🧐 Ancient Beat #97: Submerged megastructures, old(est) beads, and the age of Rongorongo script

Hello and welcome to issue #97 of Ancient Beat! Let’s get right into it.

Here’s the latest ancient news. 👇

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🗞 Ancient News: Top 5

• Stone Age Megastructure Found Submerged in the Baltic Sea — A groundbreaking discovery in the Baltic Sea revealed a Stone Age megastructure. It has been identified as a hunting wall made of 1,670 stones. The smaller stones connect to larger boulders and stretch over half a mile. Dating to around 11,000 years ago, it’s one of the oldest of its kind. The structure was likely used by hunter-gatherers to corral reindeer and bottleneck them against the water. That ancient people built this structure indicates that they may have been less transient than previously thought. Reminds me of the (very cool) desert kites that I’ve covered a number of times.

• Archaeologists Discover Oldest Known Bead in the Americas — In Wyoming, USA, archaeologists found a 12,940-year-old bead made from hare bone at the La Prele Mammoth site, marking it as the oldest known bead in the Americas. This bead, created during the Clovis period, shows the earliest evidence of hare usage by humans. Measuring about 0.28 inches in length with an internal diameter of 0.06 inches, its grooves suggest human craftsmanship, possibly for body or clothing decoration.

• Anthropologists' Research Unveils Early Stone Plaza in the Andes — At the Callacpuma site in northern Peru, researchers discovered one of the earliest circular plazas in Andean South America, dating back 4,750 years. It is built with large, upright megalithic stones, in a previously unseen construction method in the Andes. Contemporaneous with Stone Henge and the Pyramids of Giza, this is one of the oldest megalithic structures in Peru. The site, likely a ceremonial and gathering place for ancient peoples, offers new insights into the social and cultural practices of pre-ceramic societies in ancient Peru.

• Mysterious Pattern in a Cave Is Oldest Rock Art Found in Patagonia — In Patagonia's Cueva Huenul 1, a cave adorned with ancient art, researchers have dated a unique comb-like motif to about 8,200 years ago, several thousand years older than expected, making it the region's oldest known rock art. This period marks a significant era of climatic changes and the researchers suggest that the paintings in the cave were a way to pass down memory for social preservation. The consistency of pigment and design is remarkable over thousands of years. Strangely, the cave shows no signs of being lived in.

• Rapa Nui’s Rongorongo Tablets in Rome Radiocarbon Dated — Radiocarbon dating of four rongorongo tablets from Rapa Nui (Easter Island) shows three were made from trees cut in the 18th or 19th centuries, and one from a tree felled between 1493 and 1509. This suggests the rongorongo script was developed independently of European influence, predating European arrival by over two centuries. The dating also hints at the use of driftwood for the oldest tablet, as the wood is from a species not native to Rapa Nui.

Image credit: INSCRIBE and RESOLUTION ERC

That’s it for the free Top 5! If you’re a free subscriber, sign up for the paid plan for another 15 stories and 7 recommended pieces of content covering the largest inscription in Sri Lanka, animal-human burials, population replacement, the Blue Grotto, stone tool evolution, PIE, and very (VERY) old stories.

Until next time, thanks for joining me!

-James
Twitter: @jamesofthedrum

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🗞 Ancient News: Deep Dive