According to AFP, three men were caught carrying out construction work on Mykonos despite a suspension on development. On the island of Rhodes, a tour operator was arrested for illegally occupying part of a beach with metal and wooden structures. The arrests were made amid a government crackdown on illicit tourism development on Greek islands home to imperiled fragile archaeological sites.

“The law will be enforced in Mykonos,” Kostas Skrekas, Greece’s environment minister, said in a statement. “No illegal plan will be legalized… there will be no loophole.”

In March, 58-year-old archaeologist Manolis Psarrosan, an employee at the Ephorate of Antiquities of the Cyclades, was assaulted in a suburb of Athens. According to the Washington Post, Psarrosan has been involved in several cases with alleged violations, including ones revolving around “illegal constructions” and “arbitrary building activities in areas of archaeological interest” on Mykonos. He has been called as a witness in related trials. 

Due to the abundance of archaeological sites in Greece, local organizations have the power to veto development plans. 

Later that month, state-employed archeologists staged a five-hour protest outside the Culture Ministry in Athens to protest Psarrosan’s attack of a colleague in a suburb of the Greek capital, an incident they say is linked to the “mafia-style” violence targeting those tasked with persevering the country’s ancient heritage.

Upon X-raying the lump, experts identified gold and bronze metals. After cleaning away the dirt, they found an intricate piece of metal jewelry that they determined was once a buckle or possibly a brooch.

The buckle features a series of interconnected loops that appear to depict an animal. Some believe the figure could be a lion encircled by serpents, while others believe it could be a horse or dragon. The artifact would have been made with a clay mold—an indication that it was mass-produced.

It is unclear who would have worn the accessory or exactly for what purpose.

Based on the style, however, researchers believes the piece dates to roughly 1000 CE. It would have been popular among the vikings of modern-day Norway, before the spread of Christianity.

Vikings throughout Scandinavia were forced to convert to Christianity around 900 CE, wherein it became the dominant religion around 1050 CE. While Viking culture was known for including animals in its designs, Christians opted for more abstract decoration.

Not only does the statue—made from Mediterranean marble—shed greater light on trade between ancient Rome and India, it also is the first Buddha found west of Afghanistan, according to the New York Review of Books.

A joint Polish-American archaeological team, lead by historian Steven Sidebotham of the University of Delaware and archaeologist Mariusz Gwiazda of the University of Warsaw, uncovered the statue during excavation work in the city’s ancient temple.

At 28 inches or a little over two feet tall, the statue depicts Buddha standing and holding part of his robes in his left hand. There is a halo with sun rays around his head and a lotus flower at his side. Researchers believe it was made in Alexandria around the second century.

The team also uncovered a Sanskrit inscription dating to the reign of the Roman emperor Marcus Julius Philippus, who hailed from present-day Syria and was known as Phillip the Arab (244–49 CE), along with two coins from the middle Indian Kingdom of Satavahana dating to the second century CE.

These finds indicate greater connection than previously known between Ancient Rome, Egypt, and India. Due to its central location along Roman trade routes, Egypt served as a gateway between the Roman Empire and its ancient counterparts.

Berenike, which was founded in the third century BCE, became one of the largest ports in Egypt under Roman rule until it was abandoned in the sixth century CE. In its heyday, the city served as a hub for the trade of such goods as ivory, textiles, and semi-precious metals.

The policy change was unanimously approved by Greece’s Central Archaeological Council. But pet owners shouldn’t rush to make plans, as the organization did not specify an implementation date for the new regulations.

Pets still won’t be allowed at popular sites like the Acropolis in Athens, Knossos in Crete, Olympia, and Delphi due to their large annual populations of visitors, as well as as ancient theaters, temples, graves and monuments with mosaic floors.

Currently, only guide dogs for disabled visitors are allowed into the country’s archaeological sites.

The decision is “a first, but important, step toward harmonizing the framework of accessibility to monuments and archaeological sites with the standards of other European countries, where entry rules for pets already apply,” Culture Minister Lina Mendoni said in a statement.

The new policy stipulates that dogs need to be on a leash no more than 3 feet long. The animals can also be carried by their owners in a pouch or a pet carrying case. Larger dogs will be required to wear a muzzle.

