Tag: History Unleashed

Professor Lev Klein of St Petersburg State University has proposed the coupled burials are linked to reincarnation beliefs possibly influenced by deeksha rituals. ‘The ‘deeksha’ was considered as a ‘second birth’ and to complete this ritual the sacrificing one made a ritual sexual act of conceiving’. Picture: Vyacheslav Molodin, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences

These compelling images show ancient burials in Staryi Tartas village, in Novosibirsk region, where scientists have studied some 600 tombs. Dozens contain the bones of couples, facing each other, some with their hands held together seemingly for eternity.

Others show men or women buried with a child or children. But why? Archeologists are struggling for explanations and believe DNA tests will provide the answers to these remarkable burials which one writer Vasiliy Labetskiy described poignantly as skeletons in ‘post-mortal hugs with bony hands clasped together’.

As eminent academic Vyacheslav Molodin, 65, told The Siberian Times there are a number of theories about these Andronovo burials  – for example that after the man died, his wife was killed and buried with him – but for now the true reason remains unclear. Another version even suggests that some of the couples were deliberately buried as if in a sexual act, possibly with a young woman sacrificed to play this role in the grave.

‘We can fantasise a lot about all this. We can allege that husband died and the wife was killed to be interred with him as we see in some Scythian burials, or maybe the grave stood open for some time and they buried the other person or persons later, or maybe it was really simultaneous death,’ said Professor Molodin, Director of Research of the Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

‘When we speak about a child and an adult, it looks more natural and understandable.

‘When we speak about two adults – it is not so obvious. So we can raise quite a variety of hypotheses, but how it was in fact, we do not know yet.’

Archeologists are struggling for explanations and believe DNA tests will provide the answers to these remarkable burials. Pictures: Vyacheslav Molodin, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences

Another theory is that especially the couples buried between the 17th and 14th centuries BC signify the beginnings of the nuclear family as a unit, so that in death they demonstrate the importance attached by these ancient people to this form of relationship.

‘This could be the case. But, you see, we need to firstly establish unequivocally the kinship of those who were buried,’ said Professor Molodin referring to the necropolis close to the confluence of the rivers Tartas and Om. ‘Until recently archaeologists had no such opportunity, they could establish only the gender and age. But now as we have at our disposal the tools of paleogenetics, we could speak about establishing the kinship.’

He hopes that ‘in the nearest future’ his researchers ‘will have significantly more data’. In five to ten years the secrets of these remarkable burials maybe revealed.

‘For example, we found the burial a man and a child. What is a degree of their kinship? Are they father and son or….? The same question arises when we found a woman and a child. It should seem obvious – she is the mother. But it may not be so. She could be an aunt, or not a relative at all. To speak about this scientifically we need the tools of paleogenetics.

‘We have a joint laboratory with the Institute of Cytology and Genetics, of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Science,  and we actively work in this direction. We do such analysis but it is quite expensive still and there are few specialists. We are also solving other questions with help of paleogenetics.’

With such couple burials, Professor Lev Klein of St Petersburg State University has proposed they are linked to reincarnation beliefs possibly influenced by deeksha rituals in the ancient Indian sub-continent at the time when the oldest scriptures of Hinduism were composed.

‘The man during his lifetime donated his body as a sacrifice to all the gods,’ he wrote. ‘The ‘deeksha’ was considered as a ‘second birth’ and to complete this ritual the sacrificing one made a ritual sexual act of conceiving.’

In other words, in death a man should perform a sexual act to impregnate a woman. ‘Perhaps in the pre-Vedic period relatives of the deceased often sought to reproduce the ‘deeksha’ posthumously, and sacrificed a woman or a girl (or a few), and simulated sexual intercourse in the grave’.

‘There are also burials with just several cremated remains. So it is more complicated than ‘They loved each other and died in one day’.  Professor Vyacheslav Molodin pictures at Staryi Tartas archeological site. Picture: Novosibirsk Institute of Archeology and Ethnography

There has been theorising that on the man’s death, his wife was sacrificed and buried with him for posterity in an act of intimacy. Or, as Klein suggests, could a young woman have been sacrificed for this purpose, used to fulfil the female part in this ritual?

