At least, those were some of the sickies inscribed onto a 1250 BC Egyptian “ostracon” (broken-off stone) housed in the British Museum. The ostracon, labelled ‘Year 40’ of Ramses II ...

Our scientists have been looking for a rock that formed so long ago it was on Earth before complex life lived on land. Called Lewisian gneiss, it’s the oldest rock in the UK ... A Natural History ...