Recent renovations at Durham Castle have revealed new details of how the fortification was redecorated and altered over its almost 1,000-year history. With the renovation of the castle presenting a rare opportunity to learn more about this World Heritage Site’s…
Africa’s oldest cremation? Archaeological investigations in the shadow of Mount Hora, in northern Malawi, have revealed the oldest evidence for human cremation yet found in Africa. The burial, which dates to c.9,500 years ago, was discovered at a rock-shelter site…
Excavations at the former Hafod–Morfa Copperworks have revealed rare evidence of copper-processing techniques used in the Lower Swansea Valley during the 19th century which, at its peak, accounted for an extraordinary amount of the world’s copper production. The Hafod Copperworks…
Ancient footprints are not the only archaeological discoveries that have been brought to light by recent winter storms. At the end of January, gale-force winds and massive waves revealed a large fragment of a 17th-century shipwreck on Studland Beach in…
A series of 2,000-year-old footprints have been unexpectedly revealed on an Angus beach following a barrage of winter storms. They add to only a handful of ancient human tracks that have been found across Britain to-date, and are the first…
Excavations at Wandlebury Country Park, just south of Cambridge, have uncovered a large burial pit containing the remains of at least ten individuals who died violently in the 8th- to 9th-century AD (below). The Department of Archaeology at the University…
New research examining the transition between the Iron Age and Romano-British period has shed new light on the detrimental impact of Roman occupation and urbanisation on population health. Previous studies had already highlighted the likely health consequences of ‘Romanisation’ in…
New heritage law for Jersey New legislation unanimously passed by the States of Jersey will make it compulsory to report archaeological finds to Jersey Heritage within a fortnight of their discovery, with those who fail to comply facing fines or…
In 1920, a collection of antiquities and antiques was thrown away, and most of its contents remain lost more than a century later. Martin A Timoney describes recent efforts to piece together clues to their whereabouts and appeals for more information.
Newly published analysis of 11,000-year-old fragments of human bone and teeth
from Heaning Wood Bone Cave in Cumbria has revealed that they belonged to
an early Mesolithic child. Carly Hilts reports.
A century ago, an Iron Age boat was found in Denmark. Now it is revealing new secrets. Amy Brunskill spoke to Mikael Fauvelle to find out more.
Archaeological investigations by an international team of researchers have unearthed the earliest evidence for intentional human cremation in Africa. Around 9,500 years ago, a community of hunter-gatherers gathered more than 30kg of wood and grass to build a large funeral…
Archaeological work at Eilsleben, in northern Germany, has uncovered unexpected evidence of connections between the early farmers living at this site and the pre-existing hunter-gatherer communities of the region. Eilsleben was discovered in the 1970s and has since undergone extensive…
A spectacular tomb associated with the ancient Zapotec civilisation has been uncovered on Cerro de la Cantera, in San Pablo Huitzo, Oaxaca, south-western Mexico. The burial was brought to the attention of archaeologists from INAH thanks to an anonymous report…
A basilica built by the pioneering Roman architect Vitruvius has been rediscovered in the city of Fano, in the Le Marche region of Italy. Marcus Vitruvius Pollio was born in Fanum Fortunae (modern-day Fano) in the 1st century BC and…
Analysis of quartz arrowheads from South Africa reveals that they may represent the earliest use of poison arrows in hunting. Researchers from Sweden and South Africa carried out gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC-MS) analysis of ten microliths discovered in the Umhlatuzana…
Singapore’s first shipwreck Underwater excavations have uncovered the first ancient shipwreck to be found in Singapore. The vessel, known as the Temasek Wreck, underwent several stages of investigation between 2016 and 2019, and the results of the research have now…
The walls of Pompeii are littered with messages left behind by the city’s inhabitants two millennia ago. Recent research is shedding new light on one of the richest concentrations of these ancient inscriptions.
Archaeologists have discovered four military mass graves from the 18th and 19th centuries during rescue excavations in advance of the construction of the D11 highway between the towns of Jaroměř and Trutnov in the Czech Republic. The first mass grave…
During World War II, a number of German armament factories were relocated underground as a result of Allied air raids. In August 1944, a work detail of the Buchenwald concentration camp was established near the village of Walbeck, in the…
The graves of three elite warriors, dating to the period of the Hungarian Conquest (AD 920s-930s), have been discovered near the village of Akasztó in southern Hungary. One of these burials, belonging to a 17- or 18-year-old warrior, is among…
When it first took to the skies in 1935, the Douglas TBD-1 Devastator represented a significant leap forward in aircraft design, with its all-metal construction and single low-mounted wing. It was the first plane type in the US fleet with…
A temporary export ban has been placed on a Union Flag that flew from HMS Royal Sovereign – the ship that led the British charge at the Battle of Trafalgar on 21 October 1805 – in order to allow time…
How did the builders of Stonehenge manage to work with sarsen – a notoriously hard material – to create the Neolithic monument’s towering trilithons? Carly Hilts spoke to Phil Harding of Wessex Archaeology about his recent research exploring whether flint-knapping techniques might hold the key.
First excavated in the 1970s and now mostly eroded into the sea, the settlement of Buckquoy in Orkney has frequently been used as an example of how the Pictish-Viking transition occurred in the Northern Isles. New radio-carbon dating of artefacts…
Apart from the Black Death, there is not another historical disease that piques public interest quite like syphilis. The question of whether the bacterium responsible was brought to Europe from the New World following the voyage of Christopher Columbus, or…
Analysis of a sediment core from Doggerland – the prehistoric landscape that once connected Britain to mainland Europe – has provided the clearest chronology yet for when this area became submerged beneath the North Sea, showing that the process of…
Historically, the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland did not permit the burial in consecrated ground of stillborn babies and infants who died before they could be baptised (a rule that ended with the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s). Instead,…
Excavations near Skipsea Castle in East Yorkshire have uncovered a series of high-status early medieval buildings, suggesting this site may have been a ‘lordly centre’. The project, which is led by Dr Elaine Jamieson and Dr Jim Leary from the…
Excavations at Harden Quarry, an active hard-rock quarry that is operated by Tarmac at Biddlestone in the Cheviot Hills of Northumberland National Park, has revealed a near complete view of Bronze Age life in this area: where people lived, where…
Excavations along the A66 in Cumbria are revealing how this area formed a vital corridor for transport, travel, and trade over millennia. After an initial evaluation in 2022-2024 and ahead of proposed upgrades to the route, Oxford Cotswold Archaeology (OCA,…
Monumental finds in Mexico Excavations at Aguada Fénix in Tabasco, south-east Mexico, have revealed a large complex that was constructed c.3,000 years ago, making it possibly the oldest Mayan monument ever discovered. The site was first identified during a LiDAR…
Tudor Heart saved for the nation The British Museum’s campaign to raise £3.5 million to acquire a heart shaped