Professor Molodin doesn’t rule out this version, yet makes clear it is only a hypothesis. ‘It is again a suggestion. As a suggestion, it could be. This idea of Klein can be extended to Siberia too, because significant part of the researchers think that Andronovo people were Iranians.

‘So this hypothesis can be extended to them. But, I will repeat, it is only a hypothesis.’

There are he says ‘a good number’ of these couple graves. ‘The number impresses. More that this, we see some interesting facts. For Andronovo culture, cremation is more typical, and here we can see such interesting combination like cremation and inhumation in one burial. Why it is so?

‘There is a version that they did not just pour the ashes into the grave, but made a doll and put the ashes in this. But we can not say for sure.

‘There are also burials with just several cremated remains. So it is more complicated than ‘They loved each other and died in one day’.’

‘Archeology can’t answer all these questions precisely, not yet…Behind Andronov burials lay extraordinary stories about travels and discoveries, human destinies and the destinies of whole civilisations’. Picture: Vyacheslav Molodin, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences

He thinks that in most cases the couple graves were filled at the same time; so that it is not a case of a man dying and his wife being added to the grave when she died some years later. ‘It is very hard to say. I believe that all of them were buried almost at the same time, but on this necropolis we meet quite often robbed graves. And it turned out that one body was intact, and the second was damaged’.

The couples were buried together with care, this much is clear. These were no hasty funerals after battles.

‘Along with the bodies were buried people’s belongings; not everything has survived, but some of the bronze decorations, ceramic pottery and armaments was found by archeologists,’ recounted historian and writer Labetskiy.

‘Some of the pottery, with ornaments including … swastikas … belonged to people who were very different from native Siberians.

‘Archeologists classify them as the Andronovo archeological culture. Their burials are recognised by the position of the body, which is crouched on the side, while locals buried people lying on the back.’

These incomers in western Siberia looked like Caucasian people, it is believed. They ‘bred cattle, were well acquainted with metallurgy and used the innovation of the times, carts and combat chariots drawn by horses’.

‘Grave goods consisted of pottery vessels, bronze ornaments, bronze daggers, ‘gaming pieces’ (horse phalanges and sheep astragals) and bone arrowheads, a special find was a four-sided stone mould for casting ear rings and pendants,’ states one account detailing co-operation between the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Science in Novosibirsk and the the Eurasia-Department of the German Archaeological Institute.

‘Large ritual pits associated with the burials contained animal bones, bone and bronze artifacts, but also, for example, a well preserved casting mould for a large socketed axe.’

The couples were buried together with care, this much is clear. Along with the bodies were buried people’s belongings, some of the pottery, with ornaments including swastikas… belonged to people who were very different from native Siberians’. Pictures: Vyacheslav Molodin, Institute of Archeology and Ethnography of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences

As Labetskiy wrote: ‘Archeology can’t answer all these questions precisely, at least not yet. Behind Andronov burials lay extraordinary stories about travels and discoveries, about human destinies and the destinies of whole civilisations.’

There is, he argues, ‘a certain beauty in this unfinished story’ conjuring for him the Welsh poet Dylan Thomas’ classic ‘And Death Shall Have No Dominion’.

‘The best fairytales have always ended ‘They lived happily ever after, and died on the same day’.

‘It is quite astonishing how the fairytales become life, as the bronze burials tell us a story how some people were not divided even by death’.

This 2,000-year-old wooden chariot was buried alongside the remains of two horses and a dog, as well as the remains of a nobleman from Thrace, in what is now Bulgaria.(Image credit: UBB/Veselin Ignatov)

The photo of an ancient Thracian chariot alongside the bones of two horses and a dog has quickly risen to the top of Reddit today (Oct. 13), with more than 65,000 likes. But what is so exciting about the discovery, and who was buried within the chariot?

A team of archaeologists led by Veselin Ignatov, of the Istoricheski muzej Nova Zagora, a museum in Bulgaria, discovered the 2,000-year-old wooden chariot in 2008. It was covered in bronze and would have been decorated with scenes from Thracian mythology that are now difficult to see. Its exact age is uncertain and may be closer to 1,800 years old.

