An ancient Greek trading ship that had lain on the seabed off the coast of Gela in southern Sicily for 2,500 years was brought to the surface for the first time on Monday. The ancient Greek vessel is 21 metres long and 6.5 metres wide, making it by far the biggest of its kind ever discovered. Four Greek vessels found off the coasts of Israel, Cyprus and France are at most 15 metres long.

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A German archaeologist in charge of excavations in ancient Troy announced that a new dimension will be added to the excavations with the finds of the past 20 years being gathered together for the first time.   Member of the teaching staff at Tübingen University, Dr. Ernst Pernicka told the Anatolia news agency Thursday that they were ready to present the intermediate results of the two-decade dig saying, “We will crown the past 20 years of work with publications. This project will be the intermediate results of the past 20 years of work.”

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The painted caves of Lascaux in the Dordogne region of France are one of the most famed monuments of Ice Age art. Dating back about 17,000 years, the great Hall of the Bulls and its adjacent chambers proved so popular with visitors that a generation ago the cave had to be closed to save the paintings from encroaching mould. A replica, Lascaux II, was built nearby and has proved equally popular.

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OSLO – Ruins recently discovered on Greenland may mark the Vikings’ most northerly year-round hunting outpost on the icy island, a researcher said on Monday. Knut Espen Solberg, leader of ‘The Melting Arctic’ project mapping changes in the north, said the remains uncovered in past weeks in west Greenland may also be new evidence that the climate was less chilly about 1,000 years ago than it is today.

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Researchers, growers and Industry specialists from 22 countries will share the latest research into the use of Brassica species, such as mustard, radish, or rapeseed, to manage soil-borne pests and weeds – a technique known as biofumigation.“Brassica plants naturally release compounds that suppress pests and pathogens, principally isothiocyanates (ITCs), which most people would recognise as the ‘hot’ flavour in mustard or horseradish,” says CSIRO’s Dr John Kirkegaard, the conference convenor.“When ITCs are released in soil by green-manuring, soil-borne pests and pathogens can be suppressed and the yields of solanaceous vegetables such as potatoes, tomatoes and eggplants can be increased by up to 40 per cent in some cases.

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News from the OR’s Acorn Hollow: 

Greetings Everyone~!

This year’s camp was a great success. We hosted 15 children from ages 2 years to 17 years old. One child came all the way from Texas!!

The camp focused on Scandinavian Heritage. Every day we learned something a little more about our Northern Folk. The classes this year were: History; Icelandic Language; Havamal and Religion; Mythology, Folklore, and Sagas; Arts and Crafts; Music; Heraldry, and finally Drama. During the week the kids learned about several aspects of “Viking Culture”, but didn’t limit their learning to just that short period of time. We discussed how the “Vikings” were only a drop in the historical ocean of the Scandinavian people. The kids learned Icelandic Language, performed a skit, created a “Viking Settlement”, played traditional Nordic games such as Tafl and Charades, and created Huldafolk and Thor’s Hammers. Near the end of their week with a special Children’s Invocation that many of the kids said were the most powerful Blot of which they had been a part!

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Conservationists are planning to buy an 800-acre site to grow the largest continuous native forest in England.

The Woodland Trust will plant more than 600,000 trees on the site near St Albans in Hertfordshire.

The trust says a new native forest of this size and type has never been created in England before, and could take shape within 12 years.

England has lost half its ancient woodland to development, agriculture or conifer woods since the 1930s.

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The possibility of a Palaeolithic human presence in Ireland has once again presented itself. A flaked flint dating to about 200,000 years ago found in Co Down is certainly of human workmanship, but its ultimate origin remains uncertain.

Discovered at Ballycullen, ten miles east of Belfast, the flake is 68mm long and wide and 31mm thick. Its originally dark surface is heavily patinated to a yellowish shade, and the lack of sharpness in its edges suggests that it has been rolled around by water or ice, Jon Stirland reports in Archaeology Ireland.

Dr Farina Sternke has identified it as a classic Levallois-type flake from the rejuvenation of a flint core; such flakes are characteristic of stone-tool industries made by archaic humans of the pre-Neanderthal era, as technology moved towards making multiple flakes from one core and then trimming them into a variety of different tool types.

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Russian scientists have begun a record-breaking attempt to dive to the bottom of the world’s deepest body of fresh water, Lake Baikal in Siberia.

They are using two manned vessels to plunge 1,700m (5,500ft) to the bed of the lake, which contains about a fifth of the world’s fresh water.

The mission is part of a two-year plan aimed at conserving Lake Baikal’s unique ecosystem.

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