Horse-shaped pottery unearthed at South Korean Tomb site

By: Thomas Schmitt Attorney on October 02, 2019 / comment : 0 Archaeology, Asia, East Asia, South Korea

A horse-shaped earthenware object, the largest of its kind in the country’s history, has been excavated at the Geumryeongchong Tomb site in Gyeongju, North Gyeongsang Province. The presence and location of the objects excavated within and around the tumuli suggest that the tomb belonged to a king, not a young member of a royal family as presumed before.

Credit: Dong-A Ilbo

“We’ve recently excavated some 30 earthenware pots used for ancestral rites near the tomb, which had been unearthed during the Japanese colonial era,” the Gyeongju National Museum announced, saying it turns out that the tomb is likely to have been built above the ground, not from underground as previously known.

The Silla Dynasty’s tomb, presumed to date back to the late 5th century or the early 6th century, is where a pair of the pottery in the shape of a warrior on horseback, the National Treasure No. 91, had been excavated. The horse-shaped pottery discovered during the latest investigation is 56 centimeters high, and has delicately formed face, jaw, neck, and hooves. Along with it, earthenware for memorial services also turned up. Given that parts of it were neatly cut off, the pottery seems to have been intentionally broken and dedicated to the tomb.

It is also noteworthy that over 30 jars filled with offerings such as oysters and clams were found out, located with a consistent space between them. The Gold Bell Tomb turned out to be 28 meters in diameter, eight meters larger than previously known, but is still not one of the largest tombs in the country. Yet, the tomb had more jars for rituals even than Seobongchong, a bigger tomb located nearby. Inside and outside the earthenware, some bones of animals such as a horse and a cow, a plate with a cover, bells, and glass beads were also excavated. Shin Gwang-cheol, a curator at the museum, explained that the floor where the earthenware was found out indicates the process of building the tomb and holding grand memorial services several times.

Some suggest that Geumryeongchong was a royal tomb. A gold crown of the Silla Kingdom (Treasure No. 338), gold bells, belts, jade bracelets, and a large sword had been discovered near the tomb, but since most accessories were small, experts presumed that the tomb belonged to a young member of a royal family, not a king. However, Park Kwang-choon, a professor at the Department of Archaeology and Art History at Dong-A University, said that the discovery of a prop, which had been found only near royal tombs, as well as the scale of rituals hint at a possibility that it is a royal tomb of a king.

An excavation study into Geumryeongchong was conducted in 1924, but the soil and stones that covered and surrounded the burial mound were not investigated back then. This is why the tomb was incorrectly known for being an underground grave, unlike other kingdom sites built during the Silla Dynasty. The Gyeongju National Museum is set to excavate the mound again by next year.

Author: Jong-Yeob JO | Source: Dong-A Ilbo [October 02, 2019]

41 Baekje-era tumuli found near South Korea's Gongju city

By: Thomas Schmitt Attorney on July 18, 2019 / comment : 0 Archaeology, Asia, South East Asia, South Korea

A state-run research center has found traces of 41 Baekje-era tumuli near the tomb of King Muryeong in Gongju, some of which could turn out to be newfound royal tombs, the Cultural Heritage Administration said Wednesday.

This photo shows the locations of Baekje-era tumuli. The yellow ellipsis indicates the tomb of King Muryeong, and the green ellipses indicate tumuli found during the Japanese colonial period. Blue ellipses indicate tombs that have been repaired and are under maintenance, and red ellipses indicate newly discovered tumuli [Credit: Cultural Heritage Administration]

The discovery was made during research conducted as part of a long-term study on the tumuli at Songsan-ri -- part of the UNESCO World Heritage Site known as the Baekje Historic Areas -- according to the CHA affiliate the Buyeo National Research Institute of Cultural Heritage. The tumuli are thought to belong to members of the royal family and nobility of the Baekje Kingdom (18 BC-AD 660).

Unlike the Silla and Gaya kingdoms, which coexisted on the Korean Peninsula along with Baekje, Baekje tumuli were hard to identify until recently as the people of Baekje did not create large mounds and the tombs were mostly underground.

