1 . Researchers in Norway say they have found what they believe is the world’s oldest runestone (符文石)—a stone with ancient writing on it.

Runes are the characters in several Germanic letters. These characters were used in northern Europe from ancient times until the change to the Latin letters. The origin of runic writing is unclear. The Norwegian researchers say the writing on the runestone could be up to 2,000 years old.

The runestone is square and flat. The runes carved into it may show the earliest example of recorded words in Scandinavia, the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo said. It said it was “among the oldest runic writings ever found” and “the oldest runestone ever found in the world”.

Kristel Zilmer is a professor at University of Oslo, of which the museum is part. Zilmer said, “This find will give us a lot of knowledge about the use of runes in the early Iron Age. This may be one of the first attempts to use runes in Norway and Scandinavia on stone.”

Runes have been found on stones and on home goods. Older runes have been found on other objects, also, but not on stones. The oldest known runic writing is on a hair tool made from bone. Zilmer said that the ancient writer might have used a knife or needle to make the runes.

Measuring 31 centimeters by 32 centimeters, the stone has several kinds of writings. Not all of them make sense. Eight runes on the front of the stone read “idiberug”—which could be the name of a person or family but not sure.

There is still a lot of research to be done on the rock, named Svingerud stone after where it was found.

The Museum of Cultural History is going to hold a public showing of the runestone for a month. The museum holds Norway’s largest collection of historical objects, from ancient times to the modern day.

2 . In 1879, an 8-year-old girl made a discovery that would rock our understanding of human history. On the walls of Altamira cave in northern Spain, she spotted amazing drawings of wild cows, painted in vivid red and black. More striking even than the images was their age: they were made thousands of years ago by modern humans’ supposedly primitive ancestors. Today, nearly 400 caves across Europe have been found decorated with hand stencils (模板), strange symbols and beautiful images of animals created by these skillful artists.

The discoveries led to the view that artistic talent arose after modern humans arrived in the region some 40,000 years ago, as part of a “cultural explosion” reflecting a flowering of the human mind. But more recent evidence has blown this idea out of the water. For a start, modern humans might not have been the first artists in Europe. What’s more, a collection of cave paintings emerging in Indonesia has dismissed the idea that Europe was the centre of creativity.

Local people have long known that the caves of the island of Sulawesi, Indonesia, contain many painted images. Modern humans are thought to have reached the region some 65,000 years ago, but nobody imagined the art could be very old because ancient paintings seem unlikely to survive in the environment of high temperatures. A team of researchers led by Maxime Aubert, now at Griffith University in Australia, upended this idea using a technique that is shifting our understanding of cave art. Using this technique in seven caves, they found a hand stencil was at least 39,900 years old, making it the oldest known hand stencil at that time.

This opened a floodgate to new discoveries in Indonesia. These included a hunting scene created at least 43,900 years ago, and by far the oldest descriptive artwork. “When we found that image, we were absolutely delighted, but when it turned out to be that old, we were almost jumping with joy,” says Adam Brumm, also at Griffith University.

The Potala Palace (布达拉宫) features a wall painting     1     illustrates a historic marriage between members of the Han and Tibetan ethnic groups. Like the wall painting, many other relics in Tibet have also helped     2    (far) uncover cultural communication between Tibet and the rest of China.

    3    (original) built in the eighth century, the Samye Monastery is listed as an example of a combination of cultural heritage and architectural styles, while the Shalu Monastery, set up in 1087, is another example of a mix of architectural styles.

The earliest archaeological site     4    (identify) at the heart of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau (高原) so far is the Nwya Devu site. More than 4,000 stone artifacts (石器)     5    (find) at the Paleolithic site since 2016. Scientific analysis shows that the site     6    (date) back to some 40,000 years ago.

Archaeological     7    (discovery) have also provided abundant evidence of cultural integration. For example, the wooden carving unearthed from Tibet’s Ngari and those from Xinjiang are similar     8     shape.

The cultural     9    (connect) between Tibet and the Yellow River basin was proved at the Karub ruins with the finding of a crop planted in northern China. The finding proved     10     communication between the plateau and northern China some 5,000 years ago.

4 . A seven-word sentence was discovered on a 3,700-year-old comb (梳子),which is likely the oldest known sentence written in letters,according to a new study. The sentence is in Canaanite (迦南语),which is the source (来源) of later letter systems in European languages.

The comb was first discovered in 2016 in Israeli. However,it wasn’t until 2021 that a researcher from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem first noticed the words when checking the photo of the comb. The researchers were not able to directly date the comb. They believed it dated from around 1700 BC based on comparison of the letters with those on pottery (陶器) with a known age.

Garfinkel,a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem,said,“The Canaanites invented the letters. Nowadays every person in the world can read and write using the letter system. This is really one of the most important achievements of humankind. When you are writing in English,you’re really using Canaanite.”

Small groups of Canaanite letters discovered on broken pieces of pottery before did not leave much room for further research on the lives of the Canaanites. But this find of a sentence written in the first letter-based language opens up the debate about the history during the ancient time period.

Garfinkel said,“The sentence was found on an ivory comb in the ancient city’s palace and temple area,which could suggest that only wealthy men were able to read and write.” The earliest writing system started around 5,000 years ago,which relied on hundreds of pictographs (象形文字) to represent words,ideas and sounds. Canaanites were the first to use letters in their writing system. “It shows that even in the most ancient times there were full sentences,which further suggests that Canaanites stood out among the early civilizations in their use of the written word.”

More than 500 items were discovered at Sanxingdui Ruins site in southwest China’s Sichuan Province. These items, including remains of a gold mask,     1    (dig) in one of China’s     2    (significant) excavations(n. 发掘) ever.

