Reading old mail

This is really cool - a (possibly) 3400-year-old scrap of diplomatic correspondence between Canaan and Egypt has been discovered in Jerusalem, probably once part of the royal archives. It can be deciphered! Try that with a 3400-year-old thumb drive!

Archaeological discover near Yellowstone

An ancient dart has turned up near Yellowstone* after being buried in snow for perhaps 10,000 years. It's pretty old technology, a 42" dart that would have been hurled by an atlatl. Although the Aztecs were still using both bows and atlatls to fight the Spanish, in most places the atlatl was replaced when the stringed bow was invented. Cool stuff.

Expect more archaeological find to emerge from melting snow in the coming years.

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*They're not saying exactly where, no doubt to protect the site from vandals and looters.

Ancient not-cartography

Cartocacoethes: Why the World’s Oldest Map Isn’t a Map

This may be an excellent example of seeing what you would like to see.