In 2009, Ignatov and his team also found a brick tomb, containing the remains of a man dressed in what appears to be armor, near the chariot. The man was buried with several items, including gold coins, gold rings and a silver cup showing a depiction of the Greek god Eros (the Roman equivalent was Cupid). He would have been a nobleman or possibly even a ruler who lived in ancient Thrace, in what is now Bulgaria. [In Photos: Early Bronze Age Chariot Burial]

Chariot burials like this are commonly found in Bulgaria. The practice of noblemen being buried near chariots seems to have started in Bulgaria about 2,500 years ago, Ignatov wrote in a paper published in 2007 in the journal Archaeologia Bulgarica. He noted that the practice was especially popular during the time of the Roman Empire, which lasted from roughly 2,100 to 1,500 years ago.

Though the people of some other regions of the Roman Empire also sometimes buried their noblemen near chariots, this practice was “by far most popular and long-standing in Thrace,” Ignatov wrote in the journal article. “In all cases, the chariots represent prestige, power and authority,” Ignatov wrote, noting that the chariots were probably intended to be used by the deceased in the afterlife.

At the time of the burial, the horses that pulled the chariot likely would have been killed. Animal offerings such as pigs, dogs, sheep and deer would have been made to the gods, along with libations (such as wine), Ignatov wrote. Sometimes, the chariots themselves were dismantled or smashed apart before being buried, Ignatov wrote.

Because chariot burials are common in Bulgaria, and sometimes have rich burial goods, looters try to find them and sell the artifacts on the black market, Ignatov noted. This means that archaeologists in Bulgaria are often racing to discover and excavate chariot burials before looters find and pillage them.

Since the archaeologists excavated this chariot burial before looters got to it, the artifacts can be displayed publicly in a museum, and pictures showing the chariot burial are being shared publicly on Reddit and other forms of social media.

Original article on Live Science.

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Owen Jarus is a regular contributor to Live Science who writes about archaeology and humans’ past. He has also written for The Independent (UK), The Canadian Press (CP) and The Associated Press (AP), among others. Owen has a bachelor of arts degree from the University of Toronto and a journalism degree from Ryerson University.

All ancient Egyptian tombs are unique, but some pose a greater mystery than others.

Riddle Of The Decapitated Egyptian Mummy

Where was the rest of the mummy? Why was only the head there? Who and why had beheaded the deceased? Decapitation was not an ancient Egyptian burial practice anyone was familiar with at the time. The researchers had encountered a mystery, and it would take 104 years before modern forensic experts could shed some light on this peculiar story.

As archaeologists continued exploring the hidden tomb’s secrets, they realized this was no ordinary burial site.

Djehutynakht’s tomb was discovered at the bottom of a 30ft pit. It had been plundered in antiquity, and the corpses damaged. Most of the valuable jewels were stolen, but a number of objects were left behind, making it one of the largest burial assemblages of the Middle Kingdom ever discovered. 

Tomb 10A was the largest burial assemblage of the Middle Kingdom (2040-1640 B.C.) ever discovered. Scientists found magnificent cedarwood coffins, personal items such as jewelry, written religious chants, and an astounding flotilla of reassembled model boats inside the chamber. As the investigation of tomb 10A continued, researchers eventually determined this was the final resting place for a governor named Djehutynakh and his wife.

“At some point during the couple’s 4,000-year-long slumber, grave robbers ransacked their burial chamber and plundered its gold and jewels. The looters tossed a headless, limbless mummified torso into a corner before attempting to set the room on fire to cover their tracks.” 1

The tomb contained four painted coffins, an inner and outer one for both the governor and his wife. They were made of massive planks of imported cedar. 

The archaeologists felt lucky because they could recover many magnificent ancient objects that had survived the raid and sent them to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, in 1921.

