The story of the only (?) megalith grave on Gotland Island

In this paper, we discuss the easternmost material expression of the Funnel Beaker Culture – a megalith grave on the west coast of Gotland Island in the Baltic Sea. The people who built and used the megalith brought the Neolithic lifestyle to Gotland. The biography of this monument includes two excavations, of which we participated in the latest in 1984. Our osteological analysis confirms that some thirty individuals of both sexes and various ages were buried there. The structure of the monument is that of a rectangular dolmen. This paper discusses the discovery of this specific site, and explores the existence of this type of monument in a Gotland context. Furthermore, is this really the only megalith on Gotland, or are more of these structures yet to be recognised? Finally, one may ask if the Neolithic way of life really was successful on Gotland.V članku analiziramo najbolj vzhoden materialni izraz kulture lijakastih čaš – megalitski grob na zahodni obali Gotlanda na Baltskem morju. Ljudje, ki so ga zgradili, so na Gotland prinesli neolitski način življenja. V biografijo spomenika sta vključeni dve izkopavanji. Pri zadnjih leta 1984 smo sodelovali. Naše osteološke analize so potrdile, da je bilo tam pokopanih približno trideset oseb obeh spolov in različnih starosti. Spomenik je oblikovan kot pravokotni dolmen. Predstavljamo odkritje tega posebnega mesta, kjer smo raziskali nastanek tega spomenika na Gotlandu. Vprašamo se, ali je to edini megalit in ali jih je mogoče na Gotlandu prepoznati več? Lahko se vprašamo tudi, ali je bil neolitski način življenja na Gotlandu uspešen

The "Fish" for the Gods

The aim of this paper is to provide an alternative interpretation for the large Rapa Nui stone fishhooks, mangai maea . These nicely carved hooks have been interpreted as clan or status symbols, as well as ordinary fishhooks (Chauvet 1935:32-34, Martinsson-Wallin 1994:125126, Metraux 1940:363, Heyerdahl 1961 :415-426, Lee 1992). We here examine this specific type of fishhook in the light of large fishhooks found on other islands in Polynesia. There is clear evidence that oversized fishhooks were used symbolically by leading chiefs for a very specific kind of "fishing" that was dedicated to the war god at certain ceremonial structures. In this case, the "fish" consisted of human sacrifices, suspended from a tree by a large fishhook inserted in the victim's mouth. These types of human sacrifices were called "fish". The relationship between large fishhooks and human sacrifice is discussed in this article.</p

Thor Heyerdahl 1914-2002

Sr. "Kon-Tiki" passed away quietly in his home in Italy on the 18th of April 2002, at the age of 87. As one of the most famous Norwegians ever, he accomplished many different things in his life, but his name will always be intimately tied to the Kon-Tiki voyage and the archaeological investigations on Rapa Nui and East Polynesia. He was awarded a state funeral in Oslo on the 26th of April 2002, but his final resting place is on the family estate at Colla Micheri in Italy.</p

Sea, Land, and Sky as Structuring Principles in Easter Island Prehistory

This paper discusses changes in Rapa Nui subsistence patterns over time and the social implications of those changes. As revealed by the archaeological record, the symbols of status and power shifted over time. In the early settlement phase, dated to around AD 800-1100, power and status appears to have been tied to activities directed towards the sea. The majority of the bones found in early cultural deposits on the island were derived from fish whose habitats range from 500-1000 meters offshore (Martinsson-Wallin and Crockford 2001). There were also many bones from sea mammals such as spinner dolphin (delfinidae). </p

Stone tools from the ancient Tongan state reveal prehistoric interaction centers in the Central Pacific

Tonga was unique in the prehistoric Pacific for developing a maritime state that integrated the archipelago under a centralized authority and for undertaking long-distance economic and political exchanges in the second millennium A.D. To establish the extent of Tonga's maritime polity, we geochemically analyzed stone tools excavated from the central places of the ruling paramounts, particularly lithic artifacts associated with stone-faced chiefly tombs. The lithic networks of the Tongan state focused on Samoa and Fiji, with one adze sourced to the Society Islands 2,500 km from Tongatapu. To test the hypothesis that nonlocal lithics were especially valued by Tongan elites and were an important source of political capital, we analyzed prestate lithics from Tongatapu and stone artifacts from Samoa. In the Tongan state, 66% of worked stone tools were long-distance imports, indicating that interarchipelago connections intensified with the development of the Tongan polity after A.D. 1200. In contrast, stone tools found in Samoa were from local sources, including tools associated with a monumental structure contemporary with the Tongan state. Network analysis of lithics entering the Tongan state and of the distribution of Samoan adzes in the Pacific identified a centralized polity and the products of specialized lithic workshops, respectively. These results indicate that a significant consequence of social complexity was the establishment of new types of specialized sites in distant geographic areas. Specialized sites were loci of long-distance interaction and formed important centers for the transmission of information, people, and materials in prehistoric Oceania