The culture ministry said pet owners will also be required to show health certificates for the accompanying animal and carry the supplies needed for picking up poop in order to be allowed entry into the archaeological sites.

For pet owners who change their minds about visiting these historical areas with their furry friends, the ministry said there will be cages installed at the entrances to more than 110 archaeological sites.

The news of the policy was first reported by the Associated Press.

The hoard was found by an archaeological group hiking through a newly cut forest northeast of the Tuscan city Livorno in 2021. The area has since been investigated by archaeologists, who yielded no further results.

The silver Roman denarii, found inside of a terracotta pot, are all from between 157 BCE and 82 BCE. Experts believe the hoard could have possibly belonged to a solider caught in conflicts or a merchant seeking to hide his wealth. They do know for certain that whoever buried the coins never recovered them.

Since the last of the coins date to a time of internal strife, archaeologists believe whoever buried them did so for safekeeping.

In 91 BCE, a war had broken out between Rome and its Italian allies seeking citizenship. The Roman general and statesman Sulla, who had previously been declared a public enemy of the state in 87 BCE and who had attacked the city in 88 BCE, returned with his army from Asia to confront his Roman enemies in 82 BCE. As the first man of the Republic to seize power through force, his victory paved the way for future dictators such as Julius Caesar.

After remaining hidden for 2,000 years, the coins are slated for display at the Museum of Natural History of the Mediterranean in the Province of Livorno, Il Terrino reported.

Last fall, a young girl and member of a local amateur archaeology association found the coins in a field about five miles from the Viking castle Fyrkat, near the Danish town of Hobro. The coins were from two Viking treasures buried about 160 feet apart and could be dated back to the 980s during Harald Blåtand’s reign as king of Denmark and Norway.

The coins from this period featured a cross on one side and were only in circulation for a few decades before King Harald lost power to his son.

The two treasures included up to 300 pieces of silver such as jewelry, and approximately 50 coins. Archaeologists say the coins include Danish, Arab and Germanic ones and the pieces of jewelry are from Scotland or Ireland. According a statement on the discovery from The Historical Museum of North Jutland, jewelry was valued for its weight, rather than any fine artistic detail or esteemed prior ownership, and “probably used as a means of payment or remelted into new jewelry in the Scandinavian style.”

“A hoard like this is very rare,” museum director Lars Christian Norbach told the AFP. Norbach said the silver items were from the same period Fyrkat was built and would offer more insight into the history of the Scandinavian seafarers.

Archaeologist and museum inspector Torben Trier Christiansen called the location of the discovery of the silver items “incredibly exciting” because of the limited time the Viking fortress of Fyrkat was used and uncertainty around why King Haland’s ring castles were closed down.

“Perhaps the castles were not given up entirely voluntarily, and perhaps it happened in connection with the final showdown between Harald Blåtand and his son Svend Tveskæg,” Christiansen told the museum. “The Bramslev treasures were apparently buried around the same time or shortly after the castles were abandoned, and if there have been disturbances at Fyrkat, it makes good sense that the local magnate here at Bramslev has chosen to hide his valuables out of the way.”

Further archaeological work will continue in the area of the discovery in the fall, through approximately $59,000 (DKK 400,000) in support from the Danish Palaces and Culture Agency. They will focus on whether houses existed when the silver treasures were buried and “whether they are completely ordinary Viking houses.”

The coins and other silver items will be on display at the Aalborg Historical Museum starting in July.

The circular artifact contains hieroglyphic writing in a ring around two players, who are shown standing with a ball between them. The piece, dating between 800 CE and 900 CE, measures more than 12 1/2 inches in diameter and weighs about 88 pounds.

The stone serves as a record of a traditional Mesoamerican ball game believed to have possible ties to ritual practices.

“In this Mayan site, it is rare to find hieroglyphic writing, let alone a complete text,” archaeologist Francisco Perez, who coordinated the investigations in the Chichanchob or Casa Colorada complex at the site, told Reuters.

While preparing for further conservation, researchers are conducting a detailed study of the text and iconography on the stone.

