'Thorpedo' spotted at archaeological dig in IsraelAustralian Olympic champion Ian Thorpe gets down and dirty filming documentary on human evolution at an archaeological dig site in northern Israel.
Jul. 18, 2015
Australian swimming great Ian Thorpe was in Israel earlier this week to take part in filming for a docu-reality on human evolution at a prehistoric site in northern Israel.
The "Thorpedo" – as he is known to his fans – spent two days with students and archaeologists digging in the Manot Cave, in the Western Galilee.
Thorpe and his co-star, Australian actress and TV personality Julia Zemiro, were instructed in the basics of archaeology and put to work with picks, trowels and brushes, filling buckets with sediments and uncovering flint tools and animal bones dating back more than 30,000 years.
Manot was inhabited over thousands of years during the Stone Age. The cave in question made international news in January when, in a paper published by the scientific journal Nature, researchers announced the discovery there of a 55,000-year-old human skull – the oldest remains of a modern human to be discovered outside Africa.
The documentary being filmed by Australian television follows Thorpe and other celebrities as they move from site to site across the world, tracing the path of human evolution and dispersion from humanity's ancestral home in Africa.
It was Thorpe's first visit to Israel, and the crew also briefly stopped in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for filming.
During his stay in Manot, Thorpe did not speak to reporters but was friendly with the students and volunteers at the dig, chatting and snapping pictures with them. He and Zemiro were filmed interviewing experts and were led into the dark cave to join the excavation.
Jul. 18, 2015
Australian swimming great Ian Thorpe was in Israel earlier this week to take part in filming for a docu-reality on human evolution at a prehistoric site in northern Israel.
The "Thorpedo" – as he is known to his fans – spent two days with students and archaeologists digging in the Manot Cave, in the Western Galilee.
Thorpe and his co-star, Australian actress and TV personality Julia Zemiro, were instructed in the basics of archaeology and put to work with picks, trowels and brushes, filling buckets with sediments and uncovering flint tools and animal bones dating back more than 30,000 years.
Manot was inhabited over thousands of years during the Stone Age. The cave in question made international news in January when, in a paper published by the scientific journal Nature, researchers announced the discovery there of a 55,000-year-old human skull – the oldest remains of a modern human to be discovered outside Africa.
The documentary being filmed by Australian television follows Thorpe and other celebrities as they move from site to site across the world, tracing the path of human evolution and dispersion from humanity's ancestral home in Africa.
It was Thorpe's first visit to Israel, and the crew also briefly stopped in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem for filming.
During his stay in Manot, Thorpe did not speak to reporters but was friendly with the students and volunteers at the dig, chatting and snapping pictures with them. He and Zemiro were filmed interviewing experts and were led into the dark cave to join the excavation.
