Our buried and forgotten history

For the longest time, archaeologists forever in search of lost civilisations used to walk the earth, and map and dig areas where they believed ancient settlements had once existed and now lay buried under centuries of sediment and overgrowth.

- RAFIA ZAKARIA

Sometimes, discoveries were made inadvertently, as in the case of the magnificent Lascaux caves of France, which were found by a group of teenage boys walking in the forest with their dog in 1940.

Another example is that of Pompeii, which was covered in ash from Mount Vesuvius when it erupted in 79 AD.

Its location was discovered in the 16th century during work on a canal.

The find was stunning: volcanic dust and lava deposits had 'frozen' Pompeii in time.

Some corpses were found in cowering and crouching positions, just as they had been in their last moments before perishing under a heavy rain of volcanic ash.

Everything, from children's toys to food containers, had been preserved, providing a picture not only of the tragedy that occurred so long ago but also of what life was like at that time.

Pompeii remains one of the most visited archaeological sites today, so much so that the authorities have had to lately limit the number of visitors to the World Heritage Site out of fear of over-tourism.

Perhaps among the most bizarre incidents in this category of inadvertent finds was the discovery of the catacombs of Alexandria, Egypt.

The ancient Greco-Roman necropolis was discovered when a donkey fell through a hole in the ground.

Archaeology, however, has changed drastically since the days when luck and a little bit of knowledge helped explorers and archaeologists unearth some glorious object or a structure that indicated the prior existence of a bustling settlement.

Archaeologists relied more on maps, ancient texts, geographical alignments, and surface finds.