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For decades, archaeologists have been trying to work out how a trove of ancient Egyptian artefacts were buried in the grounds of a school in Scotland. In 1952, a schoolboy was sent to dig up potatoes as a punishment – how times have changed – when he found a statue. It turned out to be a masterpiece made some 4,000 years ago. Fourteen years later, more treasure was discovered by a boy during a PE class, before, in 1984, a group found another item with a metal detector. It turned out to be part of a set of 18 antiquities dug up over the next 30 years at Melville House, a historic building in Fife, Scotland. But nobody had any idea how they got there. Now, researchers think they might have unearthed what was going on. Alexander Lesie-Melville was a young heir to Melville House when he travelled to Egypt in 1856. A year later, he had returned to Scotland and died. Leslie-Melville might have picked up the collection on his travels – it certainly beats the Duty Free section at Heathrow – as antique dealers routinely sold ancient artefacts to rich foreigners during that period. After Leslie-Melville died, family members are thought to have moved the objects to an outbuilding, where they were promptly forgotten about. The outbuilding was then demolished. Margaret Maitland, principal curator of the Ancient Mediterranean at National Museums Scotland where most of the objects are housed, said: “The discovery of ancient Egyptian artifacts that had been buried in Scotland for over a hundred years is evidence of the scale of 19th century antiquities collecting and its complex history.” “It was an exciting challenge to research and identify such a diverse range of artefacts.” Dr Elizabeth Goring, who has since investigated the site, said: “Excavating and researching these finds at Melville House has been the most unusual project in my archaeological career, and I’m delighted to now be telling the story in full." The full story will be published in an upcoming article in the journal Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland. How to join the indy100's free WhatsApp channel Sign up to our free indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

When archaeologists explored an underwater cavern in southern Mexico in 2014, they were shocked by what they found. The cavern is known as Sac Uayum, and is located in Mexico’s Yucatán peninsula. It is technically a cenote – a natural pit that comes about after limestone bedrock collapses, exposing groundwater beneath. Local villagers were said to be terrified of the spot, because pits like this were sometimes used by the ancient Maya for sacrificial offerings. Archaeologist Bradley Russell, from College of St Rose, and a group of divers scaled down roughly 20 metres into the unknown. Inside the pit were two chambers with human bones and skulls scattered across the floors of each. The skulls were elongated, as part of an ancient practice that is thought to have involved flattening people’s heads during infancy. Archaeologists still don’t know why the ancient culture did this – but it ain't pretty. The cenote sits just outside the ruins of the ancient Maya city of Mayapán, and the researchers think this shows that, like the modern day locals, the ancient Mayans kept their distance too. Local legend says that Sac Uayum is guarded by a feathered, horse-headed serpent. Older residents of the nearby village of Telchaquillo tell stories of people seeing the serpent perching in a tree, leaping up, spinning around three times, and diving into the water. Russell explained to National Geographic that the sinkhole is said to be “evil”. “To this day, people do not get drinking water from that cenote, it is generally considered taboo. “It’s off-limits, people do not let their children plan near there and there’s a lot of beliefs around this cenote having evil forces or malevolent forces associated with it. “Cenotes are important because the main access to the water that you get is through these sinkholes. “They are also believed to be access to the Mayan underworld and the homes of Gods. “Mayapan is a large city, it’s incredibly dense, there’s nothing like it in the classic period, it’s incredibly dense for Maya history, there’s nothing quite like it.” He added that the location of Sac Uayum – south of Mayapan – is a clue as to what was going on. In Maya beliefs, south is the direction associated with the underworld. Alternatively, Russell also suggested they could have been plague victims. "You wouldn't want them near the rest of the population. And you wouldn't want to drink the water either.” How to join the indy100's free WhatsApp channel Sign up to our free indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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Scientists have confirmed that the first black hole to ever be captured on camera is spinning in a major new discovery. The famous doughnut-shaped M87* black hole, 6.5 billion times more massive than the sun, first drew people’s attention in 2019 for becoming the first void to be pictured. Now, it has been confirmed that the M87* black hole is spinning, but experts have yet to determine just how fast. The announcement was made on 27 September. M87* has been observed for the last two decades via a network of radio telescopes. It is located in the Messier 87 (M87) galaxy, which is around 55 million light-years away from Earth in the Virgo constellation. The instruments monitoring the black hole have observed a powerful jet of radiation and particles being expelled from its poles. According to research, the relativistic jets appeared to be on a kind of pendulum that swings every 11 years, observed over decades. Experts believe this is caused by interactions between gravitational interactions between the black hole and the material making up the disk around it. They say this provides “unequivocal evidence” that the black hole is spinning. Cui Yuzhu, a researcher at Zhejiang Lab in China and the study’s lead author explained in a statement: “We are thrilled by this significant finding,” adding, “Since the misalignment between the black hole and the disk is relatively small and the precession period is around 11 years, accumulating high-resolution data tracing M87’s structure over two decades and thorough analysis are essential to obtain this achievement.” Their findings matched with computer simulations, confirming that the jets emitting from the black hole change direction by around 10 degrees every 11 years. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

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