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Excavations at Aketala reveal traces of human activity at the oases of the western Tarim Basin, north-western China, by at least 2200 BC. The recovered artefacts indicate that, by 1800 BC, the Andronovo culture had reached this region, bringing agropastoralism and developing the earliest regional evidence of bronze manufacturing techniques.

This article redefines the concept of the Achaemenid ‘Royal’ Road using GIS-based route modelling to reconstruct possible roads between Susa and Persepolis. By integrating logistical and environmental parameters, it shows how royal mobility required a specialised infrastructure—distinct from ancillary roads—tailored to the operational scale of the Achaemenid court.

Residue analysis of small ceramic bottles from around Tyre in Lebanon reveals chemical traces of wine, resins, pitch and palm oil, indicating their multifunctional use. The authors state that these results enhance understanding of Phoenician container use, trade and production across diverse archaeological contexts.

Atop El Castillo, the largest pyramid within the Maya site of Chichen Itza, in Mexico’s Yucatan Peninsula, stand two ruined columns that once portrayed the feathered serpent deity K’uk’ulkan. 3D-imaging technologies have identified scattered sculptural fragments belonging to these columns, allowing a digital reconstruction that opens new possibilities for their conservation.

Pre-construction archaeology in West Africa presents new avenues for understanding historic urban development. Excavation of two building plots for the Museum of West African Art, Benin City, Nigeria, provides new perspectives on the Kingdom of Benin, a significant polity in the West African forest zone during the second millennium AD.

The Ecologies of Violence project examines how war and state violence generate lasting human and more-than-human entanglements that disrupt conventional heritage frameworks. Through international and interdisciplinary case studies, it reveals how structural violence creates involuntary heritage and exclusion zones that call for a planetary, ecological archaeology attuned to the multispecies, (im)material, temporal and sociopolitical complexities of conflict.

Despite lying at a crossroad of Pleistocene hominin dispersals, little is known about human occupation in Iraq during this period. An archaeological survey in the Western Desert is revealing recurrent hominin activity at Shbicha, highlighting the region’s potential in advancing our understanding of hominin behaviour and dispersal across South-west Asia.

Large-scale field investigation in the Eastern Tianshan Mountains of Xinjiang identified 108 Palaeolithic/microlithic surface findspots. Pulei Cave reveals the first well-preserved spelean sediment record containing Upper Palaeolithic cultural remains in eastern Xinjiang, dating from c. 45–43 ka BP.

Eşek Deresi Cave provides a new Late Epipalaeolithic sequence in the Central Taurus Mountains, radiocarbon dated to c. 13 200–10 700 years cal BC. Here, the authors present preliminary analyses of finds excavated between 2021 and 2024, which indicate links to contemporaneous sites in Central Anatolia and the Levant.

A newly discovered grave in Wadi Nafūn, Oman, features a unique burial structure, combining monumental architecture and the collective deposition of human remains from multiple Neolithic groups. Detailed analysis of the burial community reveals new insights into Neolithic rituals and subsistence strategies during the Holocene Humid Period in southern Arabia.

Despite its geographic correspondence with a key fourteenth-century BC port, the tell of Yavneh-Yam has yielded only meagre evidence for Late Bronze Age occupation. The recent discovery of a sealed monumental rock-cut burial cave with hundreds of grave goods provides the first clear evidence for a significant polity.

The discovery of an ornament made from Phyllobius viridicollis beetles in a cremation grave at the Domasław cemetery highlights the diverse use of organic materials in funerary rites. Together with dandelion pollen, the find offers interpretative potential for reconstructing the seasonal timing of the burial.

Excavations at the Infantas complex in Chillón Valley, Perú, revealed a U-shaped monumental centre with a central mound, clay staircase and columned atrium. Aligned with structures from the Rímac and Lurín valleys, these complexes anchored ritual-political power, serving as hubs for ideological integration and territorial organisation in early Andean societies.

The Terra Ferrifera project investigates the landscape and environmental conditions of mass iron production in one of the oldest iron production centres in central Europe: Mazovia, Poland (fourth century BC–fourth century AD). Spatial analyses, settlement pattern studies, prospection, excavation and archaeobotanical analyses provide insights into one of its microregions.

A brooch found in a mid-first-century AD context at the Roman port of Berenike, on the Red Sea coast of Egypt, represents the southernmost find of an Aucissa-type fibula. The item reflects the identity of its wearer, possibly a Roman soldier, for whom it may have held sentimental value.

Philoxenite, a town and pilgrimage station on Lake Mareotis’ southern shore in Egypt, was carefully planned as a comfortable stop for travellers visiting Saint Menas’ sanctuary from across the Roman world. Archaeological excavations conducted at the site between 2021 and 2024 fully uncovered the remains of a Late Antique church (N1).

In 2022–2023, fragments of figurative wall paintings were discovered in the Royal Palace at Sanjar-Shah, a Sogdian site near Panjikent in Tajikistan. The paintings depict a procession of priests approaching a large fire altar—this offers a rare insight into religious imagery and a representation of fire worship in Sogdian murals.

New research at Ciepłe, a unique early-medieval centre in northern Poland, reveals a Piast-era complex with three strongholds, elite chamber graves and far-reaching connections. Founded in the late tenth century AD, Ciepłe challenges traditional models of Pomeranian integration, offering fresh perspectives on early medieval state formation, frontier strategy and cross-cultural interactions.