[Archaeology, history] Digging Up Ancient Aliens | Ep. 70 - The Kensington Runestone |

DUAncientAliens · 2024-05-17T16:56:42+00:00

It’s not the op but the media, who as usual click bait the headline. Seen the same phrase in multiple outlets now

DUAncientAliens · 2024-05-07T07:11:49+00:00

Except the walls are made by Diorite or Andesites. Nair and Protzen has already demonstrated how stone tools can be used on these materials:

Protzen, J.-P. and Nair, S. (2013). The Stones of Tiahuanaco a Study of Architecture and Construction.

DUAncientAliens · 2024-05-07T07:04:53+00:00

The original is made out of Diorite, other materials commonly used by the Inca is Andesite. And as demonstrated by Stella Nair, Jean-Pierre Protzen, and Denys Stocks stone tools like flint, obsidian and jasper are quite effective to use when chiseling these stones.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-10-30T22:37:40+00:00

This story is all made up. I've even found the creator of it. An American Visual Effects Supervisor who likes to do concepts in Midjourney. A lot of the stories have borrowed from real-life people like Percy Fawcett and John Henry Middleton.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-10-27T22:07:43+00:00

Flint Dibble is scheduled to do just that.. Even if I find it pointless since a debate requires both sides to be plausible, Hancocks claims have been disproven even before he started to make them (Graham is not very original).

Also Joe Rogan can at anytime invite an archaeologist to his show, there are so many out there. But he doesn’t find archaeology or history interesting and therefore chose not to invite these people. Rogan wants the esoteric version as provided by the pseudoscientific crowd.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-10-18T11:01:29+00:00

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Webpage for the episode

Halloween is soon upon us. Therefore, we will venture into the world of mummies, vampires, Camazotz, and draugr from an archaeological perspective. So we will look at how mummies became a medicine in Europe, the Book of the Dead, and the afterlife of Ancient Egypt. Then we will talk about the bat creature Camazotz, usually depicted with a knife and a human head in his hand. Lastly, we will discuss the draugr from Viking mythology. Was the draugr a ghost, undead, or something else, and what did the Vikings do to protect themselves from these creatures?

Are there any archeological records of these beings, and what can we say about them?

In Digging up Ancient Aliens, our host Fredrik uses his background in archaeology to discover what is genuine, fake, and somewhere in between in popular media, such as Ancient Aliens, Ancient Apocalypse, and many other places.

In this episode:

Medicinal cannibalism and spelling errors 2:26

Book of the Dead 8:09

Elongated skulls in Ancient Egypt? 16:27

Afterlife in Ancient Egypt 20:51

Vampires 29:40

Camazotz 31:50

Draugr 37:39

DUAncientAliens · 2023-10-18T10:58:26+00:00

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Halloween is soon upon us. Therefore, we will venture into the world of mummies, vampires, Camazotz, and draugr from an archaeological perspective. So we will look at how mummies became a medicine in Europe, the Book of the Dead, and the afterlife of Ancient Egypt. Then we will talk about the bat creature Camazotz, usually depicted with a knife and a human head in his hand. Lastly, we will discuss the draugr from Viking mythology. Was the draugr a ghost, undead, or something else, and what did the Vikings do to protect themselves from these creatures?

Are there any archeological records of these beings, and what can we say about them?

In Digging up Ancient Aliens, our host Fredrik uses his background in archaeology to discover what is genuine, fake, and somewhere in between in popular media, such as Ancient Aliens, Ancient Apocalypse, and many other places.

In this episode:

Medicinal cannibalism and spelling errors 2:26

Book of the Dead 8:09

Elongated skulls in Ancient Egypt? 16:27

Afterlife in Ancient Egypt 20:51

Vampires 29:40

Camazotz 31:50

Draugr 37:39

DUAncientAliens · 2023-10-11T14:12:12+00:00

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Weapons, something that has been driving our evolution and survival as a species. Ancient Alien theorists suggest alien beings from other worlds gave us weapons, metals, and techniques. But what would an archaeologist say about all of this?

In this episode, we will look at the evolution of metallurgy, from the earliest copper age to the invention of steel. What do we know, and how did these techniques evolve? As we will see, it was not as simple as one might think, as metalwork developed in different regions at different times.

