How we dated the remnants of the Bokoni polity
If you go for a walk in the green hills of Mpumalanga in the north east of South Africa, you …
History
Evolutionary medicine looks to our early human ancestors for insight into conditions like diabetes
Like all living things, humans are the product of a complex evolutionary history. Our ancestors’ environment and diets, and the …
What genetic analysis reveals about the ancestry of South Africa’s Afrikaners
The story of human history is one of migrations over the globe and admixture – the exchange of DNA – …
How the bubonic plague changed drinking habits
Alcohol deaths in England and Wales in 2020 were the highest for 20 years. The Office for National Statistics…
Teeth prove foreigners fought alongside ancient Greeks
Ancient historians loved to write about warfare and famous battles. While these millennia-old stories still feed modern imaginations – Homer’s …
German spies in South Africa during WWII
The story of the intelligence war in South Africa during the Second World War is one of suspense, drama and …
Nocturnal dinosaurs: Night vision and superb hearing in a small theropod suggest it was a moonlight predator
Today, barn owls, bats, leopards and many other animals rely on their keen senses to live and hunt under the …
A cave site in Kenya’s forests reveals the oldest human burial in Africa
Africa is often referred to as the cradle of humankind – the birthplace of our species, Homo sapiens. There …
How we discovered the oldest human burial in Africa
How did human uniqueness first evolve among our ancestors, setting us apart from other animals? That is a question many …
Ocean crossing that made human evolution possible
Humans evolved in Africa, along with chimpanzees, gorillas and monkeys. But primates themselves appear to have evolved elsewhere – likely …
Medieval battles prove United Kingdom still united
Second only to COVID-19 recovery, the continued unity of the United Kingdom is the key political issue across the British …
What were the Spartans like?
In the second episode of the current season of the TV show Lego Masters, contestants were asked to build a …
South Africa’s Blombos cave is home to the earliest drawing by a human
Scientists working in Blombos Cave in South Africa’s southern Cape region have made a discovery that changes our understanding of …
South Africa’s 1994 apartheid ‘miracle’: what’s left?
In the 1990s, a commonly held view was that South Africa had achieved a “miracle” because of its relatively peaceful …
What triangular patterns on rocks may reveal
The Pleistocene epoch, which started 2.6 million years ago and lasted until about 11,700 years ago, was crucially important …
SA remains a nation of insiders and outsiders
Twenty seven years into democracy, South African politics is still for the few. And those who complain the most …
Deep-sea volcanic eruptions create megaplumes
The ocean floor is famously unexplored and is imaged in much less detail than the surfaces of Mars, the Moon …
Dead Sea Scrolls: two scribes probably wrote one of the manuscripts
Ever since the Dead Sea Scrolls were accidentally discovered over 70 years ago in a cave in Israel, they have …
The Buck Stops Here – Because Freedom Day is around the corner, and this is what Freedom Day means to young people in South Africa.
– Lebogang Ditsebe
We as young people in South Africa need to realise that two key things stand out, from …
Ancient Greece, handwashing and inequality
COVID-19 poses massive challenges nationally and globally when it comes to socio-economic inequality. It has hit the vaccine rollout especially …
What an unusual fossil reveals about parental care among pre-mammalian ancestors
South Africa’s Karoo region is world famous for its wealth of fossil remains. Many of these are from long extinct …
Tiny beetle fossil reveals how insects greeted Earth’s earliest flowers
The world as we know it today is almost inconceivable without the rich and colourful landscapes created by plant life. …
Dinosaurs: from giant reptiles to warm-blooded, feathered creatures
We look at how new discoveries are changing our understanding of what dinosaurs looked like and are helping to shed …
SA hunters may have been symbolic in choosing bones for arrows
Animals have long played an important symbolic role in human societies. They feature prominently in myths and folklore throughout …
An appreciation of Antonie van Leeuwenhoek
Imagine trying to cope with a pandemic like COVID-19 in a world where microscopic life was unknown. Prior to the …
Archaeology explains persistence of Muslim cuisine after conquest of Granada
Granada, in southern Spain’s Andalusia region, was the final remnant of Islamic Iberia known as al-Andalus – a territory that …
Viking DNA and the pitfalls of genetic ancestry tests
A middle-aged white man raises his sword to the skies and roars to the gods. The results of his genetic …
Archaeology in Africa changes our knowledge of evolution
Our species, Homo sapiens, rose in Africa some 300,000 years ago. The objects that early humans made and …