oldest

The oldest rocks on Earth are in Australia and force us to rethink how the continents were formed

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The Earth works with the mechanics of plate tectonics, that is, tectonic plates move, collide and sink under each other. The question on the table of science is when it started to work like this and the answer is complicated, simply because no rock older than 4,030 million years is preserved that allows us to reconstruct that period (spoiler: It is the Acasta gneiss and is in Canada). The only clue we have are zircons, crystals so resistant that they can almost withstand anything: they survive even when the rock that houses them disappears, so they function as a kind of time capsule. The oldest in the world They are in the hills of Jack Hillsin Western Australia and are up to 4.4 billion years old. The discovery. An international research team led by John W. Valley of the University of Wisconsin-Madison has analyzed the chemical composition of these Australian zircons and compared it with other zircons of approximately the same age found in Barberton, South Africa. What they found was surprising: while the South Africans point to a still and immobile Earth’s crust, the Australians indicate that in that place, one layer was sinking on top of another (subduction). The conclusion they reached is that 4.4 billion years ago different parts of the Earth operated with different tectonic mechanisms at the same time: in some places there was something similar to silver tectonics and in others, the crust remained stagnant, as if it were a rigid lid. Why is it important. Until now, the official history of Earth’s geology tells that the planet went from having a stationary crust to having plate tectonics. around 3.8 billion years and that the change was more or less global and simultaneous. Well nothis study dismantles it: subduction was already happening in some parts 600 million years earlier, which means that the continents began to form much earlier than previously thought. And there were earthquakes back then. This is also important for understanding the origin of life. Subduction produces granite and stable continental crust, which creates land, nourishes the oceans with minerals, and creates the environments where, according to the oldest records available, life began to develop 3,700 – 4,100 million years ago. If subduction dates back to before, those favorable conditions for life were also there before. Context. This debate is not new and in fact, neither is the conclusion. There are studies that hold that plate tectonics began in the early Hadean, others that before the plates began to move, the Earth’s crust was a rigid, immobile layer, like a lid, and the heat from within was released through columns of molten rock rising from the mantle, not through the movement and collision of plates. And be careful, because in both cases they used those same Jack Hills zircons to defend opposing positions, which gives an idea of ​​how difficult it is to interpret them. In fact, already there are previous studies that use Barberton zircons to identify a tectonic regime change around 3.8 billion years ago. What this new work does is add a nuance in the form of complexity: the change was present in Barberton, but in Australia in Jack Hills the story was different and older. How they have done it. With a technique called secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS), which makes it possible to measure with high precision some chemical elements present in zircon (scandium, ytterbium, niobium and uranium) because their proportions vary depending on the type of geological environment in which the mineral was formed. A zircon formed in a subduction zone has very different proportions than one formed in a rigid cap zone. In addition, they analyzed the age of the zircons and their hafnium and oxygen isotopes, which indicate both the origin of the mantle or whether water was involved in the process. The complete photo with these four data allows us to reconstruct the geological environment. Yes, but. The big Achilles’ heel of the study is that these zircons are loose grains carried by erosion, not samples of rock in their original place. That is, they could travel thousands of kilometers from their origin. In short: it is not known where they come from. The second major problem is that the method used to identify tectonic environments is calibrated with modern rocksbecause there are no Hadean rocks. This implies assuming that the chemistry then was similar to that of today, something that no one can guarantee. In Xataka | 4.5 billion years of Earth’s history, summarized in a spectacular video map In Xataka | We thought we had an accurate photo of what the Earth was like 4 billion years ago. Zircons are telling a different story Cover | Virtual Museum of Mineralogy and Gemini with AI

Ukraine has resurrected one of the oldest tactics of warfare. And he is isolating Russian cities without the need for soldiers

