When ideas travel further than people
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Updates every hour. Last Updated: 29-Jun-2025 13:10 ET (29-Jun-2025 17:10 GMT/UTC)
The transition to agriculture and a sedentary lifestyle is one of the great turning points in human history. Yet how this Neolithic way of life spread from the Fertile Crescent across Anatolia and into the Aegean has been hotly debated. A Turkish-Swiss team offers important new insights, by combining archaeology and genetics in an innovative way.
When and where the earliest modern human populations migrated and settled in East Asia are relatively well known. However, how these populations moved between islands on treacherous stretches of sea is still shrouded in mystery. In two new papers, researchers from Japan and Taiwan led by Professor Yousuke Kaifu from the University of Tokyo simulated methods ancient peoples would have needed to accomplish these journeys, and they used period-accurate tools to create the canoes to make the journey themselves.
In the windswept steppe of northeastern Mongolia, archaeologists have unearthed a rare window into daily life along the medieval frontier of the Liao Empire. Excavations at a remote garrison site revealed thousands of animal bones—evidence of herding, hunting, fishing, and a harsh environment—offering a ground-level view of survival far from the imperial centers recorded in history books. The findings challenge traditional accounts by illuminating the lives of soldiers and civilians who lived not in palaces, but along the empire’s long and lonely wall.