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The hinged position of her skeleton suggested that she had been buried in a seated position, possibly on a saddle whose wood and padding had rotted away, leaving only the iron stirrups found by her feet. Moreover, one of the horse skeletons on the ledge was bridled, as if ready to be ridden. In addition, the grave contained other equestrian gear, including what was likely a large currycomb. The battle gear

arranged around the warrior skeleton also told a story. The arrows, for example, were specially designed to pierce an enemy's armor. These were not for show. The other weaponry in the grave shields, spears, double edged sword, broad axe and battle knife, suggested that the warrior woman was also highly trained in

several forms of attack, including hand to hand combat. Other clues, including part of a silver coin minted by the Abbasid Caliphet, a sprawling Muslim empire whose capital lay in what is now Baghdad, linked the woman to the lucrative Viking trade in the East, and an analysis of the clothing fragments discovered in the grave revealed a distinctively Eastern style of dress. She was buried in a spectacular Eurasian steppe style of riding coat, trimmed with silk and possibly ornamented with small

pieces of mirror glass to catch the light. She also wore a costly silk cap decorated with a silver tassel and four small silver balls. Both the style and the materials inferred that it was likely manufactured in the Viking settlement of Kiev, which was perched along a major river route leading to Constantinople. Taken together, the clothing pointed to a very important person with strong connections to the East. Indeed,

comparative research by Scandinavian archaeologist and textile specialist INGA. Hague suggested that individuals buried in such distinctive hats were likely cavalry commanders who reported directly to a king or Prince, a theory the researcher proposed before the occupant of the famous grave was identified as a woman, Birkas's female warrior may have been skilled in a particular kind of equestrian combat.

During the extensive excavations conducted at Birkus Garrison during the late nineteen nineties and early two thousands, archaeologists found remnants of use Eastern archery equipment, including arrow heads used with composite Eastern bows. The discoveries strongly indicated that some warriors garrisoned in Burka were trained in a type of horseback archery mastered by nomadic tribes on the Eurasian steps. Today, Headen Steernat Jansen thinks the Birka woman may have trained

as an Eastern horseback archer too. It's a suggestion rather than a fact, she explained by e mail, adding that it is based on the array of weapons in combination with the horses and the general Eastern for example, rous

and step nomadic feel to the grave and dress. The idea that the female buried in the famous warrior grave could have fought as a horseback archer was deeply intriguing, and I found myself wondering whether that ancient material marshal technique may have leveled the playing field for some female warriors in the Viking age. To learn more, I decided to reach out to a German scientist I knew who had undergone years of training to become a horseback archer herself.

Angela Graefen is an ancient DNA specialist in Germany who has studied and published on the genome of Utzi, the well known iceman who was discovered melting out of a glacier in nineteen ninety one. She wasn't surprised by the suggestion that the vehicle woman trained as a mounted archer. Indeed, the idea seemed plausible to her. Equestrian disciplines are the one Olympic field where men and women compete against each other on equal terms, Graefen told me in an e mail.

While not an Olympic sport, the same applies to horseback archery, with several women among the ranks of the world's best. Graefen also mentioned published archaeological evidence pointing to a long tradition of female horseback archers on the uration steps, an

area well known to Viking traders and warriors. Excavations from as far west as Ukraine and as far east as Central Asia have uncovered the remains of approximately three hundred armed females, some with horses and equestrian equipment, in burial mounds dated to between the eighth century BC and the fourth century AD. In one remarkable grave field known as Mamaje Gora in Ukraine, archaeologist Elena Fialco of the National Academy of Science in Ukraine discovered the burials of about

a dozen women who formed light armed cavalry. The gear interred with these armed Eastern women varied widely, from swords and spears to armour and helmets, but the bow and arrow appeared to be the weapons of choice. Indeed, one ancient burial of a steppe woman along the Nieper River

contained a quiver holding ninety two arrows. In the view of Adrian Mayer, a Stanford University historian and an expert on the archaeological evidence of warrior women in antiquity, the common nation of an equestrian lifestyle with archery created something powerful for women. The horse and the bow were the equalizers. Women could be just as tough, fast and deadly as men. Mayer wrote in the Journal Foreign Affairs. In twenty nineteen, the Swedish team published a second article on the Berko