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One of the many movie scenes that took place during the soviet blockade of berlin occurred in 1948, when the United States and its allies kept an entire city alive using an airlift that landed every few minutes with food, coal and medicine. The operation highlighted a lesson that military strategists never forgot: in any war, sometimes the most important thing is not to conquer a city, but to decide who can continue to supply it. A silent return. For centuries, sieges were one of the tools more brutal and effective of the war. Surrounding a city, cutting off supplies, and waiting for hunger, exhaustion, or lack of ammunition to do the job was a military logic as old as empires themselves. Ukraine is now recovering that same idea, but adapted to the drone era. The big difference is that you no longer need to physically surround a city or send thousands of soldiers to isolate it. It is enough to control the roads, monitor movements and constantly destroy everything that enters or leaves. What is happening around Mariupol It is beginning to look less like a traditional war and more like a medieval siege executed from the air and hundreds of kilometers away. Mariupol as a laboratory. After conquering Mariupol in 2022, Russia turned the city into one of the ggreat logistics centers of its southern front, using its roads and port to move fuel, ammunition, troops and equipment towards Donetsk and Zaporizhia. Ukraine has started to attack precisely that circulation network. Reconnaissance and attack drones patrol the main access routes to the city looking for tanker trucks, ammunition transports or logistical convoys. The logic is extremely simple and very old: There is no need to destroy a fortified position if you can prevent it from continuing to function. According to different military sources and published videos by Ukrainian units, some drones already operate up to 160 kilometers within of territory controlled by Russia, turning entire roads into permanent risk zones for any Russian military vehicle. Turn logistics into the new front. The most important transformation of this strategy is that the main objective is no longer necessarily soldiers, tanks or trenches. They are the supplies. Ukraine is exploiting a classic vulnerability: any army depends on fuel, food, ammunition and constant transportation to maintain positions. The drones greatly facilitate that job because logistics trucks are relatively easy targets: they follow predictable routes, have little protection and often transport extremely flammable or explosive material. Even small ammunition can destroy them completely. That explains why Ukraine is dedicating so many resources to chasing supply vehicles instead of directly attacking fortified positions that are much more difficult to neutralize. From Mariupol to Moscow. The same logic also appears behind the massive drone attacks against Moscow. They remembered in Insider that Ukraine no longer uses only small improvised FPVs near the front. Now deploy long-range platforms such as FP-1 Firepointthe RS-1 Bars or the new Bars-SM Gladiatorhybrid drones between a cruise missile and unmanned aircraft capable of traveling hundreds of kilometers and crossing one of the densest anti-aircraft networks in the world. The objective is not only to cause specific damage, but to force Russia to disperse defensesspending resources and living under constant pressure even far from the front. The attack with more than 120 drones on the Moscow region demonstrates the extent to which Ukraine attempts to transfer the logic of attrition and isolation far beyond the traditional battle lines. A battle for movement. What is really important is that Ukraine seems to be redefining a fundamental idea of modern warfare: it is no longer necessary to completely control the terrain to control the situation. Just control movement. If any road can be surveilled by drones, any convoy can be destroyed and any resupply can end up intercepted, maintaining a position begins to be much more difficult even if the enemy retains numerical superiority. There is no doubt, that profoundly changes traditional military logic. The future sieges They may no longer be represented with circles surrounding cities on a map, but with invisible networks of drones capable of slowly collapsing enemy logistics without the need for major ground offensives. The war in Ukraine is demonstrating precisely that: that today you can isolate a city, wear down an army and force it to abandon positions without moving practically a single soldier. Image | Pexels In Xataka | Once again, Ukraine has opened a missile launched by Russia. Once again, surprising manufacturers have been found In Xataka | Russia has been advancing at a snail’s pace in Ukraine for months. That’s about to change because of one season: summer.

60 years ago a student wanted to study the mountains of the United States. Unknowingly felled the oldest known tree

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At a glance ‘Prometheus’ It was a twisted, rugged, whimsically shaped pine tree that stood on a Nevada mountain. Nothing to do with gigantic sequoias of Redwood National Park, also in the USA, where specimens of more than 100 meters high with bases that are around 30 m in diameter. That, of course, at first glance. Although its size was not striking and it barely stood out in the grove in which it sprouted, ‘Prometheus’ was a tree of almost 5,000 yearswhich made it one of the oldest in the world. Why do we talk about him in the past tense? Very simple: because in the 60s a student who was especially diligent with his research felled it with permission from the authorities. With you, the Pinus longaeva. Its name may not be as well known as that of the redwoods, the baobabs or the Douglas firstrees that have been fascinating humanity for centuries due to their colossal dimensions, but the bristlecone pines (Pinus longaeva) are just as amazing. Not because of its size, but because of its age. Located primarily in the higher altitude mountains of California, this species has managed to survive for several millennia. As? Its growth is very slow and they usually sprout separately from each other, which allows them to adapt to harsh habitats and withstand fires better. The key to its longevity however lies in its “architecture” and adaptations. As remember from the US National Park Service (NPS), the roots of the Pinus longaeva They only nourish the part of the tree that is directly above them. If that root dies, it only affects its section of the tree. Hence, it is not unusual to see specimens with dry bark on one side and that, however, continue to grow healthily. an old acquaintance. In Wheeler PeakNevada, stood years ago a magnificent specimen of Pinus longaeva. Its height was nothing out of this world, but it was so twisted and had such an ancient appearance that mountaineers in the area They baptized him ‘Prometheus’. Seen in perspective, the nickname is still ironic. In the classical mythology Zeus imposed a horrible punishment on the titan of that name for giving humanity the gift of fire and metallurgy. At Wheeler Peak the ‘Prometheus’ that grew rooted to the mountain ended up perishing precisely because of the efforts of a university student to understand the geology of the region. To understand it you have to go back to summer of 1964when Donald R. Currey, a graduate student studying the ice age of eastern Nevada, had an idea: To better understand the formation of glaciers, he decided to extract samples from the oldest trees that grew in the region. It wasn’t anything groundbreaking. The dendrochronologythe discipline that is responsible for studying climate patterns by analyzing tree rings, dates back to the beginning of the 20th century. In fact, the idea of ​​obtaining samples from the logs sounded so reasonable that authorities raised no objections when Currey asked for permission to study them. The great unknown. In theory, what Currey proposed was to use a drill bit to remove small samples of the trunk, a kind of cylinders from the trunk. pencil size that could later be analyzed in the laboratory. It came with the different rings and their characteristics being appreciated. When it was ‘Prometheus’ turn, something went wrong. Or so it is believed, since more than six decades later it’s still not entirely clear what exactly happened at Wheeler Peak. Some accounts claim that Currey’s drill bit broke while the geologist was trying to make his way through the dense pine wood, so he requested help from the Forest Service. To solve it, the workers opted for the most radical solution: they took out the chainsaw and cut down the tree. Other versions claim that Currey did not know how to work with such a complicated specimen or that there was simply no error and from the beginning he needed a complete cross section to study the trunk. Regardless, there are two clear details. First, that was the end of ‘Prometheus’. Second, Currey did not work as foreigners. He had permission from the Forest Service. And the surprise came. It was not necessary to cut ‘Prometheus’ in two to intuit that it was a very ancient tree. If Currey looked at this pine and others in the area it was precisely because he assumed that they were old enough to give him a broad ‘snapshot’ of the climatic events that had occurred in the region. The surprise came when he took the piece of wood to his laboratory. As ancient as I suspected ‘Prometheus’ to be, one thing is clear: Currey fell short. When he started counting growth rings, he added neither more nor less than 4,862. Given the harsh conditions in which the pine grew, which could have influenced the formation of the layers, the experts ended up concluding that its age was most likely closer to 4,900 years. That is to say, the ancient tree already appeared on the Nevada mountain when the pharaohs reigned in ancient Egypt or Hammurabi ruled in Babylon. The oldest in the world? Although environmental awareness in the 1960s was not the same as it is today, the mistake was considerable. Especially since it was the Forest Service itself that made it possible. The age of ‘Prometheus’ is in fact so astonishing that the NPS itself recognize which at the time was considered “the oldest tree ever dated.” It even surpassed the famous tree ‘Methuselah’other Pinus longaeva of California that is around 4,850 years old. Today that title is in question. Especially after a theoretically even older tree was discovered in 2012, another bristlecone from more than 5,000 years. The US authorities recognize in any case that it is “very likely” that there are other, even older, undated specimens of the same species. “The bristlecone pines of the Great Basin are notable for being the oldest non-clonal species on the … Read more