According to the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, tomb 10 A “contained four beautifully painted coffins, one of which (detail, shown above), the famous “Bersha coffin” (the outer coffin of the governor), is arguably the finest painted coffin Egypt produced and a masterpiece of panel painting. The tomb also included Djehutynakht’s walking sticks, pottery, canopic jar, and miniature wooden models that were made for the burial but reflect life on Djehutynakht’s estate, including some 58 model boats and nearly three dozen models of daily life such as individual shops for carpenters, weavers, brick-makers, bakers, and brewers. Of these, the best known is the exquisitely carved “Bersha procession” of a male priest leading female offering bearers.” 2

The outer coffin of Djehutynakht, known as the “Bersha coffin” is famous for its intricate and beautiful panel painting. The paintings and inscribed funerary texts were intended to facilitate Djehutynakht’s passage to the afterlife. 

The transportation of these ancient items was dramatic because the ship caught fire. Still, fortunately, the crew had the situation under control, and the precious ancient Egyptian artifacts suffered only slight water damage.

After arriving in Boston, the Museum put the Deir el-Bersha coffin and procession on view in the galleries, but most of the other objects were not revealed to the public.

Statuettes were found within the tomb. Right: This wooden figure of a striding man is thought to be Governor Djehutynakht.

In 2009, the Museum of Boston decided to put the stored artifacts on display, but the staff encountered a rather embarring problem. “Though the torso remained in Egypt, the decapitated head became the star of the showcase. With its painted-on eyebrows, somber expression, and wavy brown hair peeking through its tattered bandages, the mummy’s noggin brought viewers face-to-face with a mystery.” 1

Whose Head Was It And Why Was It Missing Cheek Bones?

Suddenly, the Museum realized no one knew whether the mummified head belonged to Djehutynakh or his wife. Only a DNA analysis could answer this question, but extracting DNA from a 4,000-year-old mummy is easier said than done.

The tomb included some 58 model boats, as well as models of carpenters, weavers, brick-makers, bakers and brewers. 

The Boston Museum contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigation (F.B.I.), asking for help solving this ancient mystery.

While examining the head, scientists discovered something puzzling. The mummified head was missing cheekbones and part of its jaw hinge. How could the missing facial bones be explained?

According to Dr. Rajiv Gupta, a neuroradiologist at Massachusetts General, “all the muscles that are involved in chewing and closing the mouth, the attachment sites of those muscles had been taken out.”

For years, archaeologists had puzzled over whether the mummy’s head belonged to husband or wife. The Boston Museum of Fine Arts, in possession of the entire contents of the tomb, sent it out for analysis. In 2009, doctors from the Massachusetts General Hospital extracted a tooth from the mummified head.

This had been caused by the opening of the mouth ceremony,  an ancient Egyptian ritual described in funerary texts such as the Pyramid Texts. “The Opening of the Mouth Ceremony allowed statues of deities and the dead to regain their senses, to see thereby into the realm of the living.” 3

However, the ritual was also performed so the deceased could eat, drink and breathe in the afterlife.

By extracting the mummy’s molar and studying the genetic material, F.B.I specialists could determine the mummified severed head belonged to Governor Djehutynakht.

What is still unknown and may never be solved is why Governor Djehutynakht had been decapitated and by whom. Had the ancient Egyptian governor been a hated man? Did looters deliberately cut off his head to prevent him from entering the afterlife, or did workers destroy his body before the tomb was sealed?

There is a fascinating ancient underwater cemetery in Florida, North America. It is called Windover Pond, and it is 8,000-year-old. Windover Pond is older than the Great Pyramids of Egypt and can help unravel the mystery of ancient Americans. The human remains discovered in the Windover Pond can even rewrite America’s ancient history.

There are many bog bodies in European peats, but they are not as well-preserved as the Windover bog bodies. There must have been some elements in the Windover sinkhole that helped protect the brain tissues for thousands of years.

Scientists suggest “that the slight acidity and high mineral content of the water in the sinkhole might contribute to their longevity. The preservation of brain tissues is reflected by preservation of ancient DNA, and the Windover sinkhole has yielded one of North America’s large ancient genetic populations.”

Some years ago, Andrew Merriwether, a geneticist of the University of Michigan, did one of the most extensive surveys of mtDNA sequences from modern and ancient native Americans.

When Hauswirth extended his DNA study, “one particular element caught his attention.

At one specific locus, all except one of the individuals shared one allele in common. In many a less variable region this would not merit comment, but in this highly variable part of the genome, it did suggest a blood connection between the individuals.

