Akhenaten famously tossed aside the old gods, turning the Egyptian world upside down. Now, archaeologists are looking at a relief of his family to understand the mind of the man. archaeology.org/issues/september-october-2022/collection/akhenaten-nefertiti-relief/rediscovering-egypts-golden-dynasty/

Archaeologists in Boston have identified what’s likely one of the oldest gravestones of a free Black person in America. The man changed his own name to “Boston,” married, and worked as a handyman. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/09/early-18th-century-tombstone-of-free-black-man-identified-in-boston/

One archaeologist thinks the Hittites' “Festival of Haste” went like this: If the king arrived home late from summer warfaring, all the usual autumn festivals were squished into one megafestival. archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/digs-discoveries/hurry-up-and-celebrate/

Around 2,000 years ago, merchants from India went sightseeing in Egypt’s Valley of the Kings—an ancient marvel. Archaeologists know this because the tourists left graffiti in the tombs: “Cikai Korran, having come, has seen.” archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/digs-discoveries/tamil-tourists/

More than 90,000 years ago, an early modern human had a painful encounter. Archaeologists analyzing the individual’s skull found lesions in the jaw, likely evidence of interpersonal violence. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/13/jaw-wound-in-90000-year-old-fossil-points-to-violence-among-modern-humans/

Gyeongju, seat of the Korean kingdom for 1,000 years, has electrified archaeologists. They’ve found a piece of gold foil engraved with birds and flowers, a 14-sided die for drinking games, and more! archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/off-the-grid/donggung-palace-and-wolji-pond-south-korea/

How much contact did Neanderthals and early modern humans have? Archaeologists working in Turkey think that they used the same cave (at different times), shared the same tool technologies, and more. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/10/modern-humans-and-neanderthals-may-have-shared-culture/

Caral spawned a sophisticated culture more than 4,000 years ago. New excavations at nearby Peñico in Peru have recovered dozens of wood and bone sculptures including a woman, birds, snakes, and tadpoles! archaeology.org/news/2026/07/10/3800-year-old-collection-of-figurines-discovered-in-peru/

When did we get fire? Long before Homo sapiens—and even earlier than archaeologists had thought. New evidence of burn traces in a cave suggests that Homo erectus used fire around 1.8 million years ago! archaeology.org/news/2026/06/26/traces-of-homo-erectus-fire-use-dated-to-1-8-million-years-ago/

The people of France were obsessed with tennis—everyone from a woman named Margot who defeated all Paris’ men to King Louis XIII, a formidable player and trash talker. Archaeologists are digging up Versailles to learn more! archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/features/tennis-anyone/

Ancient Egyptian illustrators finished a copy of the Book of the Dead, but the jackal in one scene looked too hefty. But archaeologists were surprised to find that papyrus painters had a way to delete their work ... archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/digs-discoveries/trimming-the-fat/

The hunter-gatherers who inhabited North America 13,000 years ago may have hunted megafauna—perhaps to extinction. But new research, including on the “Anzick child” burial, is prompting archaeologists to rethink Clovis habits. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/09/did-clovis-people-hunt-large-animals/

It’s a famous family feud of ancient Egypt: Queen Hatshepsut usurps the throne from her stepson, Thutmose III; he later defaces her monuments. Yet archaeologists have now found evidence that it may not have gone quite like that. archaeology.org/issues/may-june-2025/digs-discoveries/pharaohs-fate/

Machrie Moor in Scotland seems to have been a sacred place as early as 5,500 years ago, but archaeologists were nonetheless surprised to find evidence of a massive timber circle, 92 feet across. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/07/possible-timber-circle-detected-on-scotlands-isle-of-arran/

About 12,000 years ago, Native American people started playing games of chance. One archaeologist has examined 600-plus bone dice and says they show “understanding of randomness and the probabilistic nature of the universe.” archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/artifacts/native-american-dice/

