Alison George, Author at New Scientist

Ancient human DNA found on cave art for the first time

Alison George — Fri, 26 Jun 2026 11:45:44 +0000

DNA from ancient humans has been found on a prehistoric cave painting and on cave walls, demonstrating the potential to one day identify individual artists and resolve the debate over Neanderthals' artistic abilities

The race to understand how and when Thwaites glacier will collapse

Alison George — Thu, 25 Jun 2026 14:59:05 +0000

The ‘doomsday’ glacier’s giant ice shelf is about to break away

Alison George — Mon, 18 May 2026 09:00:26 +0000

The floating ice shelf of world’s widest glacier – Thwaites glacier in Antarctica – is detaching, with worrying implications for global sea-level rise

Stone Age symbols may push back the earliest form of writing

Alison George — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 20:00:26 +0000

Mysterious signs engraved on objects reveal that a form of proto-writing may have been used in Europe 40,000 years ago, tens of thousands of years before the emergence of a full writing system

Prehistoric crayons provide clues to how Neanderthals created art

Alison George — Wed, 29 Oct 2025 18:00:29 +0000

Ochre artefacts found in Crimea show signs of having been used for drawing, adding to evidence that Neanderthals used pigments in symbolic ways

New Scientist recommends Never Let Me Go

Alison George — Wed, 29 Oct 2025 18:00:00 +0000

The books, TV, games and more that New Scientist staff have enjoyed this week

A compelling book about the end of the Neanderthals is a rare treat

Alison George — Wed, 24 Sep 2025 18:00:00 +0000

Forget the tropes about how violence or maybe volcanic eruptions killed off our ancient cousins, The Last Neanderthal by Ludovic Slimak offers a very different take on how they died out

New Scientist recommends Curious Cures: Medicine in the medieval world

Alison George — Wed, 14 May 2025 18:00:00 +0000

The books, TV, games and more that New Scientist staff have enjoyed this week

Why saying no is so hard and what we can do about it

Alison George — Wed, 16 Apr 2025 17:00:00 +0000

Why is saying no to other people so difficult – even when we really know we should? Sunita Sah's new book Defy has some novel ideas about the interpersonal forces holding us back

Ancient clay tablets offer vivid portrait of Mesopotamian life

Alison George — Wed, 19 Mar 2025 18:00:00 +0000

A relief from Ashurbanipal’s palace showing him in a chariot

British Museum/Auday Hussein

It is one of the oldest and greatest stores of knowledge: a vast library of texts amassed by Assyrian King Ashurbanipal, who ruled ancient Mesopotamia about 2700 years ago. But after his death, it was ransacked and burned to the ground. Luckily, the texts were written on clay tablets, and so were baked and preserved by the heat.

A fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh

British Museum/Camryn Good

When the ruins of the library were found in Victorian times in what is now Iraq, the astonishing richness of this lost world was revealed. A new book, by Selena Wisnom at the University of Leicester, UK, pieces together a vivid portrait of Mesopotamian life from the shattered remnants of the 30,000 or so tablets in Ashurbanipal’s library.

Royal Game of Ur board game

Camryn Good

Written in cuneiform, the world’s oldest form of writing, the tablets not only bring kings and queens to life, but also priests, traders and professional lamenters. They also include magic spells and letters of complaint. Our lives are still influenced by ripples from this ancient world via the 60-minute hour, mathematical discoveries and the invention of the zodiac.

Clay prism with accounts of Ashurbanipal’s military campaigns

Anthony Huan/CC BY-SA 2.0

Pictured from top: a relief from Ashurbanipal’s palace showing him in a chariot; a fragment of the Epic of Gilgamesh, telling the story of a great flood; the Royal Game of Ur board game, which Ashurbanipal enjoyed as a boy, according to letters by his brother; a clay prism with accounts of Ashurbanipal’s military campaigns; and a letter in which his sister berates his wife for her poor cuneiform.

A letter in which his sister berates his wife for her poor cuneiform.

Auday Hussein

The Library of Ancient Wisdom is out now in the UK and will be published on 12 May in the US.