According to reports, scientists have recovered a record of Earth's magnetic field from ancient ritualistic village burnings in a settlement of Iron Age in southern Africa. The study was conducted by a team of scientists led by University of Rochester geophysicist John Tarduno.

The team recovered the magnetic field record between 1,000 and 1,500 AD by studying remains from a village that were burnt. The agricultural communities would cleanse villages as part of a ritual by burning down huts and grain bins.

The study has been published in Nature Communications. The team gathered data from five places that have a weak magnetic field strength. This area is called as the South Atlantic Anomaly.

So the data from the ancient Iron Age settlement indicates that the core region under southern Africa could have major contribution in the Earth's magnetic reversals and could be the origin of some of the new and future pole reversals.

The researcher found that a 30% fall in magnetic field intensity was there from 1225 to 1550 A. D. This indicates that the process that led to the weakening could be recurring at present.

According to Tarduno, "Because rock in the deep mantle moves less than a centimeter a year, we know the LLSVP is ancient, meaning it may be a longstanding site for the loss of magnetic field strength". He added that it is also a possibility that the region could activate magnetic pole reversals that might occur if the weak field region becomes extremely large.