Sculpting southern Scotland A new project, coordinated by Dr Christina Cowart-Smith and funded by the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, is set to start this autumn with the aim of documenting around 200 fragments of sculpture south of the Forth–Clyde…
The Archaeology of Industrial Cheshire in 20 Digs is a well-illustrated introduction to Cheshire’s industrial past. Each concise chapter combines documentary evidence with excavation results to trace the development of the county’s key industries across two millennia. The book opens…
The maiden flight of the world’s most famous fighter took place 90 years ago this spring. Stephen Roberts reveals how it helped to win the war.
Put your military history knowledge to the test with our competition.
Excavations along the disused Tranent–Cockenzie Waggonway have revealed a section of the historic rail route and uncovered new details about its use and construction that could potentially alter our understanding of railway innovations. The Tranent–Cockenzie Waggonway was the first railway…
To mark 200 years since the Stockton and Darlington Railway – the world’s first modern railway – opened on 27 September 1825, Historic England have announced seven new listings relating to railway heritage sites across the country. Four stations have…
REVIEW BY GRAHAM GOODLAD The Supermarine Spitfire has received more attention in print than almost any other aircraft in history, but relatively little has been written about the life of its designer, R J Mitchell. His son, the late Gordon…
Recent discharges of raw sewage into the UK’s rivers and streams are a reminder of the sanitary crisis of the 1840s to 1860s, when water pollution was identified as the major cause of rising mortality rates from ‘fever’. The response – albeit slow – involved a huge investment in waterworks that transformed public health. As revealed in a book by James Douet on water and sewage architecture, it also resulted in distinctive new building types, as Chris Catling reports.
Your thoughts on issues raised by the magazine.
REVIEW BY ANNA GARNETT Following a publishing trend of making classic and out-of-print texts available to a wide general audience, this latest reprint was first published in 2006 but is now available in paperback for the first time. There are…
Another news item that has had widespread coverage is the claim that the Step Pyramid of Djoser was built using a hydraulic lift. Research by a privately owned French institute specialising in hydrology, archaeology, and geotechnics suggests that the ancient…
David Porter on Military History's doomed inventions.
In the first of a new series to celebrate the 150th birthday of Winston Churchill, Taylor Downing examines his role in some of the incredible technological advances made during World War I.
DAVID PORTER ON MILITARY HISTORY’S DOOMED INVENTIONS
REVIEW BY GRAHAM GOODLAD The 80th anniversary of the Dambusters raid in May received a certain amount of media attention and several new books on the event will have appeared by the end of this year. Yet Barnes Wallis, whose…
David Porter on Military History's doomed inventions.
Kim Masters traces the development of the chariot wheel from its humble origin as a tree log under a stone block.
The secret of the ancient material’s durability has intrigued researchers for decades, but a new study led by a team from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology may have found the key.
Review by Dylan K Rogers To say that the Roman world was overflowing with water is an understatement. Recently, scholarship has increasingly begun to explore the numerous ways water impacted the lives of ancient Romans, from understanding the design of…
Supplying Constantinople with water was a monumental challenge that received a monumental solution. Examining the extraordinary remains of aqueducts, bridges, and cisterns reveals the ingenuity – and expense – committed to sating a thirsty ancient metropolis, as James Crow explains.
Review by Andrew Tibbs In Roman times, water was an important resource, but also had symbolic importance. Waterways acted as arterial routes of the Empire, used by the military, traders, and civilians to move resources and people, while on dry…
The elite Pathfinders of 627 Squadron may not have achieved the renown of their Dambusting comrades in 617 Squadron but, as David Price explains in a new book, their Second World War acts of valour were equally remarkable.
In an extract from a new book, John Medhurst traces the history of the submarine in warfare, from the earliest experiments to the First World War.
DAVID PORTER ON MILITARY HISTORY’S DOOMED INVENTIONS.
When it was completed in 1209, medieval London Bridge was the only fixed crossing of the Thames downstream of Kingston-upon-Thames (until Fulham Bridge was built in 1729). Remarkably, it was also home to some 500 people – equivalent to the population of a small medieval town. In London Bridge and its Houses, Dorian Gerhold has scoured the archives of Bridge House – the medieval charity that managed the bridge – to find out more about the community that lived on this extraordinary structure, as Chris Catling reports.
Many of the tanks on display and in storage are examples of British engineering heritage.
The military museum, based in Gillingham, is the largest of its kind in Kent and contains many exhibitions telling the story of Britain’s military engineers from the Roman period through to the modern Corps of Royal Engineers.
Built 6,000 years ago, the Neolithic timber trackways known as the Sweet Track and the Post Track are among Britain’s earliest known bridges. In which county can they be found?
Which city boasts the largest Roman aqueduct still in use today, 19 centuries after it was built?
The wreck of the Royal Navy’s first long-range diesel-powered submarine has been awarded protected status by the British government.
Frantic redesign efforts were made, but in 1942 the aircraft finally entered production still plagued with the same engine problems.
This is a fine, deeply researched book, with Frank Whittle’s story beginning with a lad of humble origin who, aged just 16, entered the RAF as an apprentice fitter, already with strong views about the viability of gas-turbine aero engines…
The author is a renowned scholar of the Roman Army and has written many books, both on this topic and related Roman subjects. The present work will be an absolute delight for those who are fascinated by the life and…
Patrick Boniface considers the influence of science on warfare.
Is the Titanic archaeology? A century since her loss on 15 April 1912, we learn how recent survey has revolutionised knowledge of the wreck, transforming a lost liner into a monument to a great migration, as James Delgado told Matthew Symonds.