earthworks

Defence to domesticity: Exploring the evolution of Irish castles

Marking the 1,000th anniversary of the birth of William the Conqueror, 2027 has been designated the Year of the Normans. Events to mark the millennium are planned all over Europe, with castles as a major theme. In Ireland, the best guide to the hundreds of defended structures surviving from the Anglo-Norman invasion of 1169 is the late David Sweetman, Ireland’s former Chief Archaeologist, whose book on The Medieval Castles of Ireland reveals how these 12th- and 13th-century symbols of Anglo-Norman power evolved from earthworks to commodious towers that dominated the landscape. Chris Catling reports.

Researching Wrest Park: Silsoe, Bedfordshire

Over the past 15 years, a series of research projects at Wrest Park, a 19th-century country house in Silsoe, Bedfordshire, has revealed in detail how the grounds of this estate evolved over the centuries. This work was recently highlighted during…

Surveying Skomer Island

A new 3D digital survey of Skomer Island, located a mile off the coast of Pembrokeshire, has revealed new details of its archaeological sites, allowing the public to appreciate many of them for the first time. The island, which is…

UK news in brief

Final ‘Victories’ tapestry back at Blenheim After a long conservation process, the final tapestry in the ‘Victories’ series, The Surrender of Lille, has been reinstated in the First State Room of Blenheim Palace, Oxfordshire. The tapestry depicts the famous parley…

Landscape Stability and the Formation of Social Memory in Prehistoric Britain

REVIEW BY RICHARD BRADLEY Archaeologists study memories in prehistory and help to create them in the present. Ancient people must have had a sense of the past, just as we do today. That is why older monuments were visited and…

A tale of two hillforts: Illuminating the inhabitants of Iron Age Leicestershire

An exhibition currently running at the University of Nottingham Museum showcases finds from Breedon Hill and Burrough Hill, hillforts that are both located in the East Midlands where such monuments are relatively scarce and poorly understood compared to other regions. Carly Hilts visited the displays, speaking to John Thomas, Clare Pickersgill, and Helen Sharp.

The Ancient World

The Hill of Tara, once the seat of the High Kings of Ireland, is a site steeped in mythology and history, dating back over 5,000 years. At the centre of the image lies the Mound of the Hostages, an ancient…

Friends of the Roman Road and Fleam Dyke

Fleam Dyke is a linear earthwork some 5km in length, built in phases between the mid-4th and the mid-7th centuries. The path along the top leads to Mutlow Hill, where the Dyke (now 8m/26ft in height) skirts a Bronze Age…

Chalking it up: The Uffington White Horse

A recent initiative has been working to restore the profile of the Uffington White Horse, a Bronze Age hill-figure in the care of the National Trust. When a drone survey (fundraised by David Miles and Simon Palmer, and undertaken by…

LiDAR uncovers evidence of Middle Neolithic activity in Ireland

Recent LiDAR work intended to record the state of the landscape in Baltinglass, Ireland, has revealed a complex of five Neolithic cursus monuments, shedding new light on the importance of the area during this period. The archaeological landscape of Baltinglass…

Ringing the changes: Investigating an enigmatic monument at Aspull

Three years of investigations have shed intriguing light on a near-circular feature identified on the outskirts of a village near Wigan. Patrick Maloney reports.

A conflict reimagined: Creating a digital model of the Roman assault on Burnswark Hill

Advances in digital technology are opening up ever-more realistic ways to depict archaeological sites and events from the past. John Reid describes how excavated evidence has been used to create a detailed and dramatic model of a Roman attack on a hillfort in Dumfriesshire.

Go digging!

Following on from CA 410, this selection of summer digging opportunities includes projects in North Yorkshire, Nottinghamshire, Dorset, and Aberdeenshire.

Prehistoric Sussex

REVIEW BY AB In the 1990s, archaeologists excavating in West Sussex made a remarkable discovery: human remains belonging to ancient humans who lived around half a million years ago. These discoveries from Boxgrove continue to represent the oldest human remains…

Excavations on Wether Hill, Ingram, Northumberland 1994-2015

REVIEW BY CHRIS JONES This important book is the product of 11 seasons of careful fieldwork by members of the Northumberland Archaeological Group. The book is structured around the five main areas of the project, beginning with the geoarchaeological survey…

Warham Camp: Investigating an Iron Age enigma

Last summer, excavations at Warham Camp – a monumental Iron Age enclosure in north Norfolk – revealed intriguing clues to the site’s date and purpose. Carly Hilts visited the project and spoke to Andy Hutcheson to find out more.

