Latest news with #historicalresearch
The Guardian
6 days ago
- Science
- The Guardian
Large language models that power AI should be publicly owned
Large language models (LLMs) have rapidly entered the landscape of historical research. Their capacity to process, annotate and generate texts is transforming scholarly workflows. Yet historians are uniquely positioned to ask a deeper question – who owns the tools that shape our understanding of the past? Most powerful LLMs today are developed by private companies. While their investments are significant, their goals – focused on profit, platform growth or intellectual property control – rarely align with the values of historical scholarship: transparency, reproducibility, accessibility and cultural diversity. This raises serious concerns on a) opacity: we often lack insight into training data and embedded biases, b) instability: access terms and capabilities may change without notice, and c) inequity: many researchers, especially in less-resourced contexts, are excluded. It is time to build public, open-access LLMs for the humanities – trained on curated, multilingual, historically grounded corpuses from our libraries, museums and archives. These models must be transparent, accountable to academic communities and supported by public funding. Building such infrastructure is challenging but crucial. Just as we would not outsource national archives or school curriculums to private firms, we should not entrust them with our most powerful interpretive technologies. The humanities have a responsibility – and an opportunity – to create culturally aware, academically grounded artificial intelligence. Let us not only use LLMs responsibly but also own them responsibly. Scholarly integrity and the future of public knowledge may depend on Dr Matteo VallerianiMax Planck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin, Germany Have an opinion on anything you've read in the Guardian today? Please email us your letter and it will be considered for publication in our letters section.
Times
23-05-2025
- Times
Has the Princes in the Tower mystery finally been solved?
A writer and historian who played a key role in uncovering Richard III's remains in a Leicester car park claims to have proved that the Princes in the Tower were not murdered. After ten years of investigation, Philippa Langley believes she has built a case for the boys' survival that needs to be disproven. She says her 'Missing Princes Project' has uncovered a large number of documents that, when considered together, create an irrefutable body of evidence. Others say, however, that her findings are far short of proof and do not contradict the conventional narrative. The traditional view on the Princes in the Tower — Edward V and Richard, Duke of York, the sons of Edward IV — is that the elder brother was deposed
The Independent
15-05-2025
- Science
- The Independent
Tomb thought to hold Alexander the Great's father actually found to contain remains of young woman and six infants
A tomb in Greece that was thought to hold Alexander the Great 's father, Philip II, might instead contain the remains of a young woman and six infants, a study suggests. The study published in the Journal of Archaeological Science, investigates the burial site which was discovered in 1977 at the site of Vergina, also called Aigai, in northern Greece. Located beneath a large burial mound, Tomb I is near several other tombs which are thought to hold members of Alexander the Great's family. Some archaeologists have suggested Tomb I held Philip II, while others believe he was buried in another location called Tomb II, which was not studied in this recent paper. 'Previous suggestions that the skeletal remains belong to Philip II, his wife Cleopatra and newborn child are not scientifically sustainable,' study authors wrote. Using radiocarbon dating the researchers were able to predict the man and woman lived between 388 and 356 BC. Researchers also analysed their bones and teeth which suggested the man was aged between 25 and 35 years, when he died. However, Philip II was assassinated in 336 BC at about 46. Study authors suggested this means the buried man in Tomb I is not Philip II. The tomb has no doorway and was sealed off, suggesting the man and woman in the tomb were buried together, according to researchers. However, radiocarbon dating also revealed there were at least six infants placed in the tomb between 150 B.C and 130 AD, which researchers say suggests the children were not related to the man and woman. During this time the Roman Empire controlled the region. Study authors explained the tomb was likely used as a burial place during the Roman period for disposing dead infants and animal remains. It's also believed the opening in the tomb were created by tomb robbers in 274 BC meaning the tombs were accessible during the Roman Empire. Analysis of skeletal and tooth remains helped to provide more background on who the man and woman were. Researchers said the man is likely to have spent his childhood away from the Macedonian capital of Pella, which is about 20 miles (32 kilometres) northeast of Vergina. Analysis of the woman's upper jawbone revealed she was aged between 18 and 25 years at the time of death. Further analysis of her tooth enamel and part of the skull revealed she was likely born and lived in the area of Pella/ Vergina in her childhood. Given the fact she was buried in Vergina, she most likely lived all her life in this area, researchers explained. Study authors said: 'The male occupant was most likely an important Macedonian royal of the Argead/Temenid house who died in the period 388-356 BC and was probably honoured or worshipped in the shrine above and entombed likely together with a female.'