Geophysical surveys identified the underground structures around the tomb of King Muraung [Credit: Cultural Properties Administration]

Researchers found traces of tumuli Nos. 7, 8, 9 and 29, for which records had been lost after the tumuli were reportedly discovered between 1927 and 1933 when the Korean Peninsula was under Japanese colonial rule. Of the 29 tumuli discovered during those years, records remain for only eight.

While previous research established that royal tombs existed in this area, King Muryeong’s tomb is the only one whose occupant researchers have been able identify.

King Mureung's tomb and the "Chungbang" brick. Inside the square, the Chinese word "Zhongbang" is clear [Credit: National Burial Cultural Property Research Institute, National Gongju Museum]

The Buyeo institute also found “jungbang” bricks -- similar to eight of the bricks found in King Muryeong’s tomb, which were used to form the shape of a window.

Because the bricks were found 80 meters away from King Muryeong’s tomb and 70 meters away from tumulus No. 17, a brick-based tomb that was already known to archaeologists, researchers say it is possible that another brick-based tomb may be in the area.

Interior of King Mureung's tomb [Credit: Cultural Heritage Administration]

“Most of the research on the tumuli in Songsan-ri had been conducted by the Japanese, and not much follow-up study has taken place since then. This research is very meaningful because it has been done by us (Koreans) with a systematic plan,” the CHA said.

Author: Yoon Min-sik | Source: The Korea Herald [July 18, 2019]

Ancient spider fossils, surprisingly preserved in rock, reveal reflective eyes

By: Thomas Schmitt Attorney on February 12, 2019 / comment : 0 Fossils, Palaeontology, South Korea

Usually, soft-bodied species like spiders aren't fossilized in rock like animals with bones and teeth. More often, ancient spiders and insects are more likely to be discovered preserved in amber.

Fossil specimen discovered in Korea with reflective eyes, a feature still apparent under light [Credit: Paul Selden]

Yet a new paper in the Journal of Systematic Palaeontology, co-written by a University of Kansas researcher, describes fossil spiders found in an area of Korean shale called the Lower Cretaceous Jinju Formation.

What's most remarkable: Two of the fossils from the extinct spider family Lagonomegopidae feature reflective eyes that enabled their nighttime hunting.

"Because these spiders were preserved in strange slivery flecks on dark rock, what was immediately obvious was their rather large eyes brightly marked with crescentic features," said Paul Selden, Gulf-Hedberg Distinguished Professor of Geology and director of the Paleontological Institute at KU's Biodiversity Institute and Natural History Museum. "I realized this must have been the tapetum -- that's a reflective structure in an inverted eye where light comes in and is reverted back into retina cells. This is unlike a straightforward eye where light goes through and doesn't have a reflective characteristic."

Selden said that some contemporary spiders feature eyes with a tapetum, but the new paper is the first to describe the anatomical feature in a fossilized spider. The research team said the discovery provides evidence for lagonomegopid enlarged eyes being posterior medians.

"ln spiders, the ones you see with really big eyes are jumping spiders, but their eyes are regular eyes -- whereas wolf spiders at nighttime, you see their eyes reflected in light like cats," he said. "So, night-hunting predators tend to use this different kind of eye. This was the first time a tapetum had been in found in fossil. This tapetum was canoe-shaped -- it looks a bit like a Canadian canoe. That will help us place this group of spiders among other families."

Locality map of the study area. A, distribution of Cretaceous sedimentary basins around the Korean Peninsula; rectangular  area is magnified in B. B, simplified geological map of the Gyeongsang Arc System; the sedimentary rocks represent the  Gyeongsang Backarc Basin, while the volcanic rocks represent the Gyeongsang Volcanic Arc; rectangular area is magnified in C (modified from Chough & Sohn 2010; the displacement by the Yangsan Fault has been recovered). C, road map of the study area showing the two fossil localities (stars) [Credit: Paul Selden]

Selden's collaborators were Tae-Yoon Park of the Korea Polar Research Institute and amateur fossil hunter Kye-Soo Nam of the Daejeon Science High School for the Gifted, who found the fossils preserved in the shale.

