Archaeologists surveying land this summer in Arizona's Petrified Forest National Park discovered the traces of a 1,300-year-old village, filled with ancient artifacts.
This is the second village uncovered over the past year in the Petrified Forest, says the park's archaeologist, Bill Reitze. Both villages have similar slab-lined pit-houses, and they're less than a kilometer (0.6 miles) apart. They were uncovered during an expansion project that has doubled the size of the park.
"There are not a lot of national parks that have the opportunity to get bigger like this to protect sites and produce future research," Reitze told ABC News. "A lot of archaeology happens in response to development. What makes this unique is new sites are discovered, research [is] being done, and all these sites are being protected, all at once."
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The artifacts found in this village include spear points, stone tools, shells, ceramics, scrapers, and knives. Reitze plans on using radiocarbon to date the objects they've already found and the pieces they will discover in the future.
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