A Greek historian reported that the explorer Pytheas sailed to the British Isles in the fourth century B.C., landed in Cornwall, and saw an island he claimed was flush from the tin trade. But which island is it? archaeology.org/issues/may-june-2024/collection/which-island-is-it-anyway/lost-cities/

The mighty Golden Horde, the Mongol kingdom first led by Genghis Khan’s eldest son, spanned Siberia to the Black Sea. Archaeologists are finding traces of the empire now, the latest in a remote corner of Kazakhstan. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/06/golden-horde-structure-discovered-in-kazakhstan/

The woman in the 3,500-year-old gilded coffin was buried with spectacular riches: bracelets, silver daggers, model boats. But who was Ahhotep, first queen of Egypt? A savvy trader, a wartime leader—and an enigma to archaeologists. archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/features/egypts-first-queen/

The site of Didé West 1 in Senegal is providing clues to how ironworking technology spread in West Africa. Archaeologists discovered metal slag and the remnants of 25 furnaces at the workshop, which began operating around 400 B.C.! archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/world/?location=senegal-2

The Puritans forbade drunkenness and excessive tobacco consumption. You can guess how Puritan *teenagers* took to those rules, which archaeology at their old college—Harvard—reveals. archaeology.org/issues/september-october-2021/collection/wellness-massachusetts-puritans/the-pursuit-of-wellness/

When Vesuvius erupted in A.D. 79, 1,800 papyrus scrolls in one villa’s library were carbonized. One scroll has now been “unwrapped” using CT scanning and AI. Archaeologists have begun deciphering what it says! archaeology.org/news/2026/06/29/entire-carbonized-herculaneum-scroll-virtually-unwrapped/

The Bay of Naples is far from the Arabian Peninsula, home of the Nabataeans. Yet archaeologists have discovered submerged remnants of a temple dedicated to a Nabataean god off the coast of the Roman town of Puteoli! archaeology.org/issues/march-april-2025/digs-discoveries/nabataeans-abroad/

Archaeology at Charlestown, razed after the Battle of Bunker Hill, is revealing the surprising lives of the folks who lived there in 1775, men and women, wealthy and poor, and free and enslaved Black people. archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/letters-from/in-the-shadow-of-bunker-hill/

Did Bronze Age artists in Iberia and Scandinavia meet each other and talk technique? Archaeologists examining rock art in Spain and Portugal noticed that some motifs closely match those carved in Nordic regions 3,000 years ago! archaeology.org/news/2026/06/30/bronze-age-boat-artwork-analyzed/

According to folklore, on a scorching day in July 1646, peasant-rebel-”emperor” Zhang Xianzhong sailed a fleet—carrying unimaginable wealth in gold and silver—into an ambush. It has fallen to archaeologists to find it … archaeology.org/issues/november-december-2023/features/chinas-river-of-gold/

Was Renaissance Duke Francesco de Medici poisoned with arsenic by his brother? Archaeologists examining his bones have determined that … he died of malaria. It was, however, a previously unknown strain. archaeology.org/news/2026/07/02/malaria-causing-protozoa-detected-in-medici-remains/

How does anyone deal with this heat?! Well, the medieval inhabitants of Failaka Island in the Persian Gulf built an ingenious airflow-harnessing system called a windcatcher tower, but that’s just one reason that “Archaeology Island” is special ... archaeology.org/collection/archaeology-island/

Thomas Jefferson actually built Monticello twice. It’s taken a bit of archaeology to uncover the original estate, and the latest discovery is a 1770s kiln beneath the East Lawn, used to fire bricks for “Monticello I.” archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/world/?location=virginia-5

Millennia-old mystery stone circles—not just for the English! Archaeologists in Northern Ireland have discovered the remnants of a 4,000-year-old stone circle in a nearby field. But who made it, and why? archaeology.org/news/2026/06/30/traces-of-stone-circle-discovered-near-belfast/

Archaeology is revealing that Greek and Roman sling bullets weren’t only deadly—many were also inscribed with pointed messages such as “Learn your lesson!” or “Victory!” or even “Catch!” archaeology.org/issues/july-august-2026/features/slinging-insults/