Helge Andersson
2. Viking stone
This year, scientists may have cracked a century-long mystery: decoding a message from ancient Vikings on a giant slab of granite. The message? Beware of environmental catastrophe.
Eugenio Acevez
3. 9,900-year-old skull
An ancient human skull found in the submerged Tulum cave system revealed that more than one group of humans arrived in Central and North American, complicating what we know about human settlement in this region of the globe.
4. Mammoth bone house
A pile of ancient mammoth bones shows how ancient humans could have built structures in northern Russia to withstand bitterly cold weather.
5. Female warrior skeletons
Three different generations of Scythian warrior women were found at a site in Russia, suggesting that women and girls went into battle between 900 and 200 BCE.
7. Ancient jawbone
This 160,000-year-old jawbone unearthed from a cave in Tibet appears to belong to an enigmatic ancient human ancestor called the Denisovans. The finding allowed scientists to start piecing together the history of these mysterious early humans.
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