Flint tools dating back to the Ice Age have been found during road repairs in Nottinghamshite, England.

The Highways Agency said the finds included ancient flint tools and flint knapping debris dating back to about 11,000 BC – around the end of the last Ice Age when Stone Age hunter-gathers returned as the climate began to warm up.

A46 Highways Agency project manager Geoff Bethel said: ”As the A46 follows the route of the old Roman road, we expected to uncover a number of artefacts from Roman Britain and we were not disappointed.

”But to uncover such rare flint tools dating back to the end of the Ice Age was very exciting.”
Evidence of such early people had been found in caves, but the pieces of flint found at Farndon appeared to show these people were making things out in the open, possibly in a temporary campsite, the Highways Agency said.

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A cache of dinosaur bones have been found during the construction of a sewer in Edmonton, Alberta.

“Any find like this at a new location adds information to our growing data set,” said Mr Neuman. “It expands our central knowledge of dinosaurs in Alberta.”

“One of the things that makes this find significant is that the crews are out there digging holes frequently, and it’s really nice to know they are acting as good stewards of the material and bringing it to our attention when they find it.”

Mr Neuman said workers will now continue to dig out bones still stuck inside the walls of the tunnel.

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Archaeologists in Mexico have uncovered the remains of 50 Aztec children found during excavations for a new subway line in Mexico City.

The team from Mexico’s National Institute for Anthropology and History also found the foundations of Aztec homes, hundreds of small figurines, and pots and plates dating from 1100 to 1500 AD, on the eve of the Spanish conquest, along the 15-mile (24-km) subway line, due to open in 2012 in southern Mexico City, home to about 20 million people.

“In total there are 60 graves, 10 adults and around 50 children of different ages, some two or three years old,” archeologist Maria de Jesus Sanchez told Reuters.

The graves, found scattered in excavation areas since builders began digging the subway line in September 2008, reflect burial practices of the Aztecs, who often interred their dead relatives underneath their homes.

The Aztec empire, with its capital in modern-day Mexico City, held sway over a large part of Mesoamerica for about a century until the arrival of the Spanish.

Deceased children were often placed in earthen vessels before burial in the belief that the jars would resemble the mother’s womb and keep them warm.

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Two brothers digging in their backyard to lay the foundations for an expansion to their home stumbled across eight 1,300-year-old pots.

“The first bit came when we had dug about 40 centimeters. Then we found a pot to the side and then a third. When we began dig deeper, came the fourth. Every time we saw more, the whole piece. At that time we made contact with the archaeologists ” said Roberto Carrazana, uncle of the brothers Franco and Gonzalo, who directed the work of masonry.

These are very brittle ceramics that were apparently used to store food. Their destination is as yet uncertain, although the Secretariat of Tourism of Jujuy has anticipated that it is likely that some of them will be left on display in the house of the Carrazana, with an explanatory panel, to remember the event.

The archaeologist in charge of analyzing the pots, Humberto Mamani, pointed out that the final date from the formative period, is the year 700 of the Christian era, which would be older than the Pucara, the pre-Columbian fortress that became an emblem of the people and in 2003 was declared a World Heritage Site.

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The vibrations caused by construction are threatening to collapse the 10,000-year-old settlement of Hasankeyf in Turkey.

An investigation begun after a man was killed by a falling rock at the ancient city of Hasankeyf has revealed that construction vehicles working in the area have brought the 10,000-year-old settlement close to collapse.

“It is a crime by law to enter protected areas with heavy-duty vehicles. Before the rock broke, there were cracks but the necessary precautions were not taken,” said archaeologist Ercan Alpay, a member of the committee formed by the Initiative to Revive Hasankeyf to investigate the death of a man killed July 13 when a rock fell from a tower in the area.

After the fatal incident, the road to the ancient bazaar and tents located near the Tigris River were closed to vehicle and passenger traffic.

“Excavating with vehicles in a historical site has nothing to do with scientific research,” Alpay said, adding that such work can do massive damage to a fragile site such as Hasankeyf.

The committee, which includes archaeologists, architects and building and geology engineers, found in its report that caves used as dwellings as early as 800 B.C. had been damaged. It concluded that the ancient city is at risk of collapse.

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