visited China. I'd have to pack a bag with cases of MREs so I'd have something to eat.
 
lxskllr said:
I wonder how you tell the difference?

The method for creating century eggs likely came about through the need to preserve eggs in times of plenty by coating them in alkaline clay, which is similar to methods of egg preservation in some Western cultures.[3] The clay hardens around the egg and results in the curing and creation of century eggs instead of spoiled eggs.

en.wikipedia.org

Century egg - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

I'd starve to death if I ever visited China. I'd have to pack a bag with cases of MREs so I'd have something to eat.
Click to expand...
Avoid the Mexican beef patty. Tastes like a Sonoran SpongeBob. Will also stop you pooping for about three days.

Also, century eggs? Blegh!

Nothing like cracking an egg into bacon grease, that's so fresh it warms your hand.
 
lxskllr said:
I wonder how you tell the difference?

The method for creating century eggs likely came about through the need to preserve eggs in times of plenty by coating them in alkaline clay, which is similar to methods of egg preservation in some Western cultures.[3] The clay hardens around the egg and results in the curing and creation of century eggs instead of spoiled eggs.

en.wikipedia.org

Century egg - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

I'd starve to death if I ever visited China. I'd have to pack a bag with cases of MREs so I'd have something to eat.
Click to expand...
Nah, you'd be fine John if you can eat MREs. I've been to China 4 times now and the food is wonderful. Of course you can find the outlier otidies.

For instance:
 
:barf:
I've always heard that our digestive system isn't strong enough to handle rotten meat. Why play with this, given the fact of the deadly outcome with some common microorganismes?
 
I feel like that's somewhat obvious. Not necessarily the methodology in crafting, but the wide use of wood certainly, and things like fire hardening would be readily noticed and replicated just from every day living. Trees leave ready made tools as it is. It's not a big step from picking up a stick, and after using it, thinking "This would be so much better if...", then making it happen with stone and bone tools.

Cool article though, and super cool that they found stuff that usually rots away. Even if it is obvious, it's good to have confirmation, and fill in some of the technology holes in history.
 
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