woman in the journal Antiquity. They laid out pages of detailed archaeological and historical evidence to support the contention that the woman in the weapon packed grave was a warrior and quite possibly a military commander. For many Viking Age specialists, including Marianne Mohn, the head of the Department of Archaeology at the Museum of Cultural History in Oslo, this second paper was very convincing. By the time Hadden, Stirna Jansen and I reached Birka, it was well past midday and

the sky had clouded over. We walked up the slope to the hillfort and the garrison hall, where Birka's warriors once feasted and drank on long dark winter night ights. Hirdon steer Na Janssen then turned and led the way to the burial ground that had once held the famous warrior woman. On a high terrace, the researcher pointed to the spot where mourners had lowered the body into a

magnificent weapon filled grave. I had hoped to see some kind of marker or sign of distinction, but there was nothing at all, No mound, no memorial, no grand vista, no outline even of the excavated grave. A dense thicket of green shrubs had taken root on the spot, shrouding the tomb in branches and leaves. As we lingered there for a few minutes, the engraving of the burial chamber I had seen earlier in the day flashed through my mind, the human skeleton resting on the ground, the weapons of

a professional warrior carefully arranged all around the bones. For nearly one hundred forty years, that image had captivated archaeologists and others, raising a myriad of questions about the tomb and the identity of its occupant. Now, thanks to the work of a modern interdisciplinary team of scientists, we have a fuller picture, with evidence showing that this individual was a woman, a female warrior whose distinguished life ended in

a grave of an important military figure. She had not just endured the spear storms and weapon thunder of Viking battlefields, it seemed, but she'd also excelled there, inspiring the loyalty of those who fought with her. And as I think about what we have now learned, I am overcome with respect for her. Today, nature has reclaimed her grave, but Birka's Woman Warrior no longer languishes in obscurity. She is once again part of human memory, taking her rightful place

in the great drama of the Viking Age. Artifacts from Osberg The Osberg Ship was looted some time after the women spurial, but thieves left behind many intricately decorated everyday objects, including tapestries, delicate combs, and carved wood animal habits. The number and quality of the artifacts indicate that these women, like the Birka Warrior, were high status members of Viking society,

a sorcereer's term. Vikings often buried their illustrious dead with iconic longships, like the famous Osberg ship uncovered on a farm in Norway in nineteen o three. This discovery was unusual not only for the richness of its grave goods, but also for its ninth century occupants, to elite women, one believed by some to be a sorceress. In addition to new scholarship exploring the role of Viking women on the battlefield, discoveries are shedding light on their place in

the spiritual realm. Some were considered mighty sorceresses or vulvas with the ability to see into the future and cast spells to aid Viking forces. Supernatural tools. Items found in the sorceress's burial site were rare, some with origins overseas. Foreign unfamiliar objects could have made her seam otherworldly butlandic box brooch, a clothing fastener repurposed as a cup, contained white lead and ointment believed to have medical or magical qualities.

Hen Bane seeds carried in a fur pouch on her belt. The seeds have pain relieving properties. If thrown into fire, they produce a hallucinogenic smoke. Copper alloy bowl. Originally from Central Asia, it once held fat that, when mixed with henbane seeds, could produce powerful hallucinogens. Birds feet pendent, possibly inspired by or imported from Western Slavic lands. It may have served as an adornment attached to a headband or

veil chair shaped charm. This silver amulet may represent the wooden chair, a cirrus used during rituals, and could be linked to the chief Norse god odin raiders and traders. As our understanding of gender roles in Viking society evolves, scientists are discovering them. Women held critical positions in commercial affairs. Scales, weights, and other items found at women's grave sites, including those here, testified to the work that women performed As Viking groups

expanded their reach. At Birka and other Viking sites, about a fifth of trade related artifacts from voyages to the East were found buried alongside women. A case of mistaken identity, the Birka Warrior's skeletal remains can be seen as they lay when discovered. The grave contained many different weapons and acts, multiple blades and iron tipped arrows, suggesting the occupant was a skilled fighter. Stirrups and crampons indicated an experienced rider

