King Richard III: DNA and genealogical study confirms identity of remains found in Leicester and uncovers new truths about his appearance and Plantagenet lineage

International research led by the University of Leicester published in Nature Communications reveals:

• Analysis of all the available evidence confirms identity of King Richard III to the point of 99.999% (at its most conservative).
• Analysis of the mitochondrial DNA shows a match between Richard III and modern female-line relatives, Michael Ibsen and Wendy Duldig.
• The male line of descent is broken at one or more points in the line between Richard III and living male-line relatives descended from Henry Somerset, 5th Duke of Beaufort.
• King Richard was almost certainly blue-eyed and probably had blond hair at least during his childhood.
• The portrait which appears to most closely match the genetically-determined hair and eye colour is the Arched-Frame Portrait in the Society of Antiquaries.

An international research team led by Dr Turi King from the University of Leicester Department of Genetics provides overwhelming evidence that the skeleton discovered under a car park in Leicester indeed represents the remains of King Richard III, thereby closing what is probably the oldest forensic case solved to date.

The team of researchers, including Professor of English Local History, Kevin Schürer, who is also Pro-Vice-Chancellor for Research at the University of Leicester, who led the genealogical research for the project, has published their findings online today (Tuesday 2 December) in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Nature Communications.

The researchers collected DNA from living relatives of Richard III and analysed several genetic markers, including the complete mitochondrial genomes, inherited through the maternal line, and Y-chromosomal markers, inherited through the paternal line, from both the skeletal remains and the living relatives.

While the Y-chromosomal markers differ, the mitochondrial genome shows a genetic match between the skeleton and the maternal line relatives. The former result is not unsurprising as the chances for a false-paternity event is fairly high after so many generations. This paper is also the first to carry out a statistical analysis of all the evidence together to prove beyond reasonable doubt that Skeleton 1 from the Greyfriars site in Leicester is indeed the remains of King Richard III.

The researchers also used genetic markers to determine hair and eye colour of RIII and found that with probably blond hair and almost certainly blue eyes RIII looked most similar to his depiction in one of the earliest portraits of him that survived, that in the Society of Antiquaries in London.

The research team now plans to sequence the complete genome of RIII to learn more about the last English king to die in battle.

The University of Leicester was the principal funder of the research. Dr King’s post is part-funded by The Wellcome Trust and the Leverhulme Trust.

Dr King said:

“Our paper covers all the genetic and genealogical analysis involved in the identification of the remains of Skeleton 1 from the Greyfriars site in Leicester and is the first to draw together all the strands of evidence to come to a conclusion about the identity of those remains. Even with our highly conservative analysis, the evidence is overwhelming that these are indeed the remains of King Richard III, thereby closing an over 500 year old missing person’s case.”

Professor Schürer added:

“The combination of evidence confirms the remains as those of Richard III. Especially important is the triangulation of the maternal line descendants. The break in the Y-chromosome line is not overly surprising given the incidence of non-paternity, but does pose interesting speculative questions over succession as a result.”

Simon Chaplin, Director of Culture & Society at the Wellcome Trust, added: “It is exciting to have access to genetic data from any known historical individual, let alone a king of England lost for more than 500 years, so we are thrilled to be able to support this fascinating project through our Research Resources grant scheme. Adding this information to a wealth of existing material about Richard III further highlights the ways in which studying human remains can inform our understanding of the past, and we look forward to learning more about Richard for many years to come.”

University of Leicester – Header Image : These are remains of Richard III discovered at Greyfriars.

In the summer of 2014, the Oriental Department of the German Archaeological Institute led excavations in the quarry of Baalbek Heliopolis (Lebanon) and discovered the world’s largest ancient quarried stone block.

The monolithic block is a staggering 19.60 m long, 6 m wide and at least 5.5 m high with an estimated weight of 1650 tons. Stones like this were quarried for the podium of a temple dedicated to Jupiter in the Roman sanctuary of Baalbek.

The team is currently investigating why the stone was never completed and left in the quarry – and by what means could the stone block be transported.

