Fractured Britannia: the twilight of Roman Britain
The end of Roman rule in Britain is not a niche topic: it is one that has been intensely studied for decades. And yet we still have so much to learn about
The comprehensive website for archaeology, history, heritage and the ancient world. Find out more about us here
Making Art in the Ice Age: the story of how our ancestors made images
Ice Age art engages something within us that feels deeply and inherently human. Most of us feel it immediately: awe, curiosity, and perhaps even sometimes a feeling that borders on spiritual. Yet,
Anglo-Saxon Beads, 400-700 AD: a visual guide to types and techniques
Anglo-Saxon beads are important as, along with cruciform brooches, they are among the most studied and datable of all the objects found in Anglo-Saxon graves, made useful by their long date-range and
The Diver of Paestum: Youth, Eros, and the Sea in Ancient Greece
On 3 June 1968, Italian archaeologists digging the ancient city of Paestum made an extraordinary discovery. They had unearthed a tomb fashioned from slabs of travertine, containing the bones of an individual
Colonial Intrigues and My Dismissal as Director of Antiquities: A Memoir of Cyprus in the 1930s
‘Journeys, like artists, are born and not made ’, Lawrence Durrell begins his encomium to Cyprus, Bitter Lemons. For millennia, this Mediterranean island was a staging post to the Middle East; then,
Making Art in the Ice Age: The Story of How Our Ancestors Made Images
In 2024, Paul Bahn and Elle Clifford published Living in the Ice Age, adapting their 2022 publication Everyday Life in the Ice Age for a younger audience. In my review of their
The Great Museum of the Sea: A Human History of Shipwrecks
Most maritime archaeologists spend their careers trying to tease out what happened before a ship sank by asking questions like who was on board, when was it built, where was it going,
Wolfpack: inside Hitler’s U-boat war
As Roger Moorhouse suggests in the introduction to Wolfpack, it was natural that post-war English language books about the Battle of the Atlantic would largely ignore the German perspective on the conflict.
The Spanish Civil War in the Air Volume 1: 1936-37
Under-funded and wracked by the hostility between political factions within its ranks, Spain’s military aviation was in a dire state in the period immediately before the Spanish Civil War. At this time,
Germany’s First World War Aviators: the lives of fliers
Since the late 1990s, the study of World War I has moved beyond the constraints of military history to embrace an increasingly multidisciplinary agenda. Not least in this has been the adoption
Tunisgrad: victory in Africa
It is something of a cliché in the history of the Second World War to claim that Stalingrad, the graveyard of Germany’s Sixth Army in Russia, was the decisive turning point of
Domination: the fall of the Roman Empire and the rise of Christianity
Through her TV work and writing, Professor Alice Roberts is a powerful and effective advocate for archaeology in the public realm. In Domination, she extends her coverage to explore Christianity in Late Antiquity,
Common Ground in Scottish Archaeology: contributions in honour of Anna Ritchie
Few people have made such a profound impact on the understanding of Scotland’s prehistoric and early medieval past as Anna Ritchie. In 2022, the Scottish Society for Northern Studies and the Pictish
Archaeology of Britain’s Oldest Church Doors
For lovers of church archaeology, anything by Warwick Rodwell is a must. His new book covers two subjects: medieval ecclesiastical doors – the Westminster example is pre-Conquest and the Hadstock one a
Neolithic Timber Halls and a Bronze Age Settlement with Hoard at Carnoustie, Angus
The timber halls ex-cavated at Carnoustie between 2016 and 2017 are some of the most significant Neolithic discoveries in Scotland in recent decades, particularly considering that the bigger of the two halls
The Archaeology of the Stonehenge Visitor Centre
This book draws together diverse excavations; geophysical, augering, and fieldwalking surveys; and other investigations carried out between 1991 and 2009 to help determine a location and explore design options for the Stonehenge
Neolithic Impressed and Related Wares in Britain and Ireland
This volume comprises 11 regional or national papers and a synthesis of lipid analysis results. Several contributors note that Impressed Wares have been a ‘Cinderella’ among Neolithic pottery traditions. They echo Isobel
The Libyan Pharaohs of Egypt: Their Lives and Afterlives
Aidan Dodson’s The Libyan Pharaohs of Egypt is a detailed reappraisal of one of the most complex periods of ancient Egyptian history. Drawing on his long-standing expertise in Egyptian royal history, Dodson
Clever Minds and Expert Hands: Egyptian Art and Artists in the New Kingdom
This new publication brings a welcome focus to the creative individuals behind the artistic achievements of the New Kingdom. Building on a 2022 conference in Madrid, the collection’s 12 papers examine a