5000 Year Old Warrior's Skeleton Found Near Rome

ROME -- Archaeologists have found the skeleton of a warrior from up to 5,000 years ago floating in a tomb filled with sea water on a beach near Rome, Italy's art squad said Friday.

The bones - believed to date from the 3rd millennium B.C. - were discovered in May as art hunters were carrying out routine checks of the region's archaeological areas, Carabinieri art squad official Raffaele Mancino said.

Archaeologists believe the warrior was likely killed by an arrow, part of which was found among his ribs, Mancino said. There was also a hole in the back of the skull, and six vases and two daggers were found buried nearby.

The tomb of the warrior, nicknamed "Nello" after the archaeologist who found him, could be part of a wider necropolis lying just a few steps from the sea, Mancino told a news conference.

"We will check the area to see whether this tomb is isolated and the warrior was buried here because this was the battlefield where he died," Mancino said. "Or maybe there is a bigger necropolis, as we indeed believe."

The tomb, hidden in the bushes on a public beach in Nettuno, about 40 miles (65 kilometers) south of Rome, was excavated in less than one day to preserve it from sea water erosion, Mancino said. Part of it has already been damaged.

The warrior's bones will be examined and eventually put on display, officials said.

The beach remains open, though the area of the discovery has been cordoned off.

Comments

[Richard Hart]

04:15 AM on 08/03/2009

Why is it the Xtians, who are supposed to turn the other cheek, are the ones buying all the guns? They can't ALL be special like the C-Street Cult members.

[JessWonderin]

08:02 PM on 08/02/2009

gee, just think less than 9 generations before he was buried . . the earth was created . . . .

[whoknew---]

03:54 AM on 08/03/2009

Hallelujah!

The Lord works in mysterious ways?

[AirViceMarshalPark]

05:29 AM on 08/03/2009

He was living with dinosaurs everywhere; that must have really scared his wife, Wilma.

[AirViceMarshalPark]

04:27 AM on 08/02/2009

Nello?

Everybody knows that "nello" is from the 1960s spoof card game called "Frisbee." A nello is 4 cards, played from your hand at once, where none of the cards match in suit or number. Face cards cannot be part of a nello. That brings you down to 7 cards in your hand and you do not have to draw from the boneyard after playing a nello.

The disadvantage to playing a nello is that it leaves mostly face cards in your hand, increasing the chance that you will take tricks, and leave you very short of the desired "wipeout" that wins the game.

[Goliadkin]

06:06 PM on 08/02/2009

Nello is a man's name. Check out Nello Santi (conductor). It is also a last name.

[YankinCanada]

08:35 PM on 08/02/2009

Air, that has to be the best non sequitor, most useless information, the expression of blather and a bent toward idiosyncrasy I haven't come across in months and from the bottom of my heart, I thank you, truly.
Now i have to play the damn game.....

[AirViceMarshalPark]

03:53 AM on 08/03/2009

The strategy is to so skillfully play your cards so that all you have left in your hand is a nello. You are then able to wipeout early in the game, to the shock of your opponents, and hang lots of points on them.

Frisbee is played to a previously agreed upon point limit. If you want a short game, you agree to a low limit. As soon a one player crosses that limit, the game is over.

A single player who takes all of the tricks calls "Frisbee" and runs the table. In that case, a nello in your hand is a liability.
The Frisbee run hangs all of the point value in each player's hand to their total point score PLUS all of the point value left in the boneyard. It is a rarely executed play.

[RoveRoveRoveYourBoat]

01:53 AM on 08/02/2009

wonderful news that our murdurous species was
butchering each other routinely throughout history.

[DFutureIsNow]

02:23 AM on 08/02/2009

looks like the neocons tribe been around for a while

[Pleneras]

02:27 AM on 08/02/2009

LMAOLLLLLL

[peterbeagle]

09:07 AM on 08/02/2009

hello? this is news to you?!?

[unionave]

01:37 AM on 08/02/2009

There is a Discovery program that was aired some years ago "Tracking The First American" that I wish would be aired again . It was most interesting .

[guajiro]

10:23 PM on 08/02/2009

http://www.unl.edu/rhames/courses/current/dillehay-nature-news.pdf

[blaharumph]

08:27 AM on 08/03/2009

thanks for the link!