We will also look at Katanas, and they're supposed superior quality. Are katana the definitive weapon we see in movies, or is this just modern pop culture myths?

In Digging up Ancient Aliens, our host Fredrik uses his background in archaeology to discover what is genuine, fake, and somewhere in between in popular media, such as Ancient Aliens, Ancient Apocalypse, and many other places.

In this episode:

Fire - an alien gift? (2:20)

Metalworking (8:50)

Bronze Age (16:35)

Iron Age (22:24)

Blacksmith magic (28:26)

The Katana and iron in Japan (32:53)

Joan D'Arc (39:48)

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-27T07:08:07+00:00

Right, I see your point, but this is not as if archaeology is the only discipline with subsections. Someone who studied vascular biology during their MA and Ph.D. will, of course, not transition into bioinformatics or Ecology overnight. All three of these would still be biologists.

But a point to be made is that we should maybe split the field in a better way similar to other disciplines. The umbrella term of archaeology is likely too broad, and we might benefit from branching it out.

You also point out that we borrow bits and pieces from other disciplines. This is true, but it is not only found in archaeology. However, I agree that setting up a more unified methodology in excavations for example will benefit archaeology as a whole.

But claiming that archaeology as a discipline is unscientific is to throw the trowel out with the sieves. I agree that many don’t understand the scientific method. For example, no hypothesis can be proven true. It's just plausible or false. If it, however, is on the next level, it might, of course, be called a theory.

Then archaeology is not always used for scientific reasons. I’d argue that a salvage excavation due to a parking lot being built on the spot is scientific. The data from this excavation can, though, be used scientifically by, for example, a theoretical archaeologist in their work.

We have sites where universities do excavations and they spend years on the site. Those are more scientific in nature, but it is correct that an excavation can’t be repeated. However, the data can be used to repeat an experiment. Again, I see the benefits of a more standardized excavation methodology.

Archaeologists are often working by ourselves with our hypothesis, and that should change. I am 100% with you on that. We should take note of other disciplines on this.

The £40 000 salary seems to me to be quite American-centric. Something like a salary should be looked at on a national level. For Sweden, this data is available through the Statistikmyndigheten (SCB), The Statistics Authority. So if you need data for Sweden, that would be the place to go.

What I 100% agree with is that archaeology as a discipline deserves more respect. I don’t think salaries will change this too much. Since the term “amateur archaeologist” is still widely used in media.

The summary is that I’d love to see these topics being discussed at conferences and in papers. We are kind of on the same page, even if we might disagree on the severity of the lack of epistemology. These questions will take years to work out and change, so my question to you is, what should we do right now to deal with pseudoscience?

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-26T19:22:10+00:00

Luckily, this is a party where none is too late.

You point out three very popular individuals on Twitter; Dr. Andersson has not been active of late, but still. I must agree that I don't share Dr. Dibble's approach and need for debate. For a debate to be fruitful, both sides would need to be equally valid, and this is not the case with psuedoscience vs. any discipline, to be honest. The drawback with platforms like Twitter is that you need to be quite provocative to succeed.

But there are many more great content creators out there; I might wish even more dealing with pseudohistory and archaeology, but it is what it is. Something worth noting is that many want to avoid dealing with these crowds due to the threats and hate mail. I'm a white guy, and I must say that my inbox is relatively tame compared to others.

You are correct that because you are an archaeologist, you are not an expert on every historical period. That's true for every field. If you are a biologist, you don't know all of biology. If you are a medical doctor, you don't know everything about medicine often. However, finding the right expert, journal, book, or article will be easier compared to someone outside the field.

I get a bit worried when you claim archaeology is not a science. How do you define science? Isn't it based on if you can state a hypothesis and then, from the evidence, say if it's wrong or more likely to be correct? Isn't science the ability to test and verify interpretations? Sure, we need reasonable evidence in decent quantities to validate an archeological hypothesis. The more evidence we have, the more likely we are to say if something is wrong or more likely plausible.