comfortable with horses. Taken together, these wartime objects led to the mistaken conclusion that the Birka Warrior was male, an assumption that stood until twenty seventeen, when DNA analysis finally revealed the body was female. Next, the truth about the world's biggest eggs. Who laid the largest eggs the world has ever seen? It wasn't the dinosaurs by Hicks Wogan. The average chicken egg can fit comfortably in the palm of your hand. This rare fossilized specimen from National Geographics

historical collection is more than a hundred times larger. A just over a foot long and nine inches in diameter, The intact egg belonged to an elephant bird of flightless herbivore endemic to Madagascar that's been extinct since at least the seventeenth century. To day, researchers believe the bird resembled an oversized ostrich though it was most closely related to the Kiwi, a smaller species of ratite, Its thick legs had to support some serious weight. Adults could grow to

be ten feet tall and over one thousand pounds. Elephant bird lineage dates to around fifty million years ago, but their numbers declined as humans settled Madagascar. What happened? Gifford Miller, a geologist at the University of Colorado, Boulder who has studied I. Prinorius egg shells, says human predation may have been a cause, perhaps even before the birds could hatch. The eggs were probably durable enough for humans to carry

away from nests. Evidence suggests they were plenty tough. Two complete elephant bird eggs have been discovered on beaches in Western Australia, apparently having floated four thousand miles across the Indian Ocean. For humans, pushing an egg would have been simpler than subduing the half ton bird. As Miller notes, when it comes to keeping our species alive, we are extremely efficient. Next, New York's lost fleet of electric taxis the car of our future, was all the rage in

the late eighteen hundreds. So what happened to those e v's? By Christopher Klein. New York City had a horse problem in the late nineteenth century. Its streets and alleyways were jammed with an estimated one hundred fifty thousand of the animals, each one producing more than thirty five pounds of wist every day. The logistics of disposing of that much excrement created an enormous challenge that New Yorkers were eager to solve, and a new invention, the automobile, seemed to be the answer.

When the city's first motorized taxicab service launched in eighteen ninety seven. It featured a clean energy technology that mike shock modern New Yorkers. The cabs were electric vehicles produced by the straight forwardly named Electric Vehicle Company. The cars were known as Electrobats and were emerging as the market's leading electric vehicles. Philadelphia inventors Harriet Henry Morris and Pedro Solom patented the electro bat in eighteen ninety four, and

in two years had developed a smaller, faster version. Weighing it at twenty nine hundred pounds. The new model was propelled by a lead acid battery. It achieved a top speed of twenty miles an hour and was capable of covering distances of up to twenty five miles on a single charge. The idea of VV gliding around New York City in the eighteen nineties might sound like science fiction,

but battery powered automobiles outsold their internal combustion counterparts. At the dawn of the automobile age, electric cars were quietly and easy to drive. Back then, you were lucky if a gas car started in the morning, says Dan Albert, author of Are We There Yet? The American Automobile Past, present and driverless. It was noisy, polluting, and rickety, whereas an electric car started with a flip of the switch.

This was the dawn of the age of electricity, a moment when technologies harnessing the power source seemed capable of overcoming any challenge. If you asked people on the street what was going to happen, they would have said that electricity is this magic force, says electric car historian David A. Kersh, author of The Electric Vehicle and The Burden of History. We harnessed it for light, we harnessed it for traction through the trolley, spreading everywhere, and now it's going to

take us around. Morris and Salom bought the electro Bat to New York and devised an ingenious battery swapping system inside a former Broadway ice skating rink To keep the company's cabs in continuous operation. Employees maneuvered vehicles with elect elevators and hydraulics so that an overhead crane could pluck out the depleted twelve hundred and fifty pound batteries and insert freshly charged ones. The process took only three minutes.

It was much faster than changing a horse team and probably as fast as what we would today associate with filling a tank of gas. Kerchese. The electro Bat's rapid acceleration and quiet ride pose some unforeseen challenges. In May eighteen ninety nine, cab driver Jacob Jerman became the first automobile operator arrested for speeding after whizzing down Lexington Avenue

at twelve miles an hour. A few months later, in al electric taxi fatally struck real estate broker Henry Bliss as he stepped off an Upper west Side street car. The first pedestrian killed by an automobile never heard of the elector bat coming. Morris and Saloam decided that rather than sell their vehicles, they would lease them on either a monthly or per ride basis across New York City. Their cab service, the Electric Carriage and Wagon Company, took off.