The oldest train line in Spain is still running 180 years later. And it moves 40 million passengers

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It is very likely that you have also done the exercise but I don’t know if the subject fascinates you as much as it does me. Have you ever thought about how far and how close we are from our great-grandparents and our great-great-grandparents? The City of Wonders by Eduardo Mendoza explains wonderfully how Barcelona became a technological centrifuge at the end of the 19th century and the first decades of the 20th century. When Onofre Bouvila arrives in Barcelona, ​​the city is very different from the one in front of him when the book ends. A little before what the book tells, Barcelona had already begun to assimilate some technological advances that would be difficult for the average citizen to conceive. One of them was the railway. In 1848, the first train line on the Peninsula was inaugurated in Barcelona.. It’s Barcelona-Mataró. 30 kilometers in half an hour And, indeed, the Barcelona-Mataró is not the first Spanish train line but it is the first on the Iberian Peninsula. Actually, the first train line in Spain is the one known as Havana-Güines Since on November 19, 1837, the first service between these two towns was launched. The objective was to transport the sugar and honey that was produced in the first of these towns from Güines to the port of Havana. However, the first train on the Iberian Peninsula I would have to wait another decade. It was not until October 28, 1848 when the first train from Barcelona left towards Mataró surrounded by the music of the Artillery Corps and the curious who came to Doctor Aiguader Avenue. They explain in The Vanguard that the commotion was considerable to the south of the Parque de la Ciudadela and next to what is now the Estación de Francia, because the atmosphere vibrated with the excitement of witnessing a historical event in our country. The train had 24 cars and had capacity for 900 people. They had almost 30 kilometers ahead of them, which when the service was transformed into a regular line could be covered in 35 minutes without stops and an hour of travel if it stopped at intermediate stops, leaving far behind the five or six hours that had to be spent if traveling by stagecoach. The smoke, coal and soot did not deter those who, according to the Catalan newspaper, sneaked onto the train to be part of that first cap journey. Before, a few lucky They had already had the opportunity to travel between the two cities by train. And a few weeks before the big day, two rehearsals were carried out to check that everything was perfect and worked as it should. It was the result of the work of Miguel Biada. Miguel Biada i Buñol He was a merchant mariner who became a promoter of the first train line on peninsular soil. Although he was born in Mataró, he earned his living as a merchant in the Caribbean where, already in Havana, he had been part of the group of businessmen who promoted and carried out the first Spanish train line, the aforementioned Havana-Güines. Back in Spain, the businessman pushed to push ahead with that first train line that, according to some researchwas projected on the international gauge. These sources suggest that Madrid was required to opt for what It would later be known as Ancho Ibérico. A decision that condemned Spain to be isolated from the European railway network and that It still has its consequences today.. Finally, as we said, the first train line in mainland Spain started in 1848 and became a complete success. In the first year, 675,828 passengers boarded the train among whom, unfortunately, was not its promoter who had died that same year in April. Nor did the five people who, they say, have any good luck. The Vanguardwere run over and killed that first year. These deaths did not put a stop to the expansion plans. And the railway had come to stay in the Iberian Peninsula. It did so decades behind other European countries, but the expansion was so rapid that In 1866 Spain had already accumulated more than 5,000 kilometers of roads. Today, the Barcelona-Mataró has extended to the Massanet-Massanas station and is more than 70 kilometers long. Obviously, it is the first Rodalies line in Barcelona, ​​the one known as R1 that today starts from Molins de Rei and moves almost 40 million passengers a year. Photo | Illustration and photography collected on Wikimedia In Xataka | The Madrid Cercanías have become a nest of problems and delays: their solution is new “megatrains”