A new chronology for Dinas Powys

The hillfort of Dinas Powys, located about 9km south-west of Cardiff, was first excavated by Leslie Alcock in the 1950s. While the excavation and its subsequent report were pioneering for their time and led to Dinas Powys being widely considered…

Castles of Kent through Time

REVIEW BY AB It is easy to think of castles as a static part of the historical landscape, towering relics of a bygone era, but these buildings have rich stories, many of which are still being written. In Castles of…

Power of place: Illuminating Iron Age hillforts in Wales

In CA 388 we asked, ‘what are hillforts for?’, and Toby Driver’s new book Hillforts of Iron Age Wales has some suggestions. Based on his many years spent recording these monuments on the ground and from the air, he concludes that no single explanation fits every example. Rather, like terraces of seemingly identical Victorian or Edwardian houses, external similarities disguise the many different functions, ideas, and ways of life that hillforts supported, as Chris Catling reports.

Investigating a Neolithic cursus on the Isle of Arran

A new project aims to conduct an in-depth analysis of the prehistoric landscape near Drumadoon on the west side of the Isle of Arran, including the investigation of a large Neolithic cursus monument, or rectangular enclosure, which was first discovered…

Beacons in the Landscape: The Hillforts of England, Wales, and the Isle of Man (2nd edition)

REVIEW BY GEORGE NASH One of the most impressive archaeological site-types in the British Isles is the Iron Age hillfort. Archaeological evidence has shown that it took many generations to construct and remodel these structures. Even after Roman occupation, hillforts…

Above the Downs: Documenting human history from the Neolithic to the Cold War

A recent survey project has analysed almost 10,000 aerial photographs as well as LiDAR imagery to explore archaeological features preserved within a large swathe of the South Downs National Park. From monuments to military remains, both well-known sites and new discoveries have been brought to light, as Carly Hilts reports.

A matter of health

In 1950, Peter Williams-Hunt published a paper in Antiquity entitled ‘Irregular earthworks in eastern Siam: a review’. A former RAF pilot, he had pored over wartime aerial photos taken of the extensive Khorat Plateau in North-east Thailand. He was intrigued…

Below Excavations exploring the remains of the Civil War defences of King’s Lynn in July 2022. While 40° temperatures restricted activity during the early part of Week 1, work continued with enthusiasm undimmed.

King’s Lynn under siege: how a small field in North Lynn illuminated Civil War fortress engineering

This year is the 380th anniversary of the Siege of King’s Lynn, an important but often overlooked engagement during the Civil War. David Flintham presents the latest findings of a community archaeology project exploring the town’s fortifications.

CA 396 Letters – February

Your views on issues raised in CA.

Roman women: tracing female archaeologists of the Roman frontiers

David Breeze, Tatiana Ivleva, and Rebecca Jones consider the contribution made to the study of Roman frontiers by Brenda Heywood, who died last December, and other contemporary female archaeologists.

The Marlborough Mound: prehistoric mound, medieval castle, Georgian garden

Review by Stephen Rippon Silbury Hill in Wiltshire is one of our best-known prehistoric monuments, but was it unique? It seems not, as a similar – if somewhat smaller – mound appears to have lain ‘hidden in plain sight’ just…

Ancient mounds in America

In the middle of Louisiana State University’s campus stand two earthen mounds, each c.5.5m tall. The LSU Campus Mounds have long been known to be among the c.800 mounds created by ancient indigenous communities in this region, but archaeological investigations…

Investigating Flower’s Barrow hillfort

The 2,500-year-old fortifications are perched on the edge of a cliff, and are fast disappearing due to processes of natural coastal erosion.

Left The dense vegetation in Amazonia still has archaeological secrets to share.

Lost cities of Bolivia: rethinking prehistoric life in the Amazon

It has long been assumed that Amazonia was always sparsely inhabited by humans. Now LiDAR survey in Bolivia has revealed the stunning scale of settlements that lay concealed beneath dense tropical vegetation. Heiko Prümers told Matthew Symonds why it is time to rethink the nature of life in this region.

Low Res cr Wetland Baseline Environment m.JPG

Research sheds new light on Cahokia’s North Plaza

The study found that the plaza would have been underwater for most if not all of the year at the time of the site’s creation.

The Offa’s Dyke Association

The Offa’s Dyke Association (ODA) – one of the many heritage bodies that have recently celebrated their half century – was founded in 1969 by Frank Noble, a school teacher and archaeologist based in Knighton, Powys, at the midpoint along…

Assessing Iron Age Marsh-Forts

Review by Ian Ralston The subtitle to this volume – ‘with reference to the stratigraphy and palaeoenvironment surrounding The Berth’ – indicates clearly its main objective: detailed consideration of the environs of the Shropshire fort, the subject of several small-scale…

Atlas of the Hillforts of Britain and Ireland

Review by Andrew Tibbs. This invaluable contribution to our knowledge of hillforts is the most complete study on the subject in Britain and Ireland to-date. A long-awaited volume, it sheds much light on these somewhat enigmatic structures, detailing the results…

Backs against the Wall, AD 117-113

In the early years of Hadrian’s reign, the military situation in Britain was in danger of spiralling out of control. The emperor hit on a radical solution, as Matthew Symonds describes.

Stone circle discovered inside Cornwall henge

This represents a rare find for the area: the only other known Cornish henge monument with a stone circle is Stripple Stones on Bodmin Moor.