Anthropology

Chemistry

19th century painters may have primed their canvases with beer-brewing leftovers

Several paintings from the Danish Golden Age contain remnants of brewer’s yeast, barley and other grains commonly used to brew beer.

Science & Society

Anténor Firmin challenged anthropology’s racist roots 150 years ago

In The Equality of the Human Races, Haitian scholar Anténor Firmin showed that science did not support division among the races.

Archaeology

A prehistoric method for tailoring clothes may be written in bone

A punctured bone fragment was probably a leatherwork punch board. Perforated leather sewn together may have been seams in clothing.

Science & Society

The Smithsonian’s ‘Lights Out’ inspires visitors to save the fading night sky

The exhibition examines how light pollution harms astronomy, ecosystems and human cultures. But it also offers hope.

Anthropology

Native Americans corralled Spanish horses decades before Europeans arrived

Great Plains groups incorporated domestic horses into their cultures by the early 1600s, before Europeans moved north from Mexico.

Anthropology

A surprising food may have been a staple of the real Paleo diet: rotten meat

The realization that people have long eaten putrid foods has archaeologists rethinking what Neandertals and other ancient hominids ate.

Anthropology

Two scientists’ trek showed how people of Chaco Canyon may have hauled logs

By carrying a log with the aid of head straps called tumplines, the duo demoed how people may have hauled timbers to Chaco about 1,000 years ago.

Archaeology

The Yamnaya may have been the world’s earliest known horseback riders

5,000-year-old Yamnaya skeletons show physical signs of horseback riding, hinting that they may be the earliest known humans to do so.

Anthropology

Hominids used stone tool kits to butcher animals earlier than once thought

Finds in Kenya push Oldowan tool use back to around 2.9 million years ago, roughly 300,000 years earlier than previous evidence.

Archaeology

Vikings brought animals to England as early as the year 873

A chemical analysis of cremated remains offers physical evidence of the arrival of Norse animals to England in the ninth century.

Archaeology

Mysterious marks on Ice Age cave art may have been a form of record keeping

Hunter-gatherers during the Ice Age may have recorded when prey mated and gave birth, suggesting that these people possessed complex cognitive skills

Life

These science discoveries from 2022 could be game changers

Gophers that farm, the earliest known hominid, a strange hybrid monkey and the W boson's mass are among the findings awaiting more evidence.