Apparently, the oldest restaurant in the world is in Madrid

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Here’s a question for note: What do Tarantino, Hemingway, Tom Jones, Pérez Galdós, Charlton Heston and Nancy Reagan have in common? The answer is that all those celebrities enjoyed (or that’s what tradition says) of the stews served in one of the most special restaurants on the entire planet: Botin Housea food establishment famous for its barbecues located in the historic center of Madrid, five minutes from the Plaza Mayor. If the business is famous beyond the capital or Spain, however, it is not because of its vast list of illustrious clients, nor even for its baked suckling pig or lamb. What stands out is its age. The restaurant owners come back Its origins date back to 1725, which would make it the oldest in the world. This is how it appears certainly in the Guinness of records. The oldest? That’s how it is. The world is very big and above all it has many, many restaurants (in Spain close to 90,000), but if we ask the authors of the Guinness book no doubt Which is the oldest of all: Botín, a restaurant that traces its origins back to the beginning of the 18th century. This is how its owners defend it, they need that the business was founded in 1725, and so it is recognized the most famous record guide on the planet, the Guinness World Records. In fact, the place generates so much interest that in 2025, coinciding with its 300th anniversary, it starred in chronicles in media such as Smithsonian Magazine, The Times either Financial Timeswhose reporters took the opportunity to try their famous baked suckling pig and order a bottle of Rioja. And what is its story? The Guinness Book assures that the restaurant was set up in the 18th century by a French chef, Jean Botin, and his wife, originally from Asturias. Other versions they need that it was Jean’s nephew, Cándido Remis, who started the business (hence why he is known as ‘Botín’s Nephew’). What all versions agree on is that the origins of the business date back to 1725 and that the building it occupies, on Cuchilleros Street, is even earlier and can be dated to late 16th century. Another surprising fact is that, despite its astonishing longevity, the restaurant has only passed through the hands of two families: first that of its founder, then, already in the 1930s, that of the González family, who have run the restaurant since before the Civil War. How is it possible? The big question. No matter how good a restaurant is, no matter how much effort its owners put into it, or how appetizing their food is, it usually ends up declining over time. Changes in tastes, changes in cities, crises, pandemics, wars, generational changes… there are many rocks on which a family business like Casa Botín can run aground. If there is something exceptional about her, beyond her piglets, it is her great resilience and ability to adapt to changes. The authors of the Guinness Book themselves remember Until the 18th century, the inn could not sell meat or food. He only cooked the food that the guests brought. “There is a legend that it was feared that if taverns served meals, men would never return home to their wives,” remember in Smithsonian Magazine Floriana Gennari, anthropologist. Over time, towards the 19th century, the business began to be called a ‘restaurant’, emulating the culinary fashions of France and opting for a more select approach. “In fact they made cakes and sweets before focusing on pork and local meat,” duck Gennari. Is it really the oldest? Its owners so they claim. And this has been recognized by the Guiness World Record and international media that present it as such, including National Geographic, Forbes, cnn or Forbes, which included it in 2012 your selection of “10 classic restaurants to visit”. Now, the popular establishment on Cuchilleros Street is not the only one to claim that title. Without leaving the Community of Madrid we found another business, the Casa Pedro tavern, which hold that its origins can be traced back even further in time, to 1702. Even the international press has been echoed of the struggle between both establishments to be able to hang in their living room the certificate that distinguishes them as the oldest restaurant. Outside of Spain there are also businesses that they assure have a centuries-old history behind them, some even greater than Botín’s. And what are they? There are those who say that in Salzburg there is a place, the St. Peter Stifskulinariumwhich was founded in the 9th century. In Regensburg (Germany) there is another that dates back its history to the 12th century, the same century in which the museum supposedly opened its doors. Ma Yu Chingin Henan, China. In Japan we also find some restaurant which ensures that its history is well before that of Botín. Probably what few can compare with Botín (besides his suckling pig) is his history, rich in legends. It is said that Goya came to work at the premises washing dishes, Galdós organized gatherings there and the fire in his oven has never gone out, not even during the pandemic. Enough to have captivated figures like Hemingway, who mentions the restaurant in his work ‘Fiesta’. Images | Wikipedia 1 and 2 In Xataka | In Vigo the hoteliers have decided that it is enough to occupy tables to just have a coffee. Solution: minimum consumption