Their taxi fleet expanded from a dozen cars in eighteen ninety seven to more than one hundred and eighteen ninety nine. With their business growing, Morris and Salom imagined a grand future for their car. They found new backing from wealthy investors, notably New York financier William Whitney, known for his success in electrifying the city's street cars. Under Whitney's ownership, the group also purchased a leading battery manufacturing firm, Aiming to

control the majority of the electric vehicle market nationwide. The electric vehicle companies swiftly exped and its taxi operations to major cities like Philadelphia, Chicago, and Boston, eventually becoming the nation's largest automobile manufacturer. However, its rapid expansion proved unsustainable. Operations outside New York were poorly run, and investors felt swindled.

When an eighteen ninety nine New York Herald investigation revealed the Electric Vehicle Company had fraudulently secured alone, the company's stock fell and the enterprise's finances grew strained. By nineteen o two. The company's collapse sent shockwaves through the investment community and cast a dark shadow over the formerly bright

future of electric vehicles. The thing that killed it is not really the idea, the technology, or the business model, Albert says, it was the shadiness of the wheeler dealers behind it. A devastating fire destroyed a significant portion of the fleet, and then the Panic of nineteen o seven, a nationwide financial crisis, caused car production to plummet, dealing a final blow to electric cabs in New York City, but gasoline powered vehicles were gaining momentum in the market.

In nineteen oh seven, local businessman Harry Allen introduced a taxi service with sixty five gasoline powered cabs imported from France. Within a year, his fleet had swelled to seven hundred vehicles. It seemed New York would never look back. The Eve's days were numbered, especially after the affordable gas powered Model

T debuted in nineteen o eight. Electric cars hung on until the nineteen twenties, while the internal combustion engine grew ever more popular, going on to drive the next American century. But electric cars would make a comeback when twenty five all electric taxis began operating on the streets of New York in twenty twenty two, the car of the future arrived again. Next, a hike with explosive views in Guatemala's

Sierra Madre. A spectacular trek puts you close to one of the Central america As most active volcanoes, but not too close by Erik Pinego. There aren't many hikes that offer their grandest views at night. Of course, there aren't many hikes that bring you to the edge of a

frequently erupting volcano either. High in Guatemala's Sierra Madre, Volcan de Fuego is a geological marble that has become a singular tourist experience the volcation is best glimpsed from the heights of its neighbor, the currently inactive Volcanda Acca Tenago, which at thirteen thousand forty five feet, is the third highest mountain in Guatemala. The strenuous hike to the summit moves visitors from leff lush coffee plantations through cloud forests

up to the otherworldly terrain near the peak. From there, the reward is an incredible view of Fuego's spewing gas and ash as the earth rumbles under foot. The most natural starting point for the journey is in the small, cobblestoned colonial city of Antigua, Guatemala. Until the late eighteenth century,

Antigua functioned as Guatemala's capital. Later it became a center of coffee production and more recently a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a distinction that has protected its rich Spanish architectural legacy.

At five thousand feet above sea level, the city offers the intrepid adventure a place to acclimatise to the altitude and enjoy some of the local cuisine, from a hardy bowl of Shoutit del soup at Cafe Candesa to the mouth watering stake offered by La las An Torkas word to the wise, hold off on drinking or smoking before the hike. A post hike celebratory drink goes down much smoother than the night before chug that will leave you

keeled over. At ten thousand plus feet, hikers, whether employing a tour guide or not, make their way to the village of La Soledad, where they ship out. The hike to base camp on Acatanango takes five to six hours

on average to depending on pace and weather conditions. Some tours offer a limited horseback option for travelers inclined to ride, but be aware the final stretch of the climb to Acitanago's summit must be done on foot, and while the round trip hike can be completed in a single day over the course of ten to twelve hours, many travelers opt for a two day trip, overnighting at base camp