The description of the fossils boosts the number of known spiders from the Jinju Formation from one to 11. The KU researcher said the spiders, who lived between 110 and 113 million years ago, must somehow have been protected from deterioration to have become so well-preserved in the shale formation.

"This is so rare because they're very soft -- they don't have hard shells so they very easily decay," Selden said. "It has to be a very special situation where they were washed into a body of water. Normally, they'd float. But here, they sunk, and that kept them away from decaying bacteria -- it may have been a low-oxygen condition. These rocks also are covered in little crustaceans and fish, so there maybe was some catastrophic event like an algal bloom that trapped them in a mucus mat and sunk them -- but that's conjecture. We don't really know what caused this, but something killed off a lot of animals around the lake at one time or on an annual basis."

The discovery was made possible because of the unique geography of South Korea, where the shale containing the fossils was exposed during a construction project.

"It's all black shale, and in that area it's very hilly," Selden said. "South Korea doesn't have much flat land to build anything. So, they carve away the hillsides to make a flat area, and there are temporary excavations while they're cutting away and building a factory or whatever -- that's where they found these fossils."

Flint rock preserved characteristics of the spider fossils differently than the more common amber-preserved spiders [Credit: Paul Selden]

According to Selden, the shale preserved the spider fossils in a manner that highlighted the reflectivity of the tapetum, a feature that may have been missed had the spiders been preserved in amber instead, as is more typical.

"Amber fossils are beautiful, they look wonderful, but they preserve things in a different way," he said. "Now, we want to go back and look at the amber fossils and see if we can find the tapetum, which stares out at you from rock fossils but isn't so obvious in amber ones because the mode of preservation is so different."

Beyond the novelty of discovering the first fossilized-spider tapetum, Selden said the spiders informed the scientific understanding of Cretaceous biodiversity.

"This is an extinct family of spiders that were clearly very common in the Cretaceous and were occupying niches now occupied by jumping spiders that didn't evolve until later," he said. "But these spiders were doing things differently. Their eye structure is different from jumping spiders. It's nice to have exceptionally well-preserved features of internal anatomy like eye structure. It's really not often you get something like that preserved in a fossil."

Source: University of Kansas [February 12, 2019]

Tiny raptor tracks lead to big discovery

By: Thomas Schmitt Attorney on November 16, 2018 / comment : 0 Dinosaurs, Fossils, Palaeontology, South Korea

Tracks made by dinosaurs the size of sparrows have been discovered in South Korea by an international team of palaeontologists.

Credit: Dr Anthony Romilio/University of Queensland

University of Queensland researcher Dr Anthony Romilio was part of the team which described the tracks, which were originally found by Professor Kyung Soo Kim from Chinju National University of Education, South Korea.

“These 110-million-year-old footprints and trackways were made by carnivorous dinosaurs commonly known as raptors,” Dr Romilio said.

“These new tracks are just one centimetre in length, which means the dinosaur that made them was an animal you could have easily held in your hand. They are the world’s smallest dinosaur tracks.”

To estimate the size of the dinosaur that made the tracks, the team measured the footprint length and multiplied the value by 4.5 to get an approximate hip height.

 “The diminutive sizes of these new tracks are extraordinary; the tracks were made by tiny dinosaurs about the size of sparrows,” Dr Romilio said.


“Raptors placed only two of their toes on the ground, while the third toe was retracted like a cat’s claw.”

The research team are unsure if the tracks were made by a small adult species, or baby dinosaurs.

“Very small dinosaur species like the Chinese Microraptor were crow-sized, but these had feet too large to match the South Korean footprints,” Dr Romilio said.

“If the tracks were made by dinosaur chicks, we are unclear as to the specific dinosaur that made them, since dinosaurs such as Velociraptor and Utahraptor had larger feet then the ones discovered in these new tracks.”

Professor Kim said the Cretaceous lake deposits at the discovery site created perfect conditions that allowed for the preservation of tiny footprints rarely found elsewhere.