Among the Windover individuals, however, two particular microsatellite lengths dominate the population, one of nine repeats and the other of fifteen repeats. Alongside the HLA evidence this was further indication of close blood ties within a population placing its dead in the pond over several centuries.”

The fact that these people were related explains why they buried their dead in the Windover Pond.

The assumption about people who lived 8,000 years ago has been that they were too nomadic to develop much of a culture and certainly couldn’t afford to care for disabled people. Still, the Windover bog bodies tell a different story.

Among the skeletons found in the Windover sinkhole archaeologists found remains “of a boy crippled from spina bifida who had to be carried around and treated for the 16 years of his life. And there was an elderly woman who also needed such long-term care. Our ancient ancestors apparently tended carefully to each other despite their constant need to keep themselves safe and alive.”

What is still unknown is where these people originally came from, and there are some theories. The DNA studies indicate these people were of Asian origin, similar to the four other major haplotypes of Native American peoples.

“Merriwether believes the first Americans came from a single population in Asia, probably in a single wave, though the wave may have lasted for some thousands of years.” According to Merriwether there is no way to tell how long the doors was open, but it is possible to “imagine it as anywhere from one big migration with lots of people to a sort of continuous migration over a long period of time.”

Merriwether explained that genetic evidence does not tell when these people arrived.

The historical and archaeological significance of Windover Pond should not be underestimated. This site has provided “unprecedented and dramatic” information about early Archaic people in Florida and could be one of the most significant archaeological sites ever excavated in North America.

The mummy dubbed the Younger Lady was found with two other mummies in side chamber Jc of KV35. This again was a cache of looted New Kingdom mummies placed there by priests from the Third Intermediate Period. The Elder Lady and the mummy of a young boy were found next to her. The Elder Lady has now been identified as Queen Tiye, wife of AmenH๏τep III, and the young boy is suspected to either be Prince Tuthmose or Webensenu.

All three of these mummies were completely naked, with no wrappings or coffins. Other mummies in this cache were found in labeled coffins or were given linen dockets to identify them. This of course adds to the mystery of why these three mummies were treated so differently from those in the rest of the cache. The Younger Lady is also called KV35YL or 61072, the latter of which is her accession number at the Cairo Museum.

The mummy of the Younger Lady was originally determined to be of a man by Loret, the archaeologist who discovered the tomb. This mistake was probably made because of the mummy’s shaved head, which was typical of male Egyptians. When G. Elliot Smith later examined the mummy, he determined that it was of a female.

She was anywhere from 25 to 35 years old when she died. She was 5 foot 2 inches tall and quite thin. The mummy is in very bad condition, though only some of the wounds were postmortem.

The only perimortem (before death) injuries are those found on the face. The Younger Lady has a gaping wound on the left side of her mouth and cheek. Some fractured facial bones are missing and a roll of resin-soaked linen was placed in the wound by the embalmers. Scholars have determined that this wound would have likely been fatal, but they have not determined how this injury occurred. It could have been the result of a heavy object hitting her face, the Younger Lady getting kicked in the face by an animal like a horse, or a chariot accident. There are also theories of deliberate violence like her being hit with an ax.

The other injuries can be attributed to the looters. She has a small oval-shaped hole in the front of her skull and bone fragments were found within the cavity. Apparently, there was no attempt to embalm or remove her brain as it is found shrunken in her skull. The front wall of her chest is also almost entirely missing. Her heart was left in place and remains visible in her chest cavity. The diaphragm had two holes where the lungs were removed in the embalming process. In addition, her torso was packed with linen.

Her pelvis was fractured, her legs damaged, and the front half of both of her feet are missing. She also had a double piercing on her left earlobe. Finally, her right arm is missing. Two severed arms were found in KV35 and compared with the body. One was bent at the elbow and would have laid over her chest, while the other was straight. At first, the bent arm was believed to be hers, but it was proven to be too long in relation to the attached arm. So, it is believed that the other straight arm which is of equal size is the matching arm.

There have been multiple theories about the idenтιтy of this mummy. G. Elliot Smith believed that she lived during the reign of AmenH๏τep II, but many of the more recent theories push this toward the reign of AmenH๏τep III and his son.