Studying the machining marks on a similar 1000 ton monolith, named “Hajjar al-Hibla” (Stone of the Pregnant Woman) their data revealed that Hajjar al-Hibla was left in the quarry due to the poor stone quality on the block’s edge that could leave it prone to damage during transport.

The larger monolith, located in the stone layer under the Hajjar al- Hibla has a narrow side already worked to a smooth face and would have been transported as a single block.

Archaeologists also investigated the waste dumps of the mining activities, in order to locate datable and stratifiable sherds of pottery and small finds.

The giant monolith will be further investigated to gain exact dimensions during the next phase of archaeological investigations.

The research was undertaken  with the supervision of Prof. Dr. Abdul Massih Jeanine , Lebanese University and the Baalbek Project of the Orient Department of the German Archaeological Institute, in cooperation with the Lebanese Council of Antiquities.

Deutsches Archäologisches Institut

During the excavation of Sandby borg ringfort on the island of Öland, Sweden, a number of macabre finds were made. Skeletal remains from a small child were found in one of the houses in the ringforts central block.

This is the first child to be identified among the victims of the massacre at Sandby borg. It is both frightening and sensational in the sense that prior to this find the results showed that there had only been adults in the ringfort when this horrific event took place, says Helena Victor , project manager at the Dept. of Museum Archaeology at Kalmar County Museum, Sweden.

It sheds a whole new light on the massacre, she continues. The excavation was carried out in September by the Department of Museum Archaeology at Kalmar County Museum, in cooperation with students from Linnaeus University.

Osteological analyses have now been made of the bones that were uncovered and experts confirm that they belong to two individuals, one of which is a child of an estimated age of 2 to 5 years.

In the same house the skeleton of a middle – aged, 50 to 60 year old man was found lying on its stomach in the central of the building.

What we can see by looking at the position in which the skeleton was found is that he was probably struck down and fell prone into the burning fireplace, says Clara Alfsdotter, osteologist at the museum of Bohuslän who conducted the analysis.

Tragically he’s been left there, lying in the burning fireplace, which is a terrible fate.

The Sandby borg research was started in 2010.

Despite the fact that less than 3 % of the ringfort have been excavated, the remains of over ten individuals have been uncovered and all of them show indications to having died in a violent massacre that took place around 1500 years ago.

The researchers are now pleading for the public to donate so that the work can continue.

We need funding to be able to continue, Helena Victor explains.

So we’re launching a crowdfunding campaign, where one of the rewards for funding will be to join us in the trench at the next Sandby borg excavation.

It is the first time in Sweden that an archaeological crowdfunding campaign has been started.

The Sandby borg crowdfunding campaign will run between November 27 and December 31, 2013

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Led by a University of Oklahoma professor, an international team has uncovered the very first evidence of milk consumption in the ancient dental calculus – a mineralised dental plaque – of humans in Europe and western Asia. The team discovered direct evidence of milk consumption preserved in human dental plaque from the Bronze Age to the present day.

“The study has far-reaching implications for understanding the relationship between human diet and evolution,” said Christina Warinner, professor in the OU Department of Anthropology. “Dairy products are a very recent, post-Neolithic dietary innovation, and most of the world’s population is unable to digest lactose, often developing the symptoms of lactose intolerance.” Warinner headed a group of researchers from the universities of York and Copenhagen, and the University College of London.

Comprehending how, where and when humans consumed milk products is a crucial link between human consumption and their livestock. The novel research provides direct protein evidence that the milk of all three major dairy livestock – cattle, sheep and goats – has been consumed by human populations for at least 5,000 years. This validates previous evidence for milk fats identified on pottery and cooking utensils in early farming communities.

“The discovery of milk proteins in human dental calculus will allow scientists to unite these lines of evidence and compare the genetic traits and cultural behaviours of specific individuals who lived thousands of years ago,” says Warinner.

Contributing Source: University of Oklahoma

Header Image Source: Wikimedia

Potential vampires in the 17th-18th century buried with rocks and sickles to ward off evil.

Potential ‘vampires’ buried in northwest Poland with sickles and rocks across their bodies were most probably local and not immigrants to the area, according to a study published yesterday in the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Lesley Gregoricka from University of South Alabam and colleagues.