[jsarets]

12:22 AM on 08/02/2009

I recommend the BBC documentary miniseries The Incredible Human Journey. Very good summary of the current theories on how modern humans left Africa and populated the world.

[NoblesseOblige]

01:01 AM on 08/02/2009

Yes. And, National Geographic has a great one, too, "The Journey Of Man".

[Mekrabb]

11:39 PM on 08/01/2009

Found at a beach near ROME? Rome is in the center of the country nowhere near the beach.

[dreadylocks]

12:12 AM on 08/02/2009

near can be a pretty relative term. so do the math.

[andhakari]

01:32 AM on 08/02/2009

The center of Rome is about 30 km from the Mediterranean. Look at a map.

[whateverlolawants]

10:48 PM on 08/01/2009

That's so cool. I wish we had the capability to see what that man looked like, what his life was like, etc. We'll only ever know bits and pieces.

[dreadylocks]

12:13 AM on 08/02/2009

see: hbo: rome.

[WoodyCPM]

03:57 AM on 08/02/2009

That's an odd statement. Wife? Why do you even assume had had a wife? Besides what has that to do with what they found? If they have the skull, actually forensic scientists and taxidermists are pretty darn good a reconstructing a face.

[ZiggyZipgun]

06:53 AM on 08/02/2009

You may have dyslexia; he never said wife. He did say "what his life was like"

[beaupritchard]

09:56 PM on 08/01/2009

It is humbling to think that some parts of the world have 4766 more years than we to get this how to live together thing figured out ...

[dreadylocks]

12:13 AM on 08/02/2009

If you live in the west, that is our history, too. if you live in the east you have a much longer one...

[jsarets]

12:14 AM on 08/02/2009

Archeological and anthropological evidence suggests that numerous ancient civilizations across the populated world rose and fell, establishing shared cultural/religious identities across far-reaching geographies and then being overcome by social or environmental change.

The Mayan civilization peaked at about the same time as Rome, and may have been considerably more sophisticated in some respects.

Remember, most of what we know about ancient civilization is limited to stone artifacts. Advanced civilizations based on wood are lost forever. Our concrete will crumble and our steel will rust away long before our few remaining stone structures. Our electronic databases will be the first records of our civilization to be lost.

Future civilizations may not be impressed by what our civilization leaves behind.

[divitius]

09:11 AM on 08/02/2009

What, a mountain of discarded AOL discs? That's impressive!

[wanked]

10:49 AM on 08/02/2009

Yea...we'll leave plastic...

[pomawg]

09:38 PM on 08/01/2009

Oh come on...the earth wasn't 'created' yet!

[cliffhammond]

09:33 PM on 08/01/2009

Can they tell if this warrior was circum=sized? I was just wondering if he was an ancestor of Benyamin Netanyahu or Ehud Barak.

[TFlint]

11:09 PM on 08/01/2009

The found a skeleton.

[cliffhammond]

11:27 PM on 08/01/2009

Well there you go. He at least had a bone.

[jeliz]

09:27 PM on 08/01/2009

I wonder if any dinosaurs bones were found nearby.

[WoodyCPM]

03:59 AM on 08/02/2009

Elvis, they found Elvis nearby.

[KLordsha]

08:52 PM on 08/01/2009

He-Man......we hardly knew ye....

http://media1.break.com/dnet/media/2008/12/95%20He-Man%20Looks%20Different%20In%20Real%20Life.jpg

[cliffhammond]

09:21 PM on 08/01/2009

Love that outfit but it needs a purse.

[naruto fan]

08:44 PM on 08/01/2009

so cool

[UncleJimbo]

08:41 PM on 08/01/2009

The sad thing is 5,000 years from now Archeologists will dig up American bones in Iraq and Afghanistan and wonder why!

[Mogamboguru]

08:48 PM on 08/01/2009

Foremost, thy will find 1 milion shattered skeletons of locals from a 6-year-timespan and ask, which barbary had happened there?

[UncleJimbo]

09:00 PM on 08/01/2009

Yes shattered into the depths of their own country,for no good reason!

[TFlint]

11:11 PM on 08/01/2009

They'll dig up gas stations and wonder why!

[Pleneras]

02:31 AM on 08/02/2009

LMAOLLLL!