Thursday, February 14, 2019

WARSAW, POLAND—Science in Poland reports that a 2,000-year-old settlement, complete with surrounding fields, farms, and roads, has been discovered in northern Poland’s Tuchola Forest. Mateusz Sosnowski of Nicolaus Copernicus University and Jerzy Czerniec of the Polish Academy of Sciences spotted the untouched site, which covers about 420 acres, with airborne laser-scanning equipment and dated it with pottery recovered on the ground. Sosnowski said the layout of the fields suggests people may have been using a farming system thought to have been developed in the Middle Ages. Soil analysis indicates rye was grown in areas with fertile soil. Land less suitable for agriculture was avoided, Sosnowski added. To read about the use of airborne laser scanning in Cambodia, go to “Angkor Urban Sprawl.”