There is just so much we don’t know about our ancient past, I guess this is why we keep digging. Scientists believe they may have found the first use of tools. There has been bone and flints used as far back as 2.5 million years ago by hominids, but they were used in the gathering and preparation of food. There was this huge bolder in Tel Aviv which had to be moved to unblock a roadway. The construction crew blew it up. To the surprise of everyone an opening to a cave appeared. Scientists estimate the cave had been sealed off for over 200,000 years. When archaeologists entered the cave they were astounded at what they saw. There was a 300,000 years old fireplace and tortoise shells were found next to it. The turtles have been cooked and this is considered the oldest evidence of cooking meat to eat ever found. Besides this, the oldest knives and hand axes ever found were also inside the cave. The knives were thought to be over 400,000 years old. The oldest knives found in Europe only date back 30,000 years. For some reason it seems the people who lived in this cave were far ahead of everyone else in technology. Scientists still need to find out exactly which one of our ancestors lived in the cave. The name of the cave is Qesem Cave.

A monument which seems to be from the Stone Age, but in reality is said by scientists to be only 1,500 years old has been found in Kazakhstan. The discovery came as a shock to scientists. Scientists do not know who created the structure, but they are guessing the Huns. The smallest objects were about 13 feet by 13 feet, the biggest are 112 feet by 79 feet. The site has an interesting discovery story. The site was discovered in 2010 by a man with a metal detector. He had noticed pieces of silver from a saddle scattered near a massive stone slab. When the saddle was found it had a relief decoration on it the same as the stone. Initially it was thought they had found a small tomb of a local leader, but nothing could have been further from the truth. The excavation started in 2014 and the site was found to be a large one. The Huns were known for leaving impressive monuments. Some skeletons have been found, but dating will have to wait since funds have run out.

There is a desolate area in Jordan known as the Black Desert. This desert is located in northern Jordan near Syria. Thousands of Petroglyphs have been found in this area proving it was inhabited in the past. Petroglyphs are images created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving or abrading. Some scientists believe this unknown race might have lived in the area as far back as 200 BC. It was amazing to find that an area with such harsh living conditions could have been populated. It has been said not only would this be a harsh place to live, but it is a harsh place to even cross. It is known this was a lush area with plenty of trees about 2,000 years ago. The area never had the interest of archaeologists, because they felt there would be nothing there. Now that this has changed I guess we can look forward to more archaeological activity in the future. The inscriptions found were in the ancient Safaitic language. This area is also home to some very strange wheel shaped patterns which are only visible from the air.

While not a man-made monument or an interesting cave, an incredible object has been found. For the very first time in history scientists have found a fossilized dinosaur brain. The story of its being found is almost as incredible as the brain itself. A collector was walking on a beach near Bexhill in Sussex, England when he found it. I presume he thought it was a very strange rock. Scientists believe a lot of events had to come together to form this fossil. One of the first things was the dinosaur had to die in a low-oxygen body of water. The very exciting part of all this for scientists was the fact the outer millimeter of the brain tissues themselves were mineralized preserving their delicate surfaces for examination. It might turn out dinosaurs were more intelligent than first thought since this specimen seems to indicate this brain filled the entire brain cavity much as a modern bird’s brain does.

Sometimes we find credit is misplaced. An incredible tablet from Babylon has been found. The tablet calculates the movements of Jupiter by Babylonian astronomers. We are talking about calculations based on geometry which were made 1,400 years before this technique was invented by Europeans and 1,000 years before the invention of the telescope. When this was first found scientists couldn’t believe their eyes. This tablet had confounded scientists for decades until one broke the code. These tablets have been laying in the British Museum since the 19th century. The French and British used the same technique to do the same thing in the 14th century.

What do you think of when you see an ancient Greek statue? You might think of a white marble statue of a god, soldier, king or queen, but it turns out that concept might be incorrect. Recently it has been found what we think of ancient Greek statues might be incorrect, at least the white marble part. When an ultraviolet light was shone on one of these statues it was revealed it had been painted. Instead of those white marble states we think of, at least some might have been painted in bright colors.

We just keep finding ancient treasures and the way it looks there are probably plenty more monuments, fossils and things to find which will boggle our imaginations.