Archaeologists have rebuffed a theory by geological researchers that Australia has been subject to prehistoric mega-tsunamis up to 20 m in height over the past 10,000 years.
According to a report in The Australian, in 2003, geological researchers suggested that ancient tsunamis over the past 10,000 years were much larger than those recorded since European settlement.
This theory was based on findings of shell and coral deposits in a 2,500 km stretch of the WA (Western Australia) coast, supposedly caused due to tsunami surges up to 20m in height.

But now, archaeologists from the Australian National University (ANU) have rejected this theory, saying that deposits might be a result of Aboriginal occupation.

Our field work would suggest that the shell and coral deposits found high on headlands in WA or further inland are evidence of Aboriginal occupation of the area, and not deposits of mega-tsunamis or other major inundations, said ANU researcher Dr Tony Barham.

An archeological team has begun uncovering rubble under which the largest known

statue of Pharaoh Ramses II is buried in the southern Egyptian town of Sohag.

According to a report in Voice of America, the statue, which workers discovered more than 15
years ago, 476 kilometers miles south of Cairo, is finally being uncovered.

The Egyptian team had been hampered in its excavation work, until now, by the presence of a
Muslim cemetery in the region of Akhmim across the Nile River from Sohag.

Archeologists were finally able to begin their work when bodies from the modern-era cemetery were moved elsewhere.
Antiquities chief Zahi Hawass said the statue was the largest of Ramses II ever found in Egypt, and his team said the statue was part of a temple complex dedicated to Ramses II.

French Egyptologist Bruno Argemi of the Egyptian Archeological Society of Provence, France,

said that Ramses II is one of the most important Pharaohs of Egypt’s New Kingdom’s 19th
dynasty, which is the next to last dynasty of the era.

The reign of Ramses II was marked by major building projects and archeologists say that he
is reputed to have built more buildings and statues in Egypt than any other pharaoh.
Ramses II ruled for approximately 67 years.
In addition to being known as a builder, Ramses II is also believed to have carved his name over the names of other Pharaohs to rededicate their statues to himself.
According to Argemi, the discovery of the new statue is also an important event, not only because of its colossal size, but because few other remnants of his reign have been found, to date, in the Middle Egyptian region of Sohag.

He said that Ramses II built many impressive temples and statues, including those of Abu Simbel and Athenis, so the discovery of one that is even larger than that of the 25 meter statue at Abu Simbel, is a major find.
Argemi also determined that many statues and temples of Ramses have been found in both Upper

Egypt and the Delta region, but very few in Sohag, making this an unusual find. (ANI)

The Archaeology magazine has announced the top 10 finds of 2008, describing the past year as that of imperial Roman marble heads.
Archaeology’s top 10 for 2008:
The secret of Maya Blue: Scientists found that the sacred blue pigment Mayans used in religious ceremonies, was made through the ritual burning of a mixture, including indigo, minerals and copal incense.
Masked mummy of Peru: An intact 1,700-year-old mummy, was unearthed in Lima, bearing a wooden mask with seashell eyes. Archaeologists say it belongs to a master weaver from Peru’s Wari culture.
The stone with soul: A 2,800-year-old basalt tomb was found in Turkey. An inscription hewed into it showed that the Iron Age culture believed the soul was separate from the body and could inhabit a monument.
Brown gold from Oregon: Preserved feces found in an eastern Oregon cave showed that the colonization of the Americas by humans dates back to 14,300 years ago. DNA studies provided more information about the ancient inhabitants of the Americas.

Oldest oil paintings: The world’s oldest-known paintings were found in a maze of caves in Afghanistan’s Bamiyan Valley.
The first European? A 1.3 million-year-old chunk of a human jawbone was unearthed in a cave in northern Spain. The find showed that early humans entered Europe about 500,000 years earlier than previously thought.

The earliest shoes: 42,000-year-old human toe bones found in China showed that the person wore some form of footwear.

Pristine Portuguese shipwreck: A 16th-century cargo ship found buried on the seafloor off the coast of Namibia. The find included almost 50 pounds of gold coins, navigational instrument and elephant tusks among other treasures.
The colossal heads of the Roman Empire: Parts of statues depicting Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius and Faustina the Elder (wife of the emperor Antoninus Pius) were found in central
Turkey.
The origins of whaling: A 3,000-year-old 20-inch-long walrus tusk was found on Russia’s Chukotka Peninsula, which bears the carvings of a seal, a bear and a boatful of people
hunting a whale. Archeologists believe it is the earliest evidence of whaling.

After scoring a clean 60 days run, Dil Raju’s film Kotha Bangaru Lokam considered a hit in the industry circles has run into a trouble.
The Department of Archaeology and Museums and the Indian National Museum’s for Art and Cultural Heritage (INTACH) have jointly issued notices to the Producer to this extent for taking shoot of the song at the sacred Buddhist site near Vizag, without the permission of the concerned departments.

This act is being viewed as a violation of the AP Ancient and Historical Monuments and Archaeological places and Remains Act 1960. The officials maintained that there was vulgarity in the song sequences that too in the backdrop of the Buddhist sites. The Trust further sought the producer to immediately scrap the song from the film.

According to the said Act, no person has a right either to vandalise or defame the ancient and historical fragile remains in any manner.

INTACH Visakhapatnam Chapter convener E Rani Sarma said that the particular song `Nijamga…Needega’ was obscene and shot on the lead pair on the Buddha Sthupas at Bavikonda, 10 km from here. importantly, many youth being influenced from such movies are behaving vulgarly outdoors, particularly at ancient and historical places,’’ she said and demanded that the song be removed from the movie immediately.

Sarma has lodged a written complaint against the film-makers with the Department of Archaeology. She also appealed to Visakhapatnam Urban Development Authority vice chairman V N Vishnu to provide security measures at the ancient structures.

When contacted, Director of the Department of Archaeology and Museums P Chenna Reddy said that they would first issue notice to the film producer, and director of the Archaeology film.

Modern humans may have evolved more than 80,000 years earlier than previously thought, according to a new study of sophisticated stone tools found in Ethiopia.
The tools were uncovered in the 1970s at the archaeological site of Gademotta, in the Ethiopian Rift Valley. But it was not until this year that new dating techniques revealed the tools to be far older than the oldest known Homo sapien bones, which are around 195,000 years old.Many of the tools found are small blades, made using a technique that is thought to require complex cognitive abilities and nimble fingers, according to study co-author and Berkeley Geochronology

Some archaeologists believe that these tools and similar ones found elsewhere are associated with the emergence of the modern human species,
“It seems that we were technologically more advanced at an earlier time that we had previously thought,” said study co-author Leah Morgan, from the University of California, Berkeley.
In many parts of the world, archaeologists see a leap around 300,000 years ago in Stone Age technology from the large and crude hand-axes and picks of the so-called Acheulean period to the more delicate and diverse points and blades of the Middle Stone Age.

At other sites in Ethiopia, such as Herto in the Afar region northeast of Gademotta, the transition does not occur until much later, around 160,000 years ago, according to argon dating. This variety in dates supports the idea of a gradual transition in technology.