YukonU Anthropology

Our ANTH 102: World Prehistory class went on a field trip to the Yukon Government Heritage Unit. Thank you to Yukon Palaeontologist Dr. Grant Zazula and Yukon Archaeologist Christian Thomas for a super informative and engaging tour of the collections.

Mummified late Holocene porcupine discovered in the Yukon.

Genomic identification and complete mitochondrial recovery of a Late Holocene porcupine (Erethizon dorsatum) mummy from Yukon permafrost - Scientific Reports We identified a 3000-year-old specimen from the Traditional Territory of the Tr’ondëk Hwëch’in in central Yukon Territory, Canada as the first known mummified remains of an ancient North American porcupine (Erethizon dorsatum), known as “Ts’ey” in the Hän language, using genetic analysi...

New much younger dates for Chile’s Monte Verde archaeological site:

Monte Verde fieldwork resets age of famous South American archaeological site New research led by a University of Wyoming archaeologist near an ancient encampment in South America challenges a relatively new but widely accepted theory that the people who made and used Clovis points in North America were not the first inhabitants of the Americas south of the continental ice sh...

We lost an important defender of orangutans today 😢💔 Very sad to hear about the passing of Dr. Birute Galdikas. https://orangutan.org/tribute-to-dr-birute-mary-galdikas/

Everyone welcome! This Wednesday, February 25th Viking researcher Dr. Keith Ruiter will be presenting on medieval sources and what they can teach us about moving towards a more just society. Room A2801 at noon.

IRELAND’S LARGEST PREHISTORIC HILLFORT SETTLEMENT REVEALED

Archaeologists have uncovered extraordinary evidence of what is now believed to be the largest prehistoric hillfort settlement ever identified in Ireland or Britain. At Brusselstown Ring in County Wicklow, researchers have detected more than six hundred suspected house platforms, revealing a densely populated community unlike anything previously known from the period.

The hillfort forms part of the Baltinglass cluster and shows signs of long term activity stretching from the Neolithic into the Bronze Age. Recent surveys and test excavations confirm that the main settlement flourished during the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age, with homes of different sizes occupied at the same time. Interestingly, there is no clear sign of social hierarchy, suggesting a broadly equal community.

Even more intriguing is the discovery of a possible water cistern, which could be the first ever identified within an Irish hillfort. Together, these findings point to early proto urban living in Ireland centuries earlier than once thought.

🗺️ Find ancient sites near you with ARCHI UK: www.archiuk.com

📺 Learn how to use LiDAR & old maps: YouTube.com/

📷 Image: Antiquity (2025)

🔗 Full article: https://phys.org/news/2025-12-scientists-uncovered-evidence-ireland-largest.html

Two thousand years of garden urbanism in the Upper Amazon found using LiDAR.

Two thousand years of garden urbanism in the Upper Amazon An agrarian-based, low-density urbanism associated with a 2500-year-old culture in Amazonia has been identified.

The moment the earliest known man-made (Neanderthal) fire was uncovered
BBC News visits the prehistoric site in Suffolk

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/resources/idt-b9da7a6d-165b-492a-8785-235cd10e2e8e

The moment the earliest known man-made fire was uncovered - BBC News Archaeologists in the UK have discovered the world's oldest evidence of humans lighting fires

ANTH 101 - Chloe puts a puzzle core together in seconds 👏👏👏