It is the oldest documented evidence of psychedelics in America

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Humanity has been using drugs all its life. In fact, some of the oldest evidence dates back to 15,000 BC in Morocco. from Ephedra seeds or the mushrooms that they represented in cave paintings in Algeria in 9,000 BC or the use of hallucinogens derived from the San Pedro cactus in the Andes since at least 8,600 BC. But it is one thing to find remains of the plant and quite another to find chemical proof that our ancestors used drugs. What started in the 70s as a chance find of two pipes made of bones with traces of a hallucinogen has become, after decades of research, the oldest and most sophisticated direct chemical evidence of the use of hallucinogens in all of America. Context. We travel to 2100 BC, to the Preceramic period. The setting is the Puna of Jujuy, a high mountain plateau located in the extreme northwest of the Argentine Republic, which borders Bolivia and Chile. They lived there in caves such as Inca Cueva or Antofagasta de la Sierra groups of hunters and gatherers. The environment was extreme in terms of dryness and salinity, which has helped the organic materials to endure until today. Finally, it is worth mentioning the cebil (Anadenanthera macrocarpa), a leguminous plant whose seeds contain bufotenine, a tryptamine alkaloid with hallucinogenic effects that can be inhaled or smoked with a structure similar to the DMT family. The discovery. In the first site, in Inca Cueva and dated 2130 BC, two tubular bone pipes hidden in a cache without associated human remains. Inside there were remains of charring. Around it, remains of cebil and complete paraphernalia with decorated pumpkins and some bone spatulas to dose the hallucinogen. Their chemical analysis detected an alkaloid, N,N-dimethyltryptamine. At the Huachichocana site and dated 1450 BC, four stone pipes framed within a funeral trousseau of a young man, with other elements such as rattles or turtle shells. Chemical analysis is positive for alkaloids but negative for cebil. Pre-Columbian alkaloid trafficking. Was there cebil at 3,860 meters high? No, and that is one of the most striking things from the paper by Fernández Distel: Someone had taken him there. They sent young people to look for the cebil among tribes in the east of Salta in the summer months, when the fruit ripens. Your subsequent review contextualizes it: It was integrated into a broader transportation system that included other products such as feathers or fruit from the lowlands, hundreds of kilometers away. And the bone pipes did not come from humans, as they first hypothesized, but from pumas. Why is it important. Because Inca Cueva is the oldest record with direct chemical evidence in America for tryptamine hallucinogens, long before the from Chavín de Huántar in Peru. The paraphernalia of this site makes it clear that this was an elaborate ritual protocol, not something improvised or occasional. And the previous point shows the existence of long-distance trade networks, seasonal planning and advanced botanical knowledge. The hallucinogen was a precious commodity. The funerary context of Huachichocana is associated by Fernández Distel with a high mountain ritual, with the consideration of the deceased as a “shaman.” However, Torres reveals that consumption was a practice integrated into society: approximately 20% of men buried in some cemeteries in northern Chile took their hallucinogenic kit to the grave. How they did it. With excavations that took place between 1971 and 1976 with financing from CONICET and the University of Buenos Aires. The chemical analysis of the contents of the pipes was done using thin layer chromatography and in 1979, there was a second phase with gas chromatography. Thus, they detected seven peaks of plant alkaloids in Huachichocana that they could not identify. To date the remains they used Carbon 14. There are still many mysteries. That the Inca Cueva pipes appeared without human remains implies that we do not know who used them or under what circumstances. We also do not know why they used holes for pipes and not other elements. And although we know more or less what they consumed, there are still unknowns such as the recipes for their mixtures. In Xataka | The new era of psychedelia: how some “recreational” drugs want to help us with our mental health In Xataka | The most amazing data on drug consumption in Europe Cover | Christopher Walker and fr0ggy5

