Heather Pringle

Author bio

Heather Pringle specializes in writing about archaeology. She’s a editor emeritus at Hakai Magazine and has written four books, including The Mummy Congress. She lives a 10-minute walk from the ocean and frequently walks along the water with her husband and their two Labrador retrievers. She has won both a National Magazine Award in Canada and a Science Journalism Award from the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Heather Pringle’s Contributions:

In Bangladesh, leather factories long dumped their toxic wastewater into the Buriganga River and discarded their leather scraps along its banks. Today, parts of the river are almost dead. Photo by Zuma Press, Inc./Alamy Stock Photo

Saving the Ocean One Outfit at a Time

The sea suffers for fashion. Kombucha leather and leased jeans to the rescue.

Sep 26, 2017 | 2,900 words, about 15 minutes

Homo Sapiens Just Got Older—Way, Way Older

Bones found in Morocco place our lineage 100,000 years earlier and nowhere near where we thought.

Jun 7, 2017 | 850 words, about 4 minutes

For decades, ethnobotanist Nancy Turner has roamed Canada’s west coast, recording how First Nations elders dug roots, picked berries, and prepared ancient foods. Photo by UVic Photo Services

In the Land of Lost Gardens

Tireless in her quest, ethnobotanist Nancy Turner works with indigenous elders to preserve plant knowledge dating back to the First People in the New World.

Jun 6, 2017 | 3,100 words, about 15 minutes

Clovis hunters cut off the escape of a wooly mammoth near the end of the last ice age. For decades, archaeologists thought that Asian migrants first reached the Americas around 13,000 years ago, and swiftly migrated southward to what is now the United States. Their descendants, the Clovis people, were said to be the first Americans. Illustration by Field Museum Library/Getty Images

From Vilified to Vindicated: the Story of Jacques Cinq-Mars

How a toxic debate over the first Americans hobbled science for decades.

Mar 7, 2017 | 2,900 words, about 15 minutes

A Sunken Bridge the Size of a Continent

A remote Arctic land may hold a vital missing chapter from human history. The only problem? It disappeared at the end of the last ice age.

Sep 20, 2016 | 3,000 words, about 15 minutes

The Little Man Who Soared

On Haida Gwaii, indigenous artists carved portraits of the strange newcomers who landed on their shores.

Aug 5, 2016 | 650 words, about 3 minutes

Ancient Roman fishers hauled in nets flashing with fish to cater to the high demand for the freshest seafood possible. The desire to capitalize on this hunger pitted the very rich against the working poor, sparking one of the world’s earliest-known battles for the coastline. Illustration by National Geographic Creative/Alamy Stock Photo

How Ancient Rome’s 1% Hijacked the Beach

The rich, the poor, and the battle for the Bay of Naples.

Apr 5, 2016 | 2,600 words, about 13 minutes

The Feather Cloak of Captain Cook

When Captain Cook and his crew landed on Hawaii to restock their provisions, the island’s high chief gave the cloak off his back to the British explorer.

Feb 1, 2016 | 700 words, about 3 minutes

A Parka and a Fashionista

Designers for the Paris runways have nothing on the seamstresses of the Bering Sea’s St. Lawrence Island.

Nov 18, 2015 | 750 words, about 3 minutes

A Little Game of Thrones

There are no dragons, but fierce kings and anxious queens are depicted in these rare medieval chess pieces uncovered on the Isle of Lewis.

Aug 5, 2015 | 550 words, about 2 minutes

Time Travelers

Could these be the oldest human footprints in North America?

Jun 22, 2015 | 2,100 words, about 10 minutes

The Girl with the Shimmering Eyes

A mysterious 19th-century Haida carver breaks artistic ground and creates a rare, and stunning, portrait.

May 27, 2015 | 500 words, about 2 minutes

True Blue

Far from its origins, a new pigment appeared on an Alaskan island and made an artistic splash.

Apr 22, 2015 | 400 words, about 2 minutes

Built in 1894, the Gulf of Georgia Cannery, shown on the left, is one of British Columbia’s few historically intact canneries. It is now operated as a Canadian national historic site. Photo courtesy of Gulf of Georgia Cannery

The Ghosts of Cannery Row

Despite its picturesque beauty, Canada’s cannery row was straight out of the Industrial Revolution, with an added measure of racial segregation.

Apr 22, 2015 | 4,400 words, about 22 minutes

At Pinnacle Point in South Africa, paleoanthropologist Curtis Marean has uncovered compelling evidence for early human adaptation to coastal environments. Photo by Ilja Herb

The Brine Revolution

Did lowly shellfish change the world?

Apr 22, 2015 | 3,400 words, about 17 minutes

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