With one of the UK’s oldest commercial units recently celebrating its 50th birthday, Carly Hilts spoke to its founding director, Tom Hassall, and current CEO, Ken Welsh, about how the archaeological profession has changed over this period – and what the future might hold for the ways in which we engage with the past.
In 1789, an opinion column in The Times hailed Britain’s canal-building achievements as a matter of national pride – contrasting them with the revolutionary turmoil in France. Aristocrats and entrepreneurs were losing their heads across the Channel, while in Britain they were busy building and funding a canal network that would serve the rapid growth of the nation as an industrial power. In his new book on the Swansea Canal, Stephen Hughes looks in detail at the archaeology and history of one such pioneering enterprise, as Chris Catling reports.
Archaeological investigations ahead of a road improvement scheme near Roscommon town have uncovered traces of more than 1,000 years of medieval life, as well as a major multi-generation cemetery. Carly Hilts spoke to Shane Delaney, Eileen Murphy, and Martin Jones to find out more.
Excavations in Beaumaris, Anglesey, have uncovered elements of the town’s medieval defences that were thought to have been demolished half a century ago, as well as providing vivid insight into the lives of the people who lived beside them for hundreds of years. Matthew Jones and Catherine Rees report.
Rachel Cotton investigates an extremely rare item: a linen ‘bag-tunic’ discovered by Howard Carter and Lord Carnarvon in 1909.
Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones continues his series on the later Ptolemaic queens
with the ambitious Cleopatra III and her murderous family rivalries.
Rosalie David and Roger Forshaw consider the contribution made by ancient Egyptians to the development of surgery, and the extent to which their knowledge was transmitted to later civilisations.
Jason S Whitmarsh explores the revolutionary impact of Egypt’s so called ‘heretic king’.
Dr John Taylor describes Smyth’s scientific achievements and his less successful inroads into the world of Egyptology.
When was this curious hairstyle used and what was its significance?
Archaeologists and historians tend to approach the early medieval period through the lens of what was lost after the collapse of Roman rule. In her new book on life in Wales between c.AD 300 and 1050, Nancy Edwards shows us what survived from the centuries of Roman control – in particular Christianity and Latin literacy – and the ways in which these were used to create new identities in a formative period in the development of Wales, as Chris Catling discovers.
The discovery of an anonymous shipwreck off the coast of Sussex set archaeologists on the trail of a 350 year-old mystery. Mark Beattie Edwards reports on efforts to identify the sunken vessel and to protect its historic remains, sharing a story of bravery in battle, acts of ‘piracy’, and tragic loss of life.
This spring marked 300 years since the introduction of the 1723 Workhouse Test Act, often seen as the origin of the workhouse system in England and Wales. These institutions were designed as refuges for the destitute, but ultimately became a byword for cruelty and neglect. What can archaeology add to our understanding of the experiences of those who lived and worked in them? Carly Hilts reports on how recent excavations in London have illuminated one such site.
Excavations by the Caistor Roman Project outside the walls of Venta Icenorum are revealing the impact on local Iron Age communities of the development of a Roman regional capital. This summer, Carly Hilts visited the site and spoke to Giles Emery to find out more.
Sanxingdui has produced a wealth of startling Bronze Age artefacts. Many of these treasures were deliberately smashed or burnt before being buried, raising questions about what they were used for and how they met their end, as Tianlong Jiao and Shengyu Wang told Matthew Symonds.
In 2019, excavations at Kalambo Falls in Zambia produced a range of wooden objects. These included structural elements that have been dated using cutting-edge technology to an almost unbelievably ancient era. The results force us to rethink everything we thought we knew about the capabilities of early humans, as Larry Barham and Geoff Duller told Matthew Symonds.
The rivalry between Young and Champollion in the race to translate Egyptian hieroglyphs is legendary. But what motivated these two scholars, and what qualities did they bring to the endeavour? Andrew Robinson goes in search of the personalities behind an extraordinary intellectual achievement.
Examining artefacts from Myanmar reveals how a tale of power, wealth, people, and the rise and fall of empires played out over centuries, as Alexandra Green told Matthew Symonds.
Stephen Roberts analyses the crucial battle that cost the life of the Swedish king.
Stephen Roberts traces the history of the Thirty Years’ War, Europe’s most destructive conflict prior to the First World War.
Napoleon and Hitler both drew up detailed plans for the invasion of Britain, spreading alarm among the public and forcing urgent measures from the UK government in return. Here, David Porter compares the plans, and the threat posed by the country’s two would-be invaders.
In the second part of our series on the use of deception during World War Two, Taylor Downing uncovers the extraordinary true story of Operation Mincemeat.
In the first part of a new occasional series, Graham Goodlad profiles Robert Blake, the republican ‘general at sea’ who laid the foundations of sea power after the Civil Wars.
Considered by many the finest cavalry officer of the American Civil War, Nathan Bedford Forrest was also responsible for one of its worst atrocities. Edmund West examines a troubling legacy.
For a brief snapshot of the mid-19th century, flower festivals drew thousands of visitors to Stonehenge, long before the Neolithic monument became a popular tourist attraction in its own right. Carly Hilts visited the site and spoke to Louise Crawley, Brian Edwards, and Jennifer Wexler to learn more about this colourful but little-known episode of Salisbury Plain’s past.
Located off the south coast of Ynys Môn (Anglesey), Llanddwyn Island was home to a small monastic community for more than 1,000 years. Now a decade of archaeological investigations have shed vivid light on this remote religious community, documenting the remains of a 12th-century church and its surrounding landscape. George Nash, Philip Dell, Leslie Dodd, Thomas Wellicome, and Carol James explain further the history and archaeology of one of Wales’ hidden island gems.
In the early medieval period, Yeavering was the site of seasonal gatherings by the Northumbrian royal court, whose palatial halls were famously excavated by Brian Hope-Taylor in the 1950s and 1960s. Now, with new archaeological investigations teasing out further details of the site, and an innovative attraction recently opened in nearby Wooler to tell its story, Carly Hilts spoke to Chris Ferguson and Sarah Semple to learn more.
An eight-year effort by a dedicated band of more than 100 volunteers has borne fruit with the recent opening of a new heritage attraction in the heart of the Avalon Marshes. Richard Brunning describes how Somerset’s Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Viking past has been brought to life once more.
Do archaeological remains represent static monuments, or do they remain ‘alive’ in their natural and cultural landscapes? Emily Hanscam and Cornelius Holtorf discuss how Hadrian’s Wall and the Sycamore Gap tree can encourage us to rethink the relationships between humanity, nature, and the planet.
The Sycamore Gap tree was an immediately recognisable feature of the central section of Hadrian’s Wall. Jim Crow, who directed excavations of this portion of the Roman frontier between 1982 and 1989, investigates its archaeological and landscape history.
In the aftermath of the felling of the famous tree at Sycamore Gap, David Breeze examines how artistic interest in different sections of Hadrian’s Wall has changed over the centuries.
Dylan Bickerstaffe investigates the evidence for Tutankhamun’s long-lost mortuary temple.
Karl Harris travelled to Sudan on an expedition to identify the original locations and find-sites of objects now in museum collections.
For the first time in nearly a century, these famous Old Kingdom bracelets were scientifically analysed by an international team led by Macquarie University in Sydney, with surprising results, as Karin Sowada explains.
What was the origin of the ankh hieroglyph and what did it mean to the ancient Egyptians?
A series of elegant female figurines, the subject of ongoing research, had been wrongly identified in the past as ‘brides of the dead’. W Benson Harer Jr proposes a new theory to explain their purpose.