A man-made cave near Oddi in South Iceland is much older and larger than archaeologists initially realized. An analysis of the layers of volcanic tephra revealed that the caves were created in the middle of the 10th century, not in the early 12th century as previously believed.

The first of the caves was discovered in 2018 and then a second larger one was found to be connected to it. The current research team has been excavating the caves since 2020. The larger cave of the two was collapsed, forcing archaeologists to dig deeper to get access to the cave in the safest possible conditions in a challenging environment with crumbling sandstone walls. So far it has only been partially opened.

The investigation into the cave system is part of a larger exploration of the literary culture that thrived in Oddi during the 11th and 12th century. The Oddverjar clan who lived there were famed as historians, poets and authors of some of the most important Norse sagas, including the Heimskringla. There may even be a direct reference to the caves in one of those sagas.

Kristborg says that the cave currently being excavated may possibly be Nautahellir, Bull Cave, which is mentioned in Jarteinabók Þorláks Biskups (Bishop Þorlákur’s Legends of Saints), which dates back to 1210 – 1250. The manuscript relates how Nautahellir collapsed with 12 bulls in it. One was then rescued from the rubble.

“Although it’s older than that, it’s likely that [the cave] was used for livestock,” explained Kristborg. “Whether it was for that specific bull, we don’t know. But the history of its use obviously goes back further than we’ve managed to trace yet.”

The caves at Oddi have a complex and fascinating story to tell, says Kristborg, but the scope of the current investigation is such that she and her team need to keep their focus narrow. “These are huge structures and an unbelievably large system of caves that we’re only just starting to come to grips with. […] We’d need to undertake a much, much larger study with a much bigger crew in order to get to the bottom of this and trace this history in full, the history of these caves’ use.”

Here is a 3D scan fly-through of the cave:

The city of Siena has embarked on an innovative restoration program for The Allegory of Good and Bad Government, a masterpiece of 14th century Gothic fresco art by Ambrogio Lorenzetti, in the Sala dei Nove (Hall of the Nine) of the Palazza Pubblico. The scaffolding went up in March and diagnostic investigations of the frescoes have begun. When the study is complete, conservators will use the new information to craft a targeted restoration plan.

The room is currently closed to the public during the study phase and the initial conservation phase. Come October, visitors will be allowed inside the hall to admire the masterpiece as it is restored. Special guided tours will be offered, led by the restorers themselves. Best of all, visitors will be allowed to climb the scaffolding and view the fresco and the conservation work at eye-level, just like the conservators do.

Lorenzetti was commissioned by the Sienese government to paint the frescoes in the council hall of Siena’s nine executives (hence the Hall of Nine) in 1338. An homage to the room’s function as the Republic’s center of power, the fresco is a rare example of art from the period with a civic theme rather than a religious one. Lorenzetti utilized imagery associated with religion (bearded Wisdom looks a lot God, the virtues of Good Government look a lot like angels or cardinal virtues, horned tyrant looks a lot like the Devil, Vices of Bad Government look a lot like demons) to symbolize the advantages of a republican system in stark contrast with the viciousness of tyranny.

An inscription in the lower border makes the association explicit:

“This holy virtue [Justice], where she rules, induces to unity the many souls, and they, gathered together for such a purpose, make the Common Good their Lord; and he, in order to govern his state, chooses never to turn his eyes from the resplendent faces of the Virtues who sit around him. Therefore to him in triumph are offered taxes, tributes, and lordship of towns; therefore, without war, every civic result duly follows—useful necessary, and pleasurable.”

The finished paintings covered three of the four walls in the room. The allegories of good and bad government are accompanied by illustrations of their effects in the city and the country.  It is a tour de force of figural, landscape and architectural imagery and the fresco series was immediately hailed as Lorenzetti’s greatest masterpiece. For the next decade, he was the undisputed leading artist of the city until the Black Death took him along with 50% of the population of Siena in 1348.