“In addition to tiny dinosaur tracks, we have footprints made by birds, pterosaurs, lizards, turtles, mammals, and even frogs,” he said.

“We have named these small tracks Dromaeosauriformipes rarus, which means rare footprints made by a member of the raptor family known as dromaeosaurs,” Professor Kim said.

The research is published in Scientific Reports.

Source: University of Queensland [November 16, 2018]

World's oldest fishing net sinkers found in S. Korea

By: Thomas Schmitt Attorney on August 07, 2018 / comment : 0 Archaeology, Asia, East Asia, South Korea

Archaeologists excavating a cave in South Korea have found evidence that suggests human beings were using sophisticated techniques to catch fish as far back as 29,000 years ago, much earlier than experts previously thought.

The limestone sinkers, each weighing between 14 to 52 grammes, would have been tied to the bottom of nets and used to catch small fish such as minnows in shallow streams [Credit: AFP]

Carbon dating procedures on the fourteen limestone sinkers, unearthed in the eastern county of Jeongseon in June, have pushed back "the history of fishing by nets by some 19,000 years", Yonsei University Museum director Han Chang-gyun told AFP.

Previously, researchers had excavated sinkers -- stones used to weigh down nets for catching fish -- in Japan's Fukui Prefecture and South Korea's Cheongju city, but those discoveries were all dated back to the Neolithic Era and believed to be around 10,000 years old, Han said.

"This discovery suggests humans in the Upper Paleolithic era were actively catching fish for their diet", he added.


The limestone sinkers, each weighing between 14 to 52 grammes and with a diameter of 37 to 56 millimetres, had grooves carved into them so they could be tied to the bottom of nets and used to catch small fish such as minnows in shallow streams, he said.

Researchers also found fossilized bones belonging to fish and other animals, as well as stone tools and flakes, inside the Maedun cave, he said.

Prior to the South Korean find, the oldest fishing implements were believed to be fishing hooks, made from the shells of sea snails, that were found on a southern Japanese island and said to date back some 23,000 years.

Source: AFP [August 07, 2018]

Remains of possible sixth century palace found in southern S. Korea

By: Thomas Schmitt Attorney on June 07, 2018 / comment : 0 Archaeology, Asia, South East Asia, South Korea

Archaeologists have found the remains of what appears to be a sixth-century palace of Ara Gaya, a city-state kingdom that existed in the Korean Peninsula's southeastern area and had exchanges with the ancient Korean kingdoms of Silla and Baekje, and Japan, a state-run archaeological think tank said Thursday.

The remains of what appears to be a sixth-century palace of Ara Gaya, a city-state kingdom that existed in the Korean  Peninsula's southeastern area, in the town of Haman in South Korea's South Gyeongsang Province [Credit: Gaya National Research Institute of Cultural Heritage via Yonhap]

Ara Gaya, also known as Ana Gaya, Asiryangguk and Alla, was a city-state kingdom in the Gaya confederacy of chiefdoms and was situated around what is now the town of Haman in South Korea's South Gyeongsang Province, from 42 B.C. to A.D. 559, according to descriptions of the kingdom in Korean and Japanese ancient history books.

The Gaya National Research Institute of Cultural Heritage said its archaeologists have excavated an earthen ramparts and wooden fences at a site in the town, which is believed to have been built in the fifth or sixth century. The excavation work began last month.

The ramparts have a height of 8.5 meters and an upper width of 20 to 40 meters, with its length running about 40 meters.

Kang Dong-seok, a researcher at the institute, said the earthen ramparts are the largest among the known ramparts in the Gaya confederacy in the country's southeastern area, suggesting it could be a palace where the kingdom's rulers lived.

Inside the ramparts, remains of buildings and holes were discovered in addition to two rows of log cribs on the upper part of them that are believed to have been installed to prevent enemy approaches.

The institute said the discovery of the ramparts indicates the existence of a strong political power capable of mobilizing a massive labor force and is a boost to its study of the livelihood of the ancient kingdom's ruling class.

Source: Yonhap News Agency [June 07, 2018]