before making the final push to Akitanago's crater. Visitors can take in the spectacular sights and sounds of lava gurgling on fuego and glowing beneath the starlit sky before the sun greets hikers and volcanoes alike. Travelers who venture up the mountain and stay over night should be prepared for a dramatic temperature change on account of the hike's five thousand foot elevation gain. Daytime highs can reach beyond sixty eight degrees fahrenheit, while at night the temperature can fall

below freezing. The clearest views of Fuego are typically found from November to April, during the area's dry season, though the volcano's eruptions can be a bit unpredictable from day to day. Fuego and at Atenaco share the landscape with a third nearby volcano, Agua, which attracts its fair share of hikers. Although Fuego and Achitanango are not physically connected to Agua, the trio is part of the larger Central American Volcanic Arc, which runs some eight hundred miles from

Panama to Mexico. The journey up a Achitanago to view Fuego, while demanding, has become one of the most popular hikes in Central America. For good reason, and for those who make the overnight trip with a guide, the payoff comes in the form of a well earned glass of wine along with a sky lit by stars and lava. Next

the fight to save the desert's most tenacious bird. In the vast urban sprawl of Arizona, the habitat of the tiny western burrowing owl is being destroyed, prompting conservationists to think creatively about how to help. By Jessica Cuts, the cardboard pet carrier rested on a patch of desert grass with a towel draped over it, while an animal rescuer named Eric Murray squatted on a nearby cinder block, adjusting

his thick gloves for the extraction. Then, in one swift motion, Murray reached into the carrier and retrieved a small owl with brown and white speckled feathers. Although an adult, the owl was only about nine inches tall, with long, spindly legs and sharp talons. Its large yellow eyes widened as it slowly rotated its head at an uncanny angle to

survey the surroundings. On this hot spring day, Murray in about a dozen volunteers clad in work gloves and sun hats, gathered at Martin Farm, a two hundred forty one acre parcel of grassland northwest of Tucson, Arizona, to participate in a unique kind of bird relase. After care fully spreading one of the owl's wings to confirm its sex as female. It's quite barred all the way down, Marie said, while

pointing to a dark pattern along the inner feathers. He turned to a recently assembled temporary shelter, a ten by ten foot tent made of sheer black shade cloth. He lifted one corner of the canopy and gently tossed the creature in. The bird took a look around and flew headfirst into a fabric wall, tumbling onto a patch of freshly dved dirt. She shook it off, but repeated the process again and again. Probasita, said one volunteer, which is

Spanish for poor thing. No sabe, she doesn't understand. Next volunteers added another owl to the shelter. Both birds continued to flutter about in agitation. While difficult to watch, this process would be repeated hundreds of times throughout the year at Martin Farm. This canopy was one of twenty five spaced at intervals along the property. In recent years. Wild at Heart, the animal rescue group behind these operations, persuaded the city of Tucson to set the tract aside as

a conservation area. The group has seven active sights on public and private lands in Arizona. The hope was that in a month, the tent could be removed and the birds would have nested in this spot, or rather below it. That's because these are burrowing owls and increasingly threatened species that has evolved to live underground. Once one of the most populous owls on the continent, the burrowing owl has seen a sharp decline over the past one hundred fifty years.

The population is now a small fraction of its former numbers, with the species listed as endangered in Canada, threatened in Mexico and Florida, and assigned various degrees of protected status throughout much of the American West. The culprits are largely urban development and commercial farming, which chirn up land where

the animals used to roost. Nowhere else in America is that disastrous progression as a parent, as in Arizona, especially the Phoenix metro area, one of the fastest growing in the country, Industrial operations in solar fields are rapidly popping up all around its outskirts burrowing owls have evolved to take over abandoned burrows, commonly of badgers, prairie dogs and ground squirrels. Out West, the numbers of many of the creatures they once relied on have dwindled because of drought

and past extermination campaigns. But in Arizona, Wild at Heart is proving it can bring these animals back from the brink, even while grappling with fatal trial and error in the process. It all starts with a network of artificially manufactured burrows just below the surface. This concludes readings from National Geographic Magazine for today. Your reader has been Marsha. If you've enjoyed hearing this content, please give us call at eight

five nine four two two six three nine zero. Thank you for listening, and have a great day.