Second World War wrecks: Brecon Beacons
Today this wreck, along with several others in the Beacons, stands as a monument, a tangible example of the enormous sacrifices that were made every day during the Second World War.
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Old Oswestry Hillfort and its Landscape: ancient past, uncertain future
Sharing elements with a standard regional study of a hillfort in geographical context, this series of papers is distinctly wider in scope. It is neither underpinned by recent excavation, nor by reassessment in detail of the 1930s interventions. Instead, ten…
The Isle of Man: Stone Age to Swinging Sixties
Within its 225 square miles, the Isle of Man boasts an impressively diverse historic landscape spanning some 10,000 years of human activity. In this compact but wide-ranging book, our guide is Matthew Richardson, curator of social history at Manx National…
Great Cloister: a lost Canterbury Tale
Among the 856 heraldic shields emblazoned on the ceilings of the cloister of Canterbury Cathedral is hidden a story of the social and political history of 14th- and 15th-century England. In this large and intensively researched volume, Paul A Fox…
The Life Biography of Artefacts and Ritual Practice: with case studies from Mesolithic-Early Bronze Age Europe
Within the context of burial and ritual, archaeologists have found it near-impossible to understand why mundane objects became the focus for ritual deposition. I suppose it is all too easy to look at anthropology and ethnography to get some of…
The Chadwell St Mary Ringwork: a late Bronze Age and Anglo-Saxon settlement in southern Essex
This volume in the British Archaeological Reports series presents the results of excavations by Archaeological Solutions Ltd in advance of gravel-quarrying on a hilltop next to the Thames Estuary in Essex, just to the south-west of the Mucking ridge, where…
1520: the Field of the Cloth of Gold
Published 500 years after the event took place, this book serves as a quincentenary celebration of the legendary first meeting between Henry VIII, the English king (r. 1509-1547), and Francis I, the French king (r. 1515-1547). Known as the Field…
Excavating the CA Archive: Derbyshire
Peak prehistory and Britain's first cave art: Joe Flatman explores half a century of reports from Derbyshire
Sherds: The good, the bad and the ugly
'Context is all': as the culture wars heat up, Christopher Catling looks at the problems of our contested heritage
The Kilvert Society
The Reverend Francis (Frank) Kilvert (1840-1879) died as a result of peritonitis at the age of 38, days after returning from his honeymoon in Scotland. Although greatly mourned by his widow, family, and parishioners, he would nevertheless have been an…
The disappearing Neanderthal Y chromosome
Over the last decade, developments in genetic sequencing, as well as in the successful extraction of DNA from increasingly older and even contaminated remains, have allowed our knowledge of ancient hominins to expand exponentially. But even with these advances, our…
Delving into Viking DNA
A large study, led by researchers from the University of Copenhagen, has mapped the DNA of the Viking world. The results (recently published in Nature: https:// doi.org) paint a complex picture of population movement across Europe during this period. Over…
Finds tray – early Roman axehead
Last December, a metal-detectorist discovered this cast of a socketed axehead near Boynton in the East Riding of Yorkshire. Made of copper-alloy, it is perfectly complete but has been made in miniature, measuring only 23.9mm long. While it was probably…
Surprising finds at Shrewsbury Castle
Archaeological investigations at Shrewsbury Castle have provided surprising insights into the make-up of some of its defences. The castle was founded by the Normans and reworked in the 13th century, and the imposing ramparts, crowned with curtain walls, that surround…
Roundhouse revealed at Bamburgh Castle
Excavations within the West Ward of Bamburgh Castle in Northumberland have revealed the partial foundations of what appears to have been a substantial roundhouse. Based on its stratigraphy, it is thought to be late Romano-British, but could potentially be earlier…
Ipswich’s medieval population investigated
In 2012, an extensive excavation was carried out in the Stoke Quay area of Ipswich by Oxford Archaeology and Pre-Construct Archaeology. Covering an area of 1.2ha, the project was a major undertaking and made finds spanning the early medieval period…
World News: Mexico, Germany, Kazakhstan
Ochre mining in Mexico Evidence for the mining of red ochre has been discovered in the now-submerged caves of Quintana Roo in Mexico’s Yucatán Peninsula. Dated to between 12,000 and 10,000 years ago, this is the earliest-known exploitation of this…
Unexpected discoveries at Beacon Ring
Archaeologists excavating the Welsh hillfort Beacon Ring (Caer Digoll) made an unexpected discovery relating to the 19th-century Ordnance Survey this summer, which has cast new light on early map-making fieldwork. Beacon Ring is on the Long Mountain overlooking Welshpool. Since…
News in brief
National Trust report on colonialism The National Trust has released their Interim Report on the Connections between Colonialism and Properties now in the Care of the National Trust, including Links with Historic Slavery (read more in ‘Sherds’ on p.64). Commissioned…
Anglo-Saxon ‘warrior’ burial uncovered
The grave of a 6th-century man – a possible warrior – has been uncovered on a hilltop near Marlow, overlooking the Thames Valley. Its location within the borderlands of prominent neighbouring Anglo-Saxon kingdoms – at different times Wessex, Kent, and…
The Mayflower, 1620-2020: tracing voyages of discovery in Plymouth’s past
Four hundred years ago, the Mayflower carried around 100 would-be colonists across the Atlantic to found Plymouth Plantation in Massachusetts. What can we learn of these voyagers, the city they left behind, and the impact they had on the indigenous people who were already living on the land where they settled? Carly Hilts reports.
Sifting through the remains of Scotland’s kelping industry
For a brief period, from around 1750 to 1820, the west coast and islands of Scotland experienced a boom in demand for kelp, a seaweed-derived substance used in the soap and glass-making industries. Kevin Grant – formerly St Kilda Archaeologist with the National Trust for Scotland, now Archaeology Manager at Historic Environment Scotland – has been studying the fragile and elusive remains of this once-thriving industry, as Chris Catling reports.
The origins of Old St Oswald Church, Fulford
Many a church guide claims that their present building sits on the site of a more ancient structure. But how accurate are these claims? Recently the Fishergate, Fulford, and Heslington Local History Society (FFH) – a community group with a long-standing and very active interest in their historic landscape – decided to try to find out whether this was true of the deconsecrated medieval church, dedicated to St Oswald, that sits on the east bank of the River Ouse, in the village of Fulford, some 2km south of York. Chris Catling reports.
HEIR to the past: exploring the Historic Environment Image Resource
A unique digital archive preserves a wealth of images spanning the history of photography, offering long-lost views and vivid insights into how the historic environment has evolved over time. Janice Kinory is our guide.
Illuminating Isurium: exploring Aldborough’s Roman remains
Isurium Brigantum was a thriving and prosperous Roman town in what is now North Yorkshire, but it has attracted relatively little modern archaeological attention. Now, though, a decade of geophysical surveys have shed vivid light on its make-up, and a wide-ranging new book presents a compelling narrative for how the once-bustling settlement evolved. Carly Hilts reports.