Marianne Luban proposed that the Younger Lady was Queen Neferтιтi in 1999, a theory that has taken a life of its own. She based this mostly on the measurements between the mummy and the statue of Neferтιтi, which were very close in size. She also pointed out the shaved head, the impression of a headband on her forehead, and the double ear piercing, all of which could point to a royal mummy.

Joanne Fletcher supported this claim in 2003 pointing out all the same evidence that Luban did. She was actually allowed to examine the Younger Lady, which is when they found one of the detached arms wrapped in the bandages by her legs. But this was the flexed arm, which as I mentioned most likely does not belong to the Younger Lady. Fletcher used this as evidence that the mummy was royal because female royal mummies have one arm down and one arm flexed over the chest. But this is not a definitive factor as there are royal female mummies who have both arms down.

Dennis Forbes proposed that the mummy is Sitamun, a daughter of AmenH๏τep III and Tiye. This theory was based on the two other mummies found with the Younger Lady, the Elder Lady, and the young boy. Again the Elder Lady has been identified as Tiye, Sitamun’s mother, and one of the main theories for the idenтιтy of the mummy of the young boy is Prince Tuthmose, Sitamun’s brother.

The other theories are mostly based on DNA tests were conducted on the mummy. These were conducted between 2007 and 2009 for the Cairo Museum’s Family of King Tutankhamun Project. These results told us that this woman was the daughter of AmenH๏τep III and Tiye, the full sister of the mummy found in KV55, who is presumably Akhenaten, and the mother of King Tutankhamun!!

Based on the DNA results (which you can read more about here), most scholars believe that the mummy is not Neferтιтi or Kiya, another wife of Akhenaten who had been considered Tutankhamun’s mother. This is because neither woman was ever referred to as the King’s Sister or King’s Daughter. These тιтles would have been used throughout their life, even after they married. So because Neferтιтi and Kiya are never shown with these тιтles, they have been excluded as possible daughters of AmenH๏τep III and Tiye.

Sitamun, Isis, and Hennuttaneb are three daughters of AmenH๏τep III that have been considered but also excluded based on тιтles. These three daughters were married to their father at the end of his reign. And because of that prestigious тιтle, they would have become Akhenaten’s principal wife if he wanted to marry them. Meaning they would have taken precedent over Neferтιтi, who was a non-royal, which we know didn’t happen. Nebptah and Beketaten are two other daughters of AmenH๏τep III who were not known to have married their father, so they are likely candidates.

Nonetheless, even though she was the daughter, sister, married to, and mother of a king, she does not seem to be a prominent figure in her lifetime. No inscriptions, reliefs, or statues have even been found of her. Nothing in King Tutankhamun’s vast tomb even references her. All evidence points to his mother dying before he rose to the throne and that she was a minor wife of Akhenaten. There is also a slim possibility that this woman was not married to Akhenaten, but part of his harem.

Facial Reconstruction and Controversy
In 2018, the mummy of the Younger Lady was featured on the seventh episode of the fifth season of Expedition Unknown, enтιтled “Great Women of Ancient Egypt.” Josh Gates the host and his guests were all under the presumption that the Younger Lady is the mummy of Neferтιтi, which is a belief some scholars still hold. They used the preserved remains, modern technology, and artistry to present a reconstruction of what the Younger Lady looked like. The bust was created by French paleo-artists Elisabeth Daynes.

Again, because they presumed that the mummy was of Neferтιтi, the reconstruction wore Neferтιтi’s iconic crown and broad collar. Putting aside the controversial choice to depict the mummy as Neferтιтi after the DNA tests had most likely ruled her out, the reconstruction received a lot of controversies.

Many people were upset with the color of her skin tone, mainly it being too light. The artists said that it was compared to the skin ton of modern Egyptians, but many were concerned that she was being white-washed. Some scholars agreed, but other scholars pointed out that there would have been a great mixture of races in the royal harems, including Caucasians. But the Younger Lady would have most certainly been more brown.

Aside from the royal regalia and the color of her skin, the face is claimed to be forensically accurate to the face of the Younger Lady.