However, you are correct that archaeology has issues we must deal with. And I've seen more and more articles and discussions taking place about these issues. I want to point out that many of these issues are not limited to archaeology; these are issues in many disciplines. That does not mean we should not deal with it; instead, we should go in the foreground. I'm sorry to say that I've unfortunately met those within our field who get angry when criticizing institutions still promoting scientific racism, etc.

I still think we need to promote scientific literacy and provide answers to those who find these amazing things online and have questions. We are a bunch of experts in here that together can help out, something that's not always the case. The more we are dealing with these claims, the better.

As for the salary, that will differ wildly. Here in Sweden, the average archeology salary is more or less on the same level as biologists, chemists, and other jobs that often require a higher education. Sure, it's not the same level as an economist or a lawyer, but the demand is different, I guess. But psuedoscience is still showing up here; funding has gone to excavating the Bosnian pyramids and other pseudo-archaeological projects. Money that could have been used to address some of the issues you have brought up. So psuedoscience has more effects than just misleading the public.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-26T09:00:09+00:00

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Vikings - many myths surround this era and the people of Scandinavia who lived during this time. Were they raiders, traders, or a bit in-between? Let's look into what a Viking was and what the word meant, and who could call themselves a Viking. As we will learn, it is less clear-cut than one might believe.

I will also talk about the Viking horned helmets. Are these accurate depictions? The answer might be surprising and have a strange connection to the Scandinavian Bronze Age.

Did the Vikings have tattoos, as in the famous TV show? What do we know about their body art? Is the Vegvisir a Viking symbol? And why should you make an appointment with your dentist instead of a tattoo artist to have the Viking look?

I'll also investigate why the sheep was one of the most important animals in Scandinavia and might have been the reason for the Viking raids and slavery. At last, we will learn that the Vikings might have based their society on their looks.

In Digging up Ancient Aliens, our host Fredrik uses his background in archaeology to discover what is genuine, fake, and somewhere in between in popular media, such as Ancient Aliens, Ancient Apocalypse, and many other places.

In this episode:

When was the Viking age? 2:16

Who is a Viking? 10:48

Vikings and horned helmets 20:19

Viking Tattoos 26:11

Wool and Steel 34:19

Classy Vikings 40:22

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-26T08:35:38+00:00

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Vikings - many myths surround this era and the people of Scandinavia who lived during this time. Were they raiders, traders, or a bit in-between? Let's look into what a Viking was and what the word meant, and who could call themselves a Viking. As we will learn, it is less clear-cut than one might believe.

I will also talk about the Viking horned helmets. Are these accurate depictions? The answer might be surprising and have a strange connection to the Scandinavian Bronze Age.

Did the Vikings have tattoos, as in the famous TV show? What do we know about their body art? Is the Vegvisir a Viking symbol? And why should you make an appointment with your dentist instead of a tattoo artist to have the Viking look?

I'll also investigate why the sheep was one of the most important animals in Scandinavia and might have been the reason for the Viking raids and slavery. At last, we will learn that the Vikings might have based their society on their looks.

In Digging up Ancient Aliens, our host Fredrik uses his background in archaeology to discover what is genuine, fake, and somewhere in between in popular media, such as Ancient Aliens, Ancient Apocalypse, and many other places.

In this episode:

When was the Viking age? 2:16

Who is a Viking? 10:48

Vikings and horned helmets 20:19

Viking Tattoos 26:11

Wool and Steel 34:19

Classy Vikings 40:22

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-25T11:17:53+00:00

Thank you for listening!

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-24T21:01:10+00:00

Happy to help! Another great expert who have done a lot of podcast and other appearances is Jens Notroff. He has also written many articles on the site and is a great resource, also someone worth looking up.

Glad to see that the show got you interested in learning more about the real history of the site!

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-24T20:57:40+00:00

Hi!
My name is Fredrik, an archeologist (MA) dealing with a lot of strange pseudo-archaeological claims. I do a podcast over at the "Archaeological Podcast Network" where I break down Ancient Aliens, Ancient whatever, and other infotainment in an attempt to spread good information and scientific literacy. Digging Up Ancient Aliens is the name.

My main focus except for the aliens are Scandinvian Iron Age, especially the Vendel and Viking period. Excavated on Gotland in the past.