The fascinating search for the oldest person ever photographed

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Have you ever wondered who the oldest person ever photographed was? We don’t talk about the first photograph in history that the human being was capable of doing, which is also a very interesting topic, but the one in which the person born appears before any other who has ever been immortalized in a photo. It is not an easy task to give a clear and emphatic answer, since it is difficult to trace people born at the end of the 18th century, but there is a certain consensus around some names. Who knows, maybe in a few years we will discover a new photograph that will surprise us again as the ones we have in our hands have done. Be that as it may, the topic is as exciting as it seems. Conrad Heyer and John Adams According to the information offered by the Maine Historical Societythe oldest person ever photographed was Conrad Heyer. He was a veteran of the American War of Independence whose date of birth dates back to 1749. The following photo of Heyer is estimated to have been taken in 1852, four years before his death. Yes, here he was 103 years old. And yes, it is amazing to be able to see a photograph of someone born in the mid-18th century. The photo is simply impressive, both in terms of composition and because of Heyer’s firm and almost defiant gaze. It was made using the daguerreotypea photographic procedure that was made publicly known in Paris in 1839 and was subsequently used for years throughout the planet. Also in Spain, of course, where daguerreotypes were made from 1839 to 1860. But back to the topic at hand, was Conrad Heyer the oldest person ever photographed? This is what appears in the data offered by the Maine Historical Society, as we have seen, but on the other hand the Susquehanna County Historical Society has a copy of a photograph of a certain John Adams. A shoemaker by profession, he was born in Worcester a few years before Heyer, specifically on January 22, 1745: Conrad Heyer, born in the 18th century, very happy to pose for posterity, as can be seen. John Adams, also very excited. Once again it is a daguerreotype, although in this case it is not known for sure what year the photo was taken (the original has not been found). With the data we have, what we do know is that it had to be taken sometime between 1839 and 1849, the year in which Adams died at 104 years. Heyer and Adams enjoyed lives of more than a century. And from what we see in the photos, it can be said that they were not in bad condition at all. There are at least a couple of other people who could dispute Heyer and Adams for the honor of having been the oldest person ever photographed, although the documentation is somewhat confusing and they are not as clear-cut cases as the previous ones. The first of them is Baltus Stoneanother Revolutionary War veteran like Heyer. His date of birth could have been 1744 according to the manuscript that accompanied a daguerreotype from 1846, but in other documents It is implied that he could have been born in 1743, 1747 or 1754. Too much dancing around dates. On the other hand, the New York Historical Society He has in his possession a daguerreotype taken in 1851 of a slave named Caesar which, judging by the information that appears on the back of the frame, born in 1737 in Bethlehem (New York), and died in 1852. If this were true, not only would we have a clear winner, but Caesar would be 114 years old in the photo. Yes, looking at the image it is a little difficult to accept these data as good: Baltus Stone himself. The New York Historical Society itself confirmed to Benjamin S. Beck in a private conversation that Caesar’s date of birth could not be fully confirmed. The only public record that may shed some light on this is an August 7, 1850 entry in the Bethlehem population census listing a 110-year-old Cesar Nicholls (he was born as a slave to a Van Rensselaer Nicoll). Veterans of the Napoleonic Wars arrive In addition to the daguerreotypes of John Adams and Conrad Heyer, who could well be the two oldest people ever photographed, we cannot forget the collection of photos about veterans of the Napoleonic Wars property of Anne Seddon Kinsolving Brown. Although it is not known for sure how Ms. Brown obtained these photographs, their story is fascinating. After Napoleon’s death in 1821, veterans of the Grande Armée and the Guard who survived the Napoleonic Wars marched in uniform every May 5 to the Place Vendôme in Paris to pay their respects to the fallen emperor. The photographs in Mrs. Brown’s collection were taken around the year 1858, as the veterans shown in them were wearing the St. Helena medal awarded to them all in August 1857. They are the only remaining photos of these soldiers wearing their original uniforms and insignia. All of these veterans were around 70 or 80 years old at the time they were photographed. That is, all of them were born at the end of the 18th century and, therefore, they are part of the group of people born before 1800 who were photographed. Images | Brown University Library In Xataka | What happened to Technicolor: evolution and death of the company that changed cinema and was overwhelmed by its ambition In Xataka | The first photographic meme in history was extremely macabre: posing as decapitated corpses

For centuries Germany has boasted the oldest abbey beer in the world. The alcohol crisis has forced it to be sold