A UNESCO World Heritage Site, Chichén Itzá is believed to have been built between 500 CE and 600 CE. Earlier this year, Mexico’s National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) uncovered elite residences within the Mayan city and announced the construction of a new museum that is expected to bolster tourism at the archaeological site, which currently sees about 2 million visitors each year.

The Afghan heritage site Mes Aynak is currently at risk of being destroyed due to a delayed mining project. The site, just 25 miles southeast of Kabul, is believed to contain the second largest untapped copper mine in the world. The deposits are estimated to be worth $100 billion.

In 2008, Afghanistan’s former government, led by then-president Hamid Karza, signed a lucrative contract with a Chinese company to extract the copper through an open-pit mine in 2008, however, the project was delayed to allow for research and the relocation of any valuable artifacts.

While the new government has indicated that it aims to preserve the site’s remains, there are concerns that the Taliban’s takeover of Afghanistan has already resulted in long-term damage to heritage sites. The Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC) has recently started to repair temporary structures erected to protect more than 50 sites at Mes Aynak, as part of a $1 million project funded by the Swiss foundation Aliph, a global fund focused on the protection and rehabilitation of cultural heritage in areas of conflict. These efforts include the protection of such structures as stupas, statues, wall and floor paintings. Additionally, the project plans to create a conservation plan for the remains and the relocation of several artifacts to a nearby site.

Not only is there a race against time with the pending mining project, but artifacts that were uncovered over the last 15 years are also at risk of decay.

The project is expected to provide employment for 350 people in Afghanistan including laborers, architects, engineers, archaeologists, and technical staff.

In the past, the Taliban has actively destroyed Afghani cultural heritage including, perhaps most famously, the destruction of the Buddhas of Bamiyan in 2001.

Constructed out of sun-dried brick, the walls are adorned with Christian paintings dated to the Funj Period (16th-19th centuries C.E.), according to a press release from the Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology at the University of Warsaw, whose researchers are leading the excavation.

“Seems that [the] gods of excavations favored us in the very last season of [the European Research Council’s] UMMA grant,” wrote archaeologist Artur Obluski in a Twitter post, referring to the “Urban Metamorphosis of the community of a Medieval African capital city” (UMMA) grant that enabled the excavation of Old Dongola, also called Tungul in ancient Nubian.

One of the paintings shows a Nubian king bowing to Christ as he receives a blessing, their meeting watched over by the Archangel Michael, whose wings shelter both figures. In another painting, Mary is depicted in an unusual style, wearing a dark robe and carrying a book and a cross.

Obluski, in another post, commented on the unique style and motifs in the paintings.

“These wall paintings negate a bias that Africans tried to awkwardly copy art form the North,” Obluski wrote. “They were creative, adapting, not only adopting, world trends to their needs, thus the new paradigm should be Nubio- and Afrocentric.”

Not just the paintings but the rooms within which they are held contain mystery. The space is elevated above ground level, so it was unlikely a tomb. Yet the space was quite small and oddly shaped. One theory the researchers have proposed is that the paintings were made in this secret space as King David and his army of slave soldiers approached Dongola.

Jorge Islas, the consul general of Mexico in New York, was notified that the work had been recovered by the antiquities trafficking unit of the Manhattan District Attorney’s office.

Mexico’s secretary of foreign affairs, Marcelo Ebrard, confirmed the news on Twitter, writing, “The Olmec piece most sought after by Mexico has been recovered and is about to return to its home, from where it should never have been stolen.”

Monument 9, as the statue has been called, measures roughly six feet tall and five feet wide, and weighs more than two thousand pounds. It originated from the prehistoric site Chalcatzingo in central Mexico, and likely dates back to the Middle Preclassic Period between 800–400 BCE.

Experts believe it depicts a common motif in Olmec iconography known as the earth monster. The sculpture’s open jaws symbolize the gateway to the underworld with three concentric bands around its mouth representing access to a cave. Four shapes in the corners of the mouth indicate bromeliad branches—a plant native to Chalcatzingo, which is depicted in other monuments from the site.

It remains unclear when and how the statue was removed, though it was already in the United States by 1968.

“This monument is a key piece for research on Olmec iconography, which is why we receive this news with joy and enthusiasm,” said archaeologist Mario Córdova Tello said in the INAH statement.