Sanxingdui is believed to have sat at the heart of the Shu state,     3     historians know relatively little about due to rare     4    (write) records.     5    (discovery) made at the site date from the 12th and 11th centuries BC, and many of the items are now on show at an on-site museum. The site has changed experts understanding of     6     civilization developed in ancient China.

Archaeologists(考古学家) realized they had just got     7     excellent chance to study ancient culture     8    (date) back between 3,000 and 5,000 years.     9     particular, evidence of a unique Shu culture suggests that the kingdom     10    (develop) independently of neighboring societies in the Yellow River Valley, which was traditionally considered to be the cradle(摇篮) of Chinese civilization.

6 . Like many of the arts, music flourished during the Zhou dynasty. From this period we have instruments, models of performers, descriptions of musicians and dancers, and the Shijing, or The Book of Poetry, which contains poems and songs of court and common people during the Zhou dynasty. It is likely that music played an extremely important role in the Zhou dynasty for all social classes.

One of the most important sources of information the researchers have regarding Zhou-dynasty music is from the tomb of the Marquis Yi of Zeng (433 B.C.E.). This tomb was uncovered in 1977 in Hubei Province and contained the most extensive and well-preserved set of musical instruments ever found in an ancient Chinese tomb. This four-chamber (室) tomb was designed in imitation of a palace with a central courtyard, reflecting the belief that the Marquis Yi would require the same comforts in the afterlife that he had enjoyed during his lifetime. The central chamber of the tomb, which mirrored a palace courtyard, contained most of the musical instruments found, including a complete set of sixty-five graduated bells fixed on wooden shelves. In addition, twenty-one young women were buried with the Marquis Yi, some of whom were likely his favorite musicians and dancers.

The Marquis Yi’s set of sixty-five bells is remarkable for a variety of reasons. First, they are clearly dated—an inscription (碑文) indicates that the bells were a gift given to him in 433 B.C.E.. Second, the bells were very expensive to produce and to purchase, particularly a set of this size, so they are further evidence of the Marquis Yi’s status. Finally, the bells, along with the other instruments in the room, illustrate what an instrumental band might have consisted of during this period. Scholars predict that it would have required twenty-four musicians to play all instruments at once.

There are still many gaps in our knowledge of ancient Chinese music, partly because there was no system for recording music in a written form.

7 . In April 2018, a group of Canadian scientists flying in a helicopter (直升飞机) discovered something they didn't expect to see — a huge, unknown cave with an opening the size of a football field.

The cave was discovered in the northern part of Wells Gray Provincial Park, in a wild, faraway area of Canada's Cariboo Mountains. The area is hard to get to and even harder to travel through. It is covered with snow for much of the year.   

The group told Catherine Hickson, a scientist who studies rocks, about the cave. Dr. Hickson got a team of researchers together to study it. In September, they went for a closer look after most of the snow melted (融化). The cave is one of the largest in Canada. Not only is the opening to the cave larger than a football field, the cave is also deep. The team couldn't measure (测量) all the way to the bottom, but they think it may be more than 180 meters deep. The cave is tens of thousands of years old. But the rock in the cave is made of used to be at the bottom of an ocean (海洋). It is hundreds of millions of years old.

A small, but fast river of melting snow leads into the cave on one side, creating a waterfall near the top and a river at the bottom. The water comes out again a long way away. The exit (出口) is about 2.1 kilometers away and about l/2 kilometer lower down.

The cave will have to wait to get an official name. For now, the cave is being called "Sarlacc's Pit "because it looks similar to the home of the Sarlacc, a person in the Star Wars movie Return of the Jedi.

For Dr. Hickson, there's a lesson to be learned from the cave. "It shows you that you don't know everything, "she says." There are things yet to be discovered."

8 . Considered one of the greatest archaeological finds of mankind in the 20th century, the Sanxingdui Ruins site in Sichuan province has continued to amaze the world. Since May, more than 500 cultural relics have been found at the site. 

Some of the bronze artifacts  (工艺品) discovered during the current excavation have never been seen before, according to experts. They were beyond “our previous understanding of bronze wares and posed great challenges to our research”, said Xu Feihong, a lecturer at Shanghai University.

A unique bronze artifact from the No 3 pit features a man carrying a bronze vessel known as a zun that has a round rim (边沿) and a square body, said Ran Honglin, a researcher with Sichuan Provincial Cultural Relics and Archaeology Research Institute.

Three bronze figures, with their palms pressed together and their heads twisted to the right, have been excavated from the No 4 pit.

These three bronze figures are a unique find among Sanxingdui items in terms of their shape and decorative pattern, and they provide further material for studying the bronze casting technology of the Shu people as well as their art, religious beliefs, social system and cultural exchanges with surrounding areas, Ran said. Shu was an ancient state in what is now Sichuan. 

Again, a gold mask is catching the world’s attention. 

It is the biggest of its kind unearthed at the site so far. It is 37.2 centimeters wide, 16.5 cm high and weighs about 100 grams. Another thing that makes it stand out is that it is complete. 

It was discovered in June at the No 3 pit. Earlier this year, a similar, but less complete gold mask was found at the No 5 pit.

Gold items were found at the Sanxingdui Ruins site as early as 1986, including gold foil (金箔) pieces that show how the precious metal was used by the ancient Shu people. The finding further illustrates the custom of the ancient Shu people to use gold items, experts said.

Radiocarbon dating (放射性碳年代测定) has shown that the No 3 and No 4 pits, at 3,000 to 3,200 years old, go back to the late Shang Dynasty (16th century-11th century BC), Xu said.

Excavation of the No 4 pit was completed on Aug 19, and digging at the No 3 pit will be completed in the next two months. What other treasures will the pit bring us? Only time will tell!