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Germany is the birthplace of Oktoberfest, the lagerthe saint Hildegard of Bingen and hundreds and hundreds of artisanal wineries dedicated to beer. The refreshing amber liquid is not at its best there, however. As the young lose interest for the drink and consumption falls per national beer capita, Germany finds itself with news like the one that has shaken the sector at the beginning of 2026: the oldest monastic brewery in the world, a 976-year-old icon, just sold suffocated by the economic context. It seems like a simple sale, but it says a lot about the industry. What has happened? That Germany is preparing for one of those business transactions that, due to their enormous symbolic value, transcend the pages of the salmon press to tell us about the cultural and social changes of a country. The Bavarian brewer Schneider Weisse has just reached an agreement to acquire the Bischofshof and Weltenburger brands, linked to Bischofshof GmbH & Co. Said like this, it could seem like a simple commercial procedure, material for the German BORME, but the agreement implies that Schneider Weisse takes charge of the brewery of the Weltenburg Abbey and that is something out of the ordinary. The reason? The brewing history of the monastery dates back to 1050, which is why it is considered the abbey brewery. oldestalthough if we talk about beer in general there is another previous one in Weihenstephan (Freising), brewed since 1040. What have they agreed? The truth is that not too many details have emerged. For example, the companies have not wanted to disclose how much the operation will cost. What yes have slipped is that the agreement will become effective in January 2027 and that Scheneider Weisse will continue to operate the Weltenburg Abbey Brewery. Not only that. He will also take over the logistics part of the Bischofshof, which includes 21 employees. Part of the business, located in Regensburg, will close at the end of this year and the idea is that in the medium term the production of the different brands will be concentrated in the headquarters that Schneider Weisse already has in Kelheim and the Weltenburg Abbey. Are they important companies? At least they are companies with a reputation. Although Weltenburg Abbey beer stands out on the world stage for its long history, which can date back to 1050, in reality the three names involved in the agreement have a long tradition. The Bischofshof brewery was founded mid 17th century in Regensburg and has been in charge of the production of Weltenburg since 1973. As for the house Schneider Weissebased in Kelheim, was also launched more than a century and a half ago, in 1872. “Our goal is to create a portfolio of traditional brands. We combine our brewing tradition of more than 150 years with the almost 380 years of history of the Bischofshof brand and the brewing tradition of the oldest monastic brewery in the world, dating back to 1050,” celebrates Georg SchneiderCEO of Schneider Weisse. “This creates a range of beers steeped in history and tradition, a unique offering from a single global supplier.” Why is it important? Weltenburg is relevant enough for any operation that affects him to generate interest, but if this operation has raised expectations (even beyond Germany) is because of its context. The companies acknowledge that the maneuver attempts to adapt to “the continued weakness” of the German beer market. “The reality is that, on our own and despite all our efforts and the measures adopted in recent months, it was no longer economically viable to continue operating the brands,” recognizes Till Hedrichthe general director of the firm Bischofshof and Weltenburger. “The evolution of the market has marked us too much.” Hedrich has also defended that the operation with Schneider, a firm based in Kelheim (Bavaria) is the most advantageous for the secular Abadian winery. “The looming threat of a total closure or dismantling by an investor with no connection to the region or its history can be avoided with the ‘Bavarian solution’ being implemented with Schneider Weisse.” Has the market changed that much? It seems so. From the collective itself is spoken of a “drastic drop in sales” of German breweries in the country. The BR24 program remember that in the last ten years alone, the German beer industry has lost almost 14 million hectoliters, almost 14% of its sales. And although the complete picture is somewhat more complex (the latest data from the Bavarian sector they are not bad), the overall trend is far from ideal for the industry in its own home. If at the beginning of the 80s the per capita consumption In the country it was around 145.9 liters of beer, right now it is below 90. Is there more data? Yes. Two years ago the Berlin journalist Nicholas Potter I slipped an interesting one in Guardian. “The decline can be seen at the Oktoberfest itself. In 2019, 6.3 million visitors drank 7.3 million liters. Last year attendance was about 7.2 million people, a record number, but they consumed only 6.5 million liters.” As a backdrop, the fall in consumption, the increase of the production of non-alcoholic beer and the loss of interest of members of generation Z for beer or wine. In April the Deursche Welle channel contributed another brushstroke that completes the picture. It is not only that the consumption of German beer has fallen in the country itself, it is that sales abroad have not evolved as the industry would like. According to Destatis data, 1,450 million liters of German beer were exported in 2024, significantly below the 1,540 in 2014. Images | Bernt Rostad (Flickr) 1 and 2 and Frank Mago (Flickr) In Xataka | If the alcohol sector thought it had a problem with Gen Z, it is because it did not see its stock: 22,000 million in bottles that no one wants

We have found the oldest genetic evidence of incest in Europe. And it’s a case of father and daughter

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When we talk about endogamy in the historical worldthe truth is that it is easy to think about the royal dynasties or in island populations that were on the verge of extinction. But the truth is that this type of practice dates back 4,000 years, since it was only now that a team of researchers has found the first irrefutable biological proof of a sexual union. between a father and his own daughter in European prehistory. The study. Although it may seem crazy, the fact that a father and his own daughter were united beyond the family bond, the reality is very different. The research published in Communications Biology has reached this conclusion after analyzing some remains from a Bronze Age community in Calabria. The discovered. The finding focuses on the Grotta della Monacaan archaeological site in southern Italy used for both mining and burials during the Bronze Age (between 1780 and 1380 BC). There, archaeologists recovered remains of several individuals, but two of them powerfully called the attention of geneticists when analyzing your DNA. Specifically, an adult male with the code GMO022 and a pre-adolescent child with the code GMO007. The genetic material. It undoubtedly keeps a large number of secrets, and the fact that it is maintained over time to know all its details. By sequencing the genomes of these two subjects, the researchers They saw the kinship they had with great clarityand the subject with the number 22 was not only the father of the child. The analysis revealed that the child’s mother was also the daughter of subject 22. That is, child GMO007 was the result of a first-degree union between father and daughter. According to the researchers, led by paleogeneticists from the University of Bologna and the Max Planck Institute, this is the oldest evidence of this type of incest ever sequenced in Europe. Behind the discovery. How can researchers be so sure of this? The key is in a genetic measure called ROH or “homozygosity sections“To understand it, you have to know that when two parents are closely related, their offspring will inherit identical genetic blocks from both sides, and not different ones, as is normal in relationships with two genetically different people. The closer the relationship, the longer these blocks are. In the case of boy GMO007, researchers found unusually long stretches of identical DNA, occupying a massive portion of his genome. This through the computer modeling managed to rule out that it was a union between brothersand confirmed that the markers fit a father-daughter relationship. Habit? Without a doubt, it is the idea that can come to mind when seeing something that today can be a real aberration. In this way, looking for the reasons, it was seen that this community did not have a state of isolation that justified them having to procreate among their own relatives, since the population was about 5,000 individuals. In this way, there were many options available to not have to choose to have a father-daughter relationship. This leads the study authors to an important conclusion: this was not an accepted cultural practice. Unlike later Egyptian dynasties or the Incas, where royal incest was sacred, in this Bronze Age community the case of GMO007 appears to be a unique event. It wasn’t normal. In this way, it seems that this was a chance event or a violation of a taboo, which for some reason occurred in this family. The reasons are not known, but at that time it was not something accepted by social norms, despite talking about a community that was 3,700 years old. Its importance. Until now, evidence of first-degree incest (parent-child or full siblings) was almost non-existent in the European genetic registry outside of very specific cases. We had data on unions between siblings in Neanderthals or distant cases in the Irish Neolithic (Newgrange), but nothing so explicit between direct generations in this period. In this way, this study reminds us that the DNA of the oldest people even helps us see their most intimate details. Images | Sangharsh Lohakare In Xataka | They found a cube-shaped skull in Tamaulipas and thought it was a migrant. Science has turned history upside down