Fox News
09-05-2025
- Science
- Fox News
Second-oldest university in nation reports 'really neat' archaeology find on its grounds
The first structure at the second-oldest university in the United States was recently rediscovered by archaeologists – and it's not necessarily something to expect at a school. William & Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, was originally chartered in 1693. The idyllic Southern university houses the oldest university building in the United States, the Wren Building. But the Wren Building is not what was recently discovered – rather, a 17th-century brick kiln was found hidden in dirt not far from the colonial-era hall. Elizabeth Monroe, archaeological research manager and co-director of the William & Mary Center for Archaeological Research (WMCAR), told Fox News Digital in an interview that the kiln was first found by archaeologists in the 1930s, who recorded it and then covered it back up with dirt. (See the video at the top of this article.) It wasn't until school employees began restorative efforts – trying to waterproof the Wren Building's foundation, for example – that the kiln was rediscovered earlier this year. Pictures show excavators painstakingly digging around the brick kiln, which has miraculously survived the centuries. "The archaeology that was done in [the 1930s] is not like the archaeology we do today," Monroe said. "They were being careful for their time, but not as careful as we would have maybe liked them to be. But still, they revealed many architectural features." The brick kiln was used to make the clay bricks that used to construct the Wren Building, according to 1993 archaeological report on the structure. "We use the Wren [during] the course of daily life … just as Thomas Jefferson had classes in this building in the early 1760s." "These kilns represent the first building of any kind on the site," the report read. "The earth from the basement probably supplied the material for the bricks." The document added, "The kilns were left in situ upon the completion of the restoration [and] they were re-covered with earth." Monroe described it as "probably the oldest building that was on this site." "They would have built it prior to building the Wren," she said. "They would've had to make a lot of bricks to build this building." "It's got a three-foot-thick foundation, which is how it survived all this time…. And several people have said, 'Oh, it's so close to the [Wren] Building.' Well, the building wasn't there yet. There was a hole in the ground where the cellar is, and likely they pulled clay out of that hole to make the bricks that now serve as the structure." "It's just really neat to have a moment like this brick kiln discovery to make that age come to life." Charles Fulcher, director of Wren operations and events at William & Mary, told Fox News Digital that the Wren Building "has been doing largely the same thing for about 325 years." He added, "It was largely usable by 1699, 1700, and students still have classes in this building every single day. We use the Wren [during the] course of daily life, with students coming in and out of classes, just as Thomas Jefferson had classes in this building in the early 1760s." He also said, "It is a place where the university holds traditions and ceremonies, events of significance for the whole student body. And it's just really neat to have a moment like this brick kiln discovery to make that age come to life." Despite the novelty of rediscovering the university's oldest-ever structure, the group of historians said that archaeological discoveries are quite commonplace in Williamsburg. "Since 1693, buildings have come and gone," Monroe said. "There have been tennis courts come and go. There have been students and gardens and outbuildings and just a wide variety of things changing paths." "Pretty much, you stick a shovel in the ground anywhere on campus, and you're going to come up with something that helps tell the story of the university." WMCAR project archaeologist Tom Higgins echoed the sentiment, telling Fox News Digital that he's encountered many centuries-old artifacts. "The basement of the Great Hall [in the Wren Building] had a kitchen that was intensively used for several generations… We ended up with a lot of refuse, broken plates and bottles and things like that," he said. "Lots of the 18th-century and 19th-century refuse from the day-to-day life at the college turns up in that kind of work." Fulcher reported that the rediscovery has proven meaningful to the university community at large, especially the group of students that he supervises to give tours of the Wren building. For more Lifestyle articles, visit "When the kiln was uncovered and we could see black marks in the soil showing where the fires had been kindled and bricks had been burned… I sent out word to all of them," he said. "Many of them came by in the middle of the school day just to make sure that they could see it." For now, archaeologists have covered the kiln back up in order to make room for future scaffolding of the Wren Building, and they plan to encounter the kiln again in the future. "At some point in the future, we'll be reopening [the ground] around the foundation to actually do the waterproofing that's necessary and replace some drainage pipes," Monroe said. "But the goal is to identify where these kinds of sensitive archaeological features are and record that so that future generations as additional improvements need to be made."
