excavations

Fortress Londinium: Tracing London’s Roman defences

This summer, a museum displaying a portion of the wall that once encircled Roman London has opened, and three sections of the settlement’s riverside defences have been granted scheduled status. Carly Hilts visited the museum and spoke to Jane Sidell to learn more about Londonium’s fortifications.

Moche murals revealed

Archaeologists working at the Moche site of Pañamarca, which is in western Peru, have uncovered intriguing depictions of a two-faced figure among the murals of its pillared hall. This building, which archaeologists believe may have been the most important at…

Below One of the pits containing severed hands found at Tell el Dab’a in 2011.

Severed hands at Avaris

German researchers analysing 12 severed hands that were discovered at Avaris (Tell el-Dab’a) in 2011 have published their findings, suggesting that the amputations were part of a ritual, rather than a punishment for crime. The hands, dating to about 1500…

Heliopolis finds

The joint German-Egyptian mission at Heliopolis, excavating the area surrounding the Obelisk Open-air Museum, has discovered a series of stone fragments from statues depicting Ramesses II, Ramesses IX, Horemheb, and Psamtek II. The finds include heads belonging to sphinxes that…

Pithom trade

The ancient East Delta city of Pithom mentioned in the Bible was an important hub for international trade according to new discoveries made at Tell el-Maskhuta (Ismailia Province). The Italian-Egyptian mission excavating there has uncovered a large collection of pottery…

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This week: Hadrian’s Wall

This week on The Past, we are delighted to celebrate a very special milestone: the 400th issue of our sister publication Current Archaeology – the ground-breaking specialist magazine, first published in March 1967, that is now firmly established as Britain’s…

Surprises from the Roman frontier: excavating Hadrian’s Wall in urban Tyneside

As Hadrian’s Wall is a protected World Heritage Site, opportunities to excavate across the line of the Roman fortifications are rare. In the summer of 2021, however, planned development works in the Ouseburn area of Newcastle upon Tyne offered the possibility to do just that – and Pre-Construct Archaeology’s investigations revealed not only the first turret to be uncovered along the Wall in over 40 years, but the largest example identified to date, together with other defensive features. Project Officer Scott Vance discusses the background to the discovery and its implications for the study of Hadrian’s Wall within urban Tyneside.

Opposite Looking across the remains of Richbrough Roman fort, towards the reconstructed gateway that was recently built on the site. above The on site museum’s displays have been completely transformed to offer a more representative selection of the tens of thousands of finds that have been excavated at Richborough.

Gateway to Britannia: reimagining Richborough Roman fort

Richborough in Kent was one of the key locations in the early stages of the Roman invasion of Britain, later flourishing into a wealthy port town and then a significant military site. Over the last century, excavations have provided an extraordinary array of insights into the experiences of people who lived and worked within its walls – now, following a transformation of the on-site museum and the presentation of the outdoor archaeology, what new stories are there to tell? Carly Hilts visited to find out more.

Opposite A reconstruction by Alan Duncan of a late Roman hunting party returning to Whitley Grange villa with their quarry. right The remarkably clear results of a geophysical survey of the St Laurence School villa, Bradford on Avon.

Rural Romanitas: rethinking the role of villas

It has been an undergraduate essay topic for the last 50 years and is a question that continues to challenge archaeologists studying the history of Roman Britain: what exactly is a villa, and is there even a simple definition that fits them all? The Association for Roman Archaeology recently brought together 20 experts to consider new discoveries, new interpretations, and the role of the villa in Romano-British culture, religion, and landscape. Their conclusions have just been published, as Chris Catling reports.

Left ‘Overseer of the Fields’ Horemkhauef (on the left), in front of a row of granaries, in a scene from his tomb at Hierakonpolis.

Horemkhauef of Hierakonpolis

In the first of an occasional series focusing on remarkable people of their period, Wolfram Grajetzki introduces the ‘First Inspector of the Priests’ at Nekhen during the Second Intermediate Period.

Left The entrance façade of Rowand Anderson’s cathedral sized Gothic Revival masterpiece of 1888, Govan Old Parish Church. This A listed building is set within an ancient graveyard that looks more sparsely inhabited than it is, as has been demonstrated by recent probing surveys.

Reimagining the Govan Stones: placing archaeology at the heart of a Glasgow community

Govan Old Parish Church is home to one of the most significant collections of Viking Age carved stones in the British Isles, and recent fieldwork in the churchyard has revealed the presence of further examples buried beneath the turf. Carly Hilts spoke to Stephen Driscoll about the latest findings, and about an initiative to forge new connections between the church, its archaeological holdings, and the local community.

Below Excavation in progress in 2022 at the ‘Lost City of the Pyramid Builders’, in Giza, Egypt. Thirty five years after Ancient Egypt Research Associates initiated fieldwork here, an overview of the huge settlement is still coming together, and with it a much fuller understanding of the building of the pyramids.

Time to do it right

What Lehner’s team found was a far-flung complex of houses, storage galleries, kitchens, dormitories, and offices. The ‘Lost City of the Pyramid Builders’ saw light.

Knossos: seeking the labyrinth

Was the Minoan palace at Knossos the inspiration for myths about the Minotaur and its labyrinth lair? Delving into the archaeology of this monument and its environs reveals a reality every bit as remarkable as the ancient legends, as Andrew Shapland told Matthew Symonds.