We have found the oldest living tree in the EU. It is on Teide and almost coincided with the Roman Empire

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Spain is a tourism monster, and one of the most visited points is Teide. The territory of the volcano is imposing, and Bárbol hides on one of its slopes. As the character of ‘The Lord of the Rings‘, Treebeard, a Canary Islands cedar that was the oldest living tree in the European Union. And we say “was” because it has just been surpassed by one of its own species. One that is estimated to be 1,544 years old. Clonal or non-clonal, that is the question. Before we get into the discovery, let’s clarify an important concept when talking about the oldest living trees. There are two categories main: clonal and non-clonal. And understanding them is quite simple: A non-clonal tree is an individual, the traditional concept of a tree that grows from a seed. It is a unique individual with its root system and a main trunk. A clonal tree is one that is born from a root system. For example, some roots can give rise to a tree that grows and dies, and from those same roots, another tree is then born, being a “clone” of the original. Another Canary cedar. Found by researchers from the School of Forestry, Agronomic and Bioengineering Industry Engineering at the Duques de Soria Campus and by experts from the University Institute of Sustainable Forest Management at the University of Valladolid, the newly discovered specimen is a whopping 1,544 years old and is, like Bárbol, a Canary Islands cedar. He overcomes it by several years, since esteem that Bárbol is 1,481 years old, and fortunately for these two specimens, they are very far from tourist areas and human influence. This has allowed them to spend a millennium and a half in the same place where they were born, without worrying about the deforestation of the area caused by humans, and they have not been affected by the eruptions of the volcano. To access the new specimen, the researchers had to be assisted by local climbers to access these remote areas of the Teide National Park to be able to take the samples. This is how they found Treebeard Importance. Thus, they have been able to carry out an inventory of ancient cedars located in these areas that are difficult to access. Of the 25 specimens analyzed with the carbon 14 techniquethe existence of eight millennia has been evidenced, three of them exceeding 1,500 years. They are the witness of an ancient population of cedars that would have covered a large part of the park. The team has commented that it is one of the most important concentrations of ancient trees in the European Union and, furthermore, that “its persistence is due to the inaccessibility of the rocks in which they live.” Lucky. Its scientific value is also enormous, since it is like a historical record of the climate. Studying rings of ancient trees allows us to reconstruct the climatic history of the region, obtaining data on rainfall and drought patterns, tracing an evolution of temperatures and, in the case of Teide, identifying the frequency of volcanic events. It all depends on the “portage”. Those responsible for this discovery are the same ones who already dated to Treebeard in 2022, and it must be said that in Finland they found a juniper with a century more on its bark. Baptized as Utsjoki, in a first analysis in 2021 it was given 1,242 years, but after the discovery of Bárbol, they repeated the analysis and they found with which he was many more: 1,647 years old. But since technicalities have their importance in these things, it must be said that… everyone is right in stating that “theirs” is the longest-lived. The difference is in the arboreal habit of each subject. Both are non-clonal, but while the Finnish juniper had a bushy appearance, the canary has an arboreal appearance. And… well, it must also be said that the juniper died in 1906, so the two canaries are the longest living trees. That’s how they found Utsjoki. | Photo: UTU, Marco Carrer Legends. It is evident that there is a “competition” to find the oldest tree, but this is not a race to turn it into something touristy, as if it can happen with other finds, but rather to have new specimens that allow us to obtain a historical x-ray of the land on which they are. Apart from the specimens studied with methods such as carbon 14 belonging to this classification of non-clonal trees, we have specimens such as Old Tjikko Swedish 9,560 years old. The “trap” is that it is a clonal specimen, so the root system is almost 10,000 years old, but the trunks that appear from time to time only last a few centuries. And finally, those that belong to “folklore”, such as the yew Llangernyw in Wales which, located in the cemetery of a church, is estimated to be about 5,000 years old or the yew tree Fortingall in Scotland between 3,000 and 9,000 years old. Too wide a range. Images | Jens SteckertUVa In Xataka | Even when Spain does it well, it goes wrong: becoming the third most forested country in Europe has become a problem

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