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From CNN: Satellites unearthing ancient Egyptian ruins.

Archaeologists believe they have unearthed only a small fraction of Egypt’s ancient ruins, but they’re making new discoveries with help from high-tech allies — satellites that peer into the past from the distance of space.

"Everyone’s becoming more aware of this technology and what it can do," said Sarah Parcak, an archaeologist who heads the Laboratory for Global Health at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. "There is so much to learn."

Images from space have been around for decades. Yet only in the past decade or so has the resolution of images from commercial satellites sharpened enough to be of much use to archaeologists. Today, scientists can use them to locate ruins — some no bigger than a small living room — in some of the most remote and forbidding places on the planet.[continue].

From the Telegraph: Neanderthals could have died out because their bodies overheated.

Analysis of DNA obtained from Neanderthal remains has revealed key differences from modern humans that suggest their bodies produced excess heat.

While in the cold climate of an ice age this would have provided the species with an advantage, as the earth warmed they would have been less able to cope. Ultimately this would have caused their extinction around 24,000 years ago.

Scientists at Newcastle University have put forward the theory after examining a particular form of genetic material which was obtained from the fossilised bones of Neanderthals.

By comparing it with that found in modern humans, they discovered that [continue].

From discovery.com: King Tut’s Father ID’d in Stone Inscription.

An inscribed limestone block might have solved one of history’s greatest mysteries — who fathered the boy pharaoh King Tut.

"We can now say that Tutankhamun was the child of Akhenaten," Zahi Hawass, chief of Egypt’s Supreme Council of Antiquities, told Discovery News.

The finding offers evidence against another leading theory that King Tut was sired by the minor king Smenkhkare.

Hawass discovered the missing part of a broken limestone block a few months ago in a [continue].

From Discovery of Roman Battlefield Poses Historical Riddle.

Archaeologists in Germany say they have found an ancient battlefield strewn with Roman weapons. The find is significant because it indicates that Romans were fighting battles in north Germany at a far later stage than previously assumed.

The wilds of Germany may not have been off-limits to Roman legions, archaeologists announced on Monday. At a press conference in the woods near the town of Kalefeld, about 100 kilometers south of Hanover, researchers announced the discovery of a battlefield strewn with hundreds of Roman artifacts dating from the 3rd century A.D. [continue, see photos]

From Science Daily: Predecessor of Cows, The Aurochs, Were Still Living In The Netherlands Around AD 600.

Archaeological researchers at the University of Groningen have discovered that the aurochs, the predecessor of our present-day cow, lived in the Netherlands for longer than originally assumed. Remains of bones recently retrieved from a horn core found in Holwerd (Friesland, Netherlands), show that the aurochs became extinct in around AD 600 and not in the fourth century. [continue].

From Ancient Roman Oil Lamp ‘Factory Town’ Found.

Italian researchers have discovered the pottery center where the oil lamps that lighted the ancient Roman empire were made.

Evidence of the pottery workshops emerged in Modena, in central-northern Italy, during construction work to build a residential complex near the ancient walls of the city.

"We found a large ancient Roman dumping filled with pottery scraps. There were vases, bottles, bricks, but most of all, hundreds of oil lamps, each bearing their maker’s name," Donato Labate, the archaeologist in charge of the dig, told Discovery News.

Firmalampen, or “factory lamps,” were one of the first mass-produced goods in Roman times and they carried brand names clearly stamped on their clay bottoms. [continue, see photo].

From New Scientist: Spanish Inquisition left genetic legacy in Iberia.

It’s not often that cultural and religious persecution makes countries more diverse, but the Spanish Inquisition might have done just that.

One in five Spaniards and Portuguese has a Jewish ancestor, while a tenth of Iberians boast North African ancestors, finds new research.

This melting pot probably occurred after centuries of coexistence and tolerance among Muslims, Jews and Christians ended in 1492, when Catholic monarchs converted or expelled the Islamic population, called Moriscos. Sephardic Jews, whose Iberian roots extend to the first century AD, received much the same treatment.

"They were given a choice: convert, go, or die," says Mark Jobling, a geneticist at the University of Leicester, UK. Some of those that became Christian would have ended up contributing genes to the Iberian pool.

Historians know that [continue].

Thanks to Sarah for telling me about this story.

From The Telegraph: Lost city of ‘cloud people’ found in Peru.

Archaeologists have discovered a lost city carved into the Andes Mountains by the mysterious Chachapoya tribe.

The settlement covers some 12 acres and is perched on a mountainside in the remote Jamalca district of Utcubamba province in the northern jungles of Peru’s Amazon.

The buildings found on the Pachallama peak are in remarkably good condition, estimated to be over 1,000 years old and comprised of the traditional round stone houses built by the Chachapoya, the ‘Cloud Forest People’.

The area is completely overgrown with the jungle now covering much of the settlement but explorers found [continue, see photo].