In northwest Poland, apotropaic funerary rites – a traditional practice intended to prevent evil – occurred throughout the 17th-18th c. AD. Those of the dead considered at risk for becoming vampires for various reasons were given specific treatment, and investigating these burial practices may provide valuable information into community cultural and social practices, as well as the social identities of people living in the area at the time.

Excavations at a cemetery in northwestern Poland have unveiled six unusual graves, with sickles across the bodies or large rocks under the chins of select individuals, amidst hundreds of normal burials. In order to obtain a better understanding as to whether the bodies selected for aprotropaic burial rites were local or non-local immigrants, the authors of this study tested permanent molars from 60 individuals, including six “special” or deviant burials, using radiogenic strontium isotope ratios from archaeological dental enamel. They then compared the results to strontium isotopes of local animals.

The authors discovered that those in deviant burials appear to be a predominantly local population, with all individuals buried as potential vampires exhibiting local strontium isotope ratios.

These data indicate that those targeted for apotropaic practices were not likely migrants to the area, but rather, local individuals whose social identity or manner of death likely marked them with suspicion in some other way.

The authors imply one alternative explanation behind these apotropaic burials may be the cholera epidemics that were dominant in Eastern Europe during the 17th century, as the first person to die from an infectious disease outbreak was presumed more likely to return from the dead as a vampire.

“People of the post-medieval period did not understand how disease was spread, and rather than a scientific explanation for these epidemics, cholera and the deaths that resulted from it were explained by the supernatural – in this case, vampires,” said Dr. Gregoricka.

Contributing Source: PLOS

Header Image Source: Amy Scott

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Latest research on the oldest surviving rock art of Southeast Asia shows that the region’s first people, hunter-gatherers who arrived over 50,000 years ago, brought with them a rich art practice.

Published this week in the archaeological journal Antiquity, the research shows that these earliest people skilfully produced paintings of animals in rock shelters from southwest China to Indonesia. Besides these countries, early sites were also recorded in Thailand, Cambodia and Malaysia.

Griffith University Chair in Rock Art Professor Paul Taçon led the research which involved field work with collaborative international teams in rugged locations of several countries.

The oldest paintings were identified by analysing overlapping superimpostions of art in various styles as well as numerical dating. It was found that the oldest art mainly consists of naturalistic images of wild animals and, in some locations, hand stencils.

The research shows that 35,000 – 40,000 year old dates for some rock art in Sulawesi, Indonesia announced in October by Griffith University Senior Research Fellow Maxime Aubert is not an anomaly. Instead, the practice was widespread across the region.

Professor Taçon said that, “As with the early art of Europe, the oldest Southeast Asian images often incorporated or were placed in relation to natural features of rock surfaces.

“This shows a purposeful engagement with the new places early peoples arrived in for both symbolic and practical reasons.

“Essentially, they humanised landscapes wherever they went, transforming them from wild places to cultural landscapes. This was the beginning of a process that continues to this day.”

But unlike in Europe, the oldest surviving rock art of Southeast Asia is more often found in rock shelters rather than deep caves, suggesting experiences in deep caves cannot have been their inspiration as has long been argued for Europe.

“This significantly shifts debates about the origins of art-making and supports ideas that this fundamental human behaviour began with our most ancient ancestors in Africa rather than Europe.

“The research supports the idea suggested by the early Indonesian rock art dates that modern humans brought the practice of making semi-permanent images in rocky landscapes to Europe and Asia from Africa,’’ Professor Taçon said.

These results have implications not only for our understanding of Southeast Asian and European rock art but also Australian, because in Kakadu-Arnhem Land and other parts of northern Australia the oldest surviving rock art also consists of naturalistic animals and stencils.

Thus the practice of making these sorts of designs may have been brought to Australia at the time of initial colonisation, but it may alternatively have been independently invented or resulted from as yet unknown forms of culture contact.

All three possibilities are equally intriguing. New investigations in both northern Australia and Southeast Asia are currently being planned.