The last time the frescoes in the Sala dei Nove were restored was 35 years ago. The painted surface began to suffer from gradual deterioration very soon after the work was completed, and while the last intervention stabilized them, they are again in need of attention. The study takes a multi-disciplinary approach. Restorers are working with architectural archaeologists, chemists, petrographers, physicists and architects to analyze the works both to determine their conservation needs and to learn more about Lorenzetti’s painting technique.

A very good boy has unearthed a large hoard of medieval bracteate coins near Wałbrzych in southwestern Poland that is the largest hoard found in Poland in a 100 years. Kajtuś was out on a walk earlier this month when his canine senses prompted him to dig and dig he did, until he hit a pot filled with coins.

His owner reported Kajtuś’ find to the Lower Silesia Heritage Protection Office who dispatched a team of archaeologists to survey the site. They excavated the coins and the pieces of the earthenware pot containing them. Archaeologists identified the coins as bracteates minted in Bandenburg, Saxony or Silesia in the first half of the 13th century. They are in excellent condition, well-stamped with clear, sharp images of griffins, mermaids, angels and architectural features.

Bracteates were made from thin sheet metal, so thin that they were only stamped on the obverse with just a negative of the impression appearing on the reverse of the coin. They quickly got threadbare with use and were regularly taken out of circulation to be melted down and restamped, so bracteate hoards are relatively uncommon, and large hoards like this one even rarer.

“The idea of stamping coins from a thin plate was caused by the low availability of ore – silver or, more rarely, gold, and the reserves of the mint. Kings, dukes, and bishops could mint coins,” the heritage protection office explains.

Only with the discovery of silver deposits near Prague did the “euro of medieval Europe”, the Prague groschen, begin to be minted, which gradually took over from bracteates.

The coins are archaeological heritage and will therefore eventually make their way into a museum rather than onto the numismatic market. First, however, they need to be properly studied and conserved – which will require time as well as academic grants.

Before this find, the largest bracteate hoards in Poland were found in the  Warsaw and Kraków areas. The discovery of a large hoard in Lower Silesia will stimulate new interest in the medieval history of the area. Officials are keeping the exact number of coins and find site secret for now to make it hard on any loot-minded tourists who might want to try their luck with surreptitious metal detecting.

Kajtuś does not appear to be letting the fame go to his head.

A 14th century merchant trading vessel of the Hanseatic League has been unearthed during construction work in downtown Tallinn, Estonia. Found under a highway, the vessel is a cog, the workhorse of the Hanseatic League’s shipping networks across the North and Baltic seas. Dendrochronological analysis dates to the wreck to 1360.

The cog was the primary ship used by Hanseatic merchants. The single-masted vessel had a flat bottom and no keel so it could move through shallow waters and was easily maneuvered by a small crew, even when laden with up to 90 tons of cargo. They could be built quickly at low expense and could even be armed for defense when pressed.

They ranged in size from 15 to 25 meters (50-82 feet) long, so at 79 feet long and 30 feet wide, the Taillinn cog is at the very top of the range. It was a clinker-built boat — made of overlapping oak planks sealed with animal hair and tar.

The area where the ship was found was underwater for centuries. When it sank near the mouth of the Härjapea River (a waterway that no longer exists today) 800 years ago, the spot was under seven feet of water, and the ship was quickly covered by the shifting sand ridges. The site was still submersed in the 18th century.

The waterlogged environments preserved the organic materials. The ship is in excellent condition with oak boards intact up to 10 feet from the bottom. Archaeologists have also recovered wool used for packing cargo, tools and leather shoes. In preservation it is comparable to the Bremen Cog, found during dredging operations in Bremen, Germany, in 1962 and now on permanent display at the German Maritime Museum in Bremerhaven. The Taillinn cog is larger and older than the Bremen Cog.

The ship will have to be be removed from the find site so that construction can continue. Unfortunately it is too big to be removed in one piece. It will be taken out in sections, conserved and reconstructed either at the maritime museum in Taillinn or the wreck preservation area in Tallinn Bay