How to Decode an Ancient Roman’s Handwriting

Roger Tomlin has made a name for himself deciphering Latin texts that were never meant for posterity. Read Charlotte Higgin’s fascinating New Yorker story of paleographer Tomlin here: How to Decode an Ancient Roman’s Handwriting – The New Yorker

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130,000-year-old mastodon bones could rewrite story of how humans first appeared in the Americas

Shattered mastodon bones from a Southern California site bear the scars of human activity from 130,700 years ago, a team of scientists says — pushing back the generally accepted date that humans are thought to have settled North America by a whopping 115,000 or so years.

If verified and corroborated by other scientists, the discovery described in the journal Nature could radically rewrite the timeline of when humans first arrived in the Americas.

Read the rest of the story by Amina Khan of the Los Angeles Times here: 130,000-year-old mastodon bones could rewrite story of how humans first appeared in the Americas – LA Times

The Roanoke Colonists: Lost, and Found?

Perhaps some evidence has turned up about some of the “lost” colonists of Roanoke Island? For more, read this fascinating account by Theo Emery at the New York Times of an archaeological dig in North Carolina: The Roanoke Colonists: Lost, and Found? – The New York Times.