DERIVE AND INTEGRATE SUSTAINABILITY CRITERIA IN DESIGN SPACE EXPLORATION OF ADDITIVE MANUFACTURED COMPONENTS

Additive manufacturing has the potential to decrease the climate impact of aviation by providing more light-weight designs. Sustainability is however required to be assessed from a systemic view, including all lifecycle phases, and from a social, ecologic, and economic dimension. This is however challenging in early phase design, where also a large design space need to be explored. A case study is carried out with an aerospace company where two candidate engineering design tools are combined to address this. The integration of these two engineering tools are applied on a Turbine Rear Structure, and shows promising results in enabling a systemic view of sustainability to be integrated and assessed in early phase design space explorations of additive manufactured components. It is recommended that the integration between the two tools is further established and validated

Reconsidering precolumbian human colonization in the Galápagos Islands, Republic of Ecuador

Fifty years ago, Heyerdahl and Skjølsvold (1956, 1990) collected material from five archaeological sites in the Galápagos Islands. They retained earthenwares of possible precolumbian origin and discarded ceramic, metal, and glass artifacts postdating the arrival of the Spanish in A.D. 1535. Consequently, they argued that each site was formed as the results of a series of discard events from unrelated short-term occupations extending from the precolumbian to the historical era, and that the earthenwares represented occasional visits by fishermen from precolumbian Peru and Ecuador. In 2005, we re-excavated the sites and collected all the excavated materials. Our results show that each class of material, irrespective of age or origin, was distributed spatially and stratigraphically in the same pattern, contradicting the former assumption of multiple, unrelated occupations. We reject the palimpsest model in favor of the null hypothesis of single-phase site occupation. Analysis of putatively precolumbian pottery using optically-stimulated luminescence dating indicates that it is mostly of historical age. Radiocarbon dating confirms that the archaeological sites are younger than the sixteenth century. Research on sedimentary cores shows probable anthropogenic impacts as restricted to the last 500 years. We conclude that there was no human occupation in the Galápagos Islands until the historical era

Parallel cyclin E and cyclin A expression in neoplastic lesions of the uterine cervix

Cyclin E levels are high during late G1 and early S-phase in normal cells. The cyclin E expression over the cell cycle in tumours is not fully known. The impact on patient outcome by high cyclin E levels during other parts of the cell cycle than late G1- and early S-phase is unknown. We set out to study the expression of cyclin E over the cell cycle in cervical carcinomas. Using immunofluorescence staining of cyclin A, digital microscopy, and digital image analysis, we determined which cells in a tissue section that were in S- or G2-phase. M-phase cells were detected by morphology. By simultaneously staining for cyclin E, we investigated the variation in cyclin E levels over the cell cycle in cervical carcinoma lesions. In a case–control study, in which each deceased patient was matched with a patient still alive and well after >5 years of follow-up, we found that the deceased patients had a considerably higher fraction of cyclin A-positive cells staining for cyclin E than the survivors (n=36). We conclude that parallel cyclin E and cyclin A expression is an indicator for poor outcome in cervical carcinomas. In addition, we investigated the expression pattern of cyclin E and cyclin A in consecutive biopsy samples from cervical carcinomas at different stages, as well as in human papillomavirus positive or negative adenocarcinomas in order to further study the cyclin E and cyclin A expression pattern in neoplastic lesions of the uterine cervix

Dating of Ahu Structures within the La Perouse Area

The La Perouse bay area houses several large ceremonial structures, area with rock carvings, and other prehistoric sites. Hanga Ho'onu probably was favorable for settlements and provided a good harbor in prehistoric times. The area is still used as a fishing harbor and a few recently built houses are occasionally occupied by fishermen. At this location the large principal ceremonial center consisting of Ahu Heki'i and associated small platforms, is found. Other major ceremonial sites in the area are Ahu Ra'ai to the east and Ahu Te Pito te Kura to the west of Heki'i. Ahu Ra'ai may, for example, represent a secondary ritual center within this territorial unit.</p