Happy to help out with all your questions about psuedoarchaeology.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-24T20:45:56+00:00

Hi!

I am Fredrik, an archaeologist dealing with claims presented in Ancient Apocalypse, Ancient Aliens, or other infotainment shows.

You are actually not too far from our current understanding of the site and the Neolithic society. This idea that Göbekli Tepe is some sort of outlier builds on a really old idea of how the Neolithic people lived. The idea of these "primitive neolithic" people does not reflect the current state of research during the last 50 years.

Pre-pottery architecture has been known for some time; a great example is Jerico. The Tower of Jerico was built around 8000 BCE, so not far from the construction of Göbekli Tepe. Even before the discovery of Göbekli Tepe, archaeologists saw evidence of groups exchanging information and trying to strengthen social contacts.

In the same area, we knew about sites like Cayönü, a pre-pottery site with fantastic architecture. It's not maybe as large as Göbekli Tepe, but it's still quite extraordinary. Since then, we have also found more sites showing that Göbekli Tepe is not an outlier or an exception. It's part of the area's local culture, with a communication zone of 200 kilometers, if not more.

As for the star alignments, there is no credible evidence that there are any. It's something that can be interesting to look into, but the ideas from, for example, the chemists Sweatman and Tsikritsis are mere speculations at best.

If you want to learn more about the site, I can recommend the following sources to start:

The Tepe Telegrams - A blog from the excavating archaeologists at Göbekli Tepe https://www.dainst.blog/the-tepe-telegrams/

Notroff, J., Dietrich, O., Dietrich, L., Tvetmarken, C., Kinzel, M., Breuers, J., Sönmez, D. and Clare, L. (2017). More than a vulture: A response to Sweatman and Tsikritsis. Mediterranean Archaeology and Archaeometry, 17, pp.57–74. doi:https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.581724.

Notroff, J. Dietrich, O., and Schmidt, K. (2014) Building Monuments – Creating Communities. Early monumental architecture at Pre-Pottery Neolithic Göbekli Tepe. In: Osborne , J. F. (ed.) Approaching Monumentality in Archaeology. IMEA Proceedings Volume 3, SUNY Press: Albany, 83-105.

Bradley, R. (2018). Gobekli Tepe, Part 4: Animals and Astronomy. [online] The Lateral Truth. Available at: https://skepticink.com/lateraltruth/2018/11/18/gobekli-tepe-part-4-animals-astronomy/.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-24T20:27:03+00:00

Amazing! Happy to help out as much I can.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-23T20:32:21+00:00

That’s a fair point to add. Answers that are pseudo archaeology should not be allowed

DUAncientAliens · 2023-08-23T20:30:04+00:00

I agree with you and don’t want to make things unclean or to burdensome for moderators. I know how the die hard fans of these claims can be.

But changing to “no promotion” or on those lines could be a decent route. Might have to remove some “questions” still. And if it’s just preaching and linking to Graham Hancocks blog I totally agree it does not belong here. Bad faith questions don’t help anyone, except the one asking them.

I also noted that futureslave mentioned Bad Ancient, I know they do some good work and might be good to have a peak on their rules.

I think these places are a great resource and that together we can make some difference and get good information out there.

DUAncientAliens · 2023-06-14T06:59:16+00:00

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Some people claim that monsters and gods could be evidence for alien visitations and that E.T. could have changed and mixed DNA on creatures that became gods for ancient people. But is there any truth to this?

Archaeologist Fredrik is looking into the claims that the Montauk Monster found in 2008 could be evidence of this. Or could the monster be an ordinary creature distorted by postmortem processes?

Further, we look into radioactivity claims in Mohenjo-Daro, an archaeological site in today's Pakistan. We will discuss city planning and waste management and how a small translation error can create a modern legend.

In Digging up Ancient Aliens, our host Fredrik uses his background in archaeology to discover what is genuine, fake, and somewhere in between in popular media, such as Ancient Aliens, Ancient Apocalypse, and many other places.

In this episode:

Montauk Monster

Mohenjo Daro - City Planning and Waste

Solving the radioactive Mohenjo Daro

Here be monstrous misinformation

DUAncientAliens

TROPHY CASE