this post was submitted on 23 Jan 2026
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Archaeology

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Archaeology or archeology[a] is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscapes.

Archaeology has various goals, which range from understanding culture history to reconstructing past lifeways to documenting and explaining changes in human societies through time.

The discipline involves surveying, excavation, and eventually analysis of data collected, to learn more about the past. In broad scope, archaeology relies on cross-disciplinary research. Read more...

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‘Remarkable’ Elephant Bone Tool Is Oldest in Europe | Ancient Origins (www.ancient-origins.net)
submitted 1 week ago by HellsBelle@sh.itjust.works to c/archaeology@mander.xyz
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A palm-sized fragment of elephant bone, shaped and used as a precision tool almost half a million years ago, has been identified as the oldest known elephant-bone implement in Europe. Although the artifact was excavated at Boxgrove in West Sussex in the 1990s, new microscopic analysis revealed it was deliberately fashioned and repeatedly used to maintain razor-sharp stone handaxes - offering an unusually intimate glimpse of how early humans worked, planned and conserved valuable materials in Ice Age Britain.

The tool comes from the famous Boxgrove locality near Chichester, a site celebrated for exceptionally preserved evidence of Lower Palaeolithic life, including finely made Acheulean handaxes and butchered animal remains, explains The Independent. Researchers say the 11cm-long bone piece was initially catalogued but only recently re-examined in detail, when 3D scanning and electron microscopy exposed distinctive pitting, scoring and embedded flint fragments consistent with tool use. The finding have just been released in a Science Advances report.

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