This month finds us making our final preparations for our annual conference on 8-9 March – I look forward to meeting many of you there, and if you haven’t yet bought your ticket it’s not too late. For the latest details of CA Live! 2019, including our complete timetable, turn to p.62.

While planning a conference can feel like a monumental undertaking, the logistical challenges of building a cathedral are rather more daunting. The city of Bath was once home to one of the largest medieval cathedrals in England – today, its remains lie beneath Bath Abbey, but recent archaeological work has illuminated over 1,000 years of religious life on the site.

This ecclesiastical edifice must have served as an unmistakable landmark for centuries. So too, it seems, did a pair of Neolithic barrows that stood on the edge of what is now Trumpington. Forming the focus of Bronze Age and Iron Age activity, these mounds attracted communities who left behind enigmatic and unusual burials.

Equally enigmatic is the birth of Bristol, which seems to have sprung into being in the medieval period with no Roman predecessor. This issue’s third feature traces the evolution of a bustling port city.

Our final two articles examine ‘magical’ inscriptions, though serving dramatically opposed purposes. At Bolsover Castle, we find a host of protective graffiti safeguarding the celebrated 17th-century riding school of the ‘Father of Dressage’ William Cavendish; while rather less benevolent, though intriguingly modern, is the 19th-century curse recently identified at a farm near Llandudno.

Carly Hilts