Archaeology news for Aug 2-Sept 8

[archersangel]

American manuscript that was hidden under paint for 500 years

There are only a handful of manuscripts remaining from before Europeans came to the continent. They're made of leather strips coated with white plaster-like substance called gesso.

The one the researchers studied is called the Codex Selden, and scholars have been suspicious for decades now that the book is hiding something beneath its surface.

New evidence suggests China's legendary 'great flood' might have actually happened

According to legend, Chinese civilisation began around 4,000 years ago in the Yellow River basin, when an emperor called Yu the Great successfully managed to control a huge flood.

After all these years, the story has taken on an almost mythological status, but despite frequent retelling, evidence for the 'great flood' and the Xia dynasty itself has remained patchy.

Now researchers have found the first geological evidence that the flood actually happened - and it was just as big as the legends suggest.

Mystery bones from ancient Greece may be a sacrifice to Zeus

The ancient Greeks and Romans wrote grisly legends about Mount Lykaion. The Arcadian peak, some would write, was where one of the first Greeks tried to trick Zeus by feeding him a sacrifice tainted with human flesh. In punishment, the legend goes, Lycaon was either slain or turned into a wolf.

As a result, according to some ancient writers, the firepit altar at the top of the mountain didn't just receive gifts of livestock from the people of ancient Greece. Sometimes a human boy would be added to the offering in Zeus's honor (or eaten), perhaps even in the hope of inducing a lupine transformation. But were musings on these sacrifices taken from historical accounts, or were they simply instances of ancient myth turning into urban legend?

Iceland goose hunt turns up 1,000-year-old sword

The five men were in Skaftarhreppur in southern Iceland when they found the sword, which they think may have washed up during a recent flood, the Visir news website reports. One of the men, Arni Bjorn Valdimarsson, shared a photo of it on his Facebook page and swiftly received a call from Iceland's Cultural Heritage Agency, which took possession of the artefact on Monday morning.