Griffith University

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A rare Middle Bronze Age weapon, one of only six known from Europe, has been saved for the nation with a grant of almost £39,000 from the National Heritage Memorial Fund (NHMF).

The award, made to Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery, has allowed the Rudham Dirk, a ceremonial dagger, to come into public ownership to be placed on display for visitors to enjoy.

The Dirk was discovered twelve years ago, when it was ploughed up in a field in East Rudham, north Norfolk. Its significance unknown at that time, it was subsequently used as a doorstop until it was identified in 2013.

It is incredibly rare and only six examples of this type of dirk are known in Europe: two from France, two from Holland and now two from Britain. Intriguingly, the British parallel was also found in Norfolk, at Oxborough in 1988, and is now in the British Museum.

What makes the Rudham Dirk particularly distinctive is its monumental size. At approximately 68cms long it is about three times the size of a normal Bronze Age dirk and so large and heavy it is completely impractical as a weapon.

With a blunt blade that was never sharpened and no rivet holes for a handle, the Dirk was deliberately designed as a ceremonial weapon. This is almost certainly the reason why it was found bent in half, deliberately folded as part of the object’s ritual ‘destruction’ before its burial, a practice well known from Bronze Age metalwork.

Dr Tim Pestell, Senior Curator of Archaeology at Norwich Castle said: “We are delighted to have secured such an important and rare find as this, which provides us with insights into the beliefs and contacts of people at the dawn of metalworking. Through its display we hope to bring residents and visitors to Norfolk closer to the remarkable archaeology of our region and stories of our ancient past.”

Carole Souter, Chief Executive of NHMF, said: “This is great news! The Rudham Dirk is a fascinating piece of our heritage that offers real insight into how our Bronze Age ancestors lived. Our trustees felt it vital that it be secured for the nation and remain in Norfolk where local people can enjoy it and explore its connection to the area.”

After some years as a doorstop, the dirk was reviewed by Norfolk’s Identification and Recording Service, which runs the county’s Portable Antiquities Scheme where it was dated and identified as an artefact of incredible importance. Negotiations were subsequently opened between the landowner and Norwich Castle Museum and Art Gallery and a final sale price of £40,970 agreed. Grants from the National Heritage Memorial Fund and the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society have enabled the dirk to be secured for the nation.

NHMF – Image Credit : NHMF

Humans in Africa already exploited domestic cereals 7,000 years ago and thus several centuries earlier than previously known.

A research team from Barcelona, Treviso, London and Kiel was successful in verifying ancient barley and wheat residues in grave goods and on teeth from two Neolithic cemeteries in Central Sudan and Nubia.

Dr. Welmoed Out of the Graduate School “Human Development in Landscapes” in Kiel was involved in the investigation. “With our results we can verify that people along the Nile did not only exploit gathered wild plants and animals but even crops of barley and wheat.”

These were first cultivated in the Middle East about 10,500 years ago and spread out from there to Central and South Asia as well as to Europe and North Africa – the latter faster than expected. “The diversity of the diet was much greater than previously assumed,” states Out and adds: “Moreover, the fact that grains were placed in the graves of the deceased implies that they had a special, symbolic meaning.”

The research team, coordinated by Welmoed Out and the environmental archaeologist Marco Madella from Barcelona, implemented, among other things, a special high-quality light microscope as well as radiocarbon analyses for age determination. Hereby, they were supported by the fact that mineral plant particles, so-called phytoliths, survive very long, even when other plant remains are no longer discernible. In addition, the millennia-old teeth, in particular adherent calculus, provide evidence on the diet of these prehistoric humans due to the starch granules and phytoliths contained therein.

The Graduate School Human Development in Landscapes (GSHDL) was established in 2007 within the framework of the federal and state supported Excellence Initiative. In this context, scholars in the humanities and the natural sciences are involved in research projects on the complex relationship between society, culture and the environment. Prehistoric societies are particularly investigated as exemplary examples.

Kiel University

The Department of Antiquities, Ministry of Communications and Works, announces the completion of the fourth season of excavations within the framework of the Pafos Agora Project, which aims to explore and study the Agora of the ancient city of Nea Pafos, the capital of Cyprus in the Hellenistic and Roman periods.

The 2014 field work took place between August 8 and October 10th. The team, which was led by Professor Ewdoksia Papuci-Władyka, comprised nearly 60 persons (20 staff, 15 student trainers, 23 volunteers).

The campaign’s aim was not only to excavate and provisionally study the uncovered material, but also to conduct preservation work performed by members of the Institute’s staff and to implement new, non-invasive research techniques (already partly tested during the 2013 season).

The non-invasive research was conducted by specialists from the AGH University of Science and Technology in Krakow (Laser scanning of trenches) and the J. Kochanowski University in Kielce (Georadar prospection). Thus, the project has an interdisciplinary character.

The field work took place in all three trenches although in Trench II it was limited to the exploration of the well in Room 13, which had already began in the previous season during which it had been interpreted as a cistern. However, the excavation in 2014 clearly showed that this feature is definitely a well. The well was excavated to a depth of 7 metres, and at the depth of 5.95m, the ground water table was reached, affecting the exploration significantly: the team is deeply indebted to the local fire brigade for their assistance in this matter.

The well was filled-in with rich movable material and earth. Firstly, pottery of different categories: fine wares, plain wares, cooking ware and transport amphorae (some of which bear stamps). The team also found terracotta figurines, coins and metal objects. Amongst the metal objects were three very interesting sling bullets, two of which were decorated with a relief depicting scorpions and the third with a representation of thunderbolt.

Based on the pottery and the amphorae stamps, it can be stated that the material of the well constitutes a homogeneous, closed late Hellenistic deposit, dated from the late 2nd to the mid-1st centuries BC. From an architectural point of view, the construction of the well is very closely connected with the first phase of the stylobate of the east portico of the Agora, and so the initial date of this portico should probably be moved back to an even earlier date i.e. to Hellenistic times. However, it should be noted that this hypothesis will need to be confirmed with the study of the material, particularly the coins numbering almost 60, have been studied.

Large-scale works were undertaken in Trench I, situated in the central part of the Agora square. The excavations cleared and enlarged squares traced and partly excavated by K. Nicolaou in the 1970’s. These squares were combined with the current excavation squares, excavated within Trench I in 2011. Nicolaou had stated that it was likely that an altar had been uncovered. The Polish team proposes that this was not an altar but part of a large, very well constructed building, probably a temple with an East-West orientation.

Furthermore, the team suggests that the type of wall construction (the so-called compartment type), which is very characteristic of the Ptolemaic period, and the excavated moveable finds (mainly pottery) point to a Hellenistic date. It seems that the building/temple was in use for a long period and was rebuilt several times. In close vicinity to this building – to the south – a large pit was discovered filled-in with pottery and numerous terracotta figurine fragments of which the latest can be dated to the late 2nd and early 1st centuries BC. The building was perhaps rebuilt at this time and the material that was of no use was thrown into the pit.

In Trench III, structures that were discovered in 2013 were further investigated. In addition, the trench was extended to the south aiming to uncover a possible continuation of walls found in 2013. As a result, part of a large building, erected on cut bedrock, was uncovered composed of at least two rooms.

This building was built before the erection of the south portico of the agora. A preliminary analysis of the pottery indicates that that the building was possibly erected during the late Classical/Early Hellenistic period, i.e. in the early days of the city, and that it was also used after the erection of the south portico, during the first phase of the agora. The final period of the building’s use seems to have been the 2nd and 1st c. BC. However, the exact function of the building remains unclear. In Trench III 12 new structures were explored, among which are five walls, two floors and one channel.

As of 2013, part of the project’s aims is the development of a new system of documentation titled, “The Archaeological and Archaeometric Information System for the Pafos Agora Project” (AIS for PAP). This system will link standard archaeological documentation with Digital Elevation Model (DEM), correlated with the documentation database and coupled with orthophotomap running under the Geographical Information System (GIS).

Republic of Cyprus

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History was made this month as the robotic Philae lander completed the first controlled touchdown on a comet. The European Space Agency-led project was set up to obtain images of a comet’s surface and help scientists to understand what a comet is made of.

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