Ancient DNA is turning Europe’s deep past from a sketch into a family album. Instead of guessing who first called the continent home, researchers can now read genetic traces from teeth, bones and cave ...

Both in schoolbooks and popular imagination, 476 AD stands like a sword stroke: the year Romulus Augustulus, the teenage ...

Researchers at the University of Huddersfield have used ancient DNA to reveal that hunter-gatherers in one part of Europe survived for thousands of years longer than anywhere else on the continent—and ...

Recent archaeological discoveries are challenging established narratives of human origins and creativity. A 64,000-year-old cave art found in Europe is compelling scientists to rethink timelines of ...

Scientists analyze 22,000 genomes documenting hundreds of genetic changes due to natural selection over the past 10,000 years ...

How do we understand past societies? For centuries, our main sources of information have been pottery sherds, burial sites and ancient texts. But the study of ancient DNA is changing what we know ...

Tom has a Master's degree in Journalism. His editorial work covers anything from archaeology and the environment to technology and culture. Tom has a Master's degree in Journalism. His editorial work ...

A new study claims to have identified the first speakers of Indo-European language, which gave rise to English, Sanskrit and hundreds of others. By Carl Zimmer In 1786, a British judge named William ...

More than 1,600 ancient genomes have helped to trace the roots of a host of genetic traits found in modern Europeans. The genomes suggest that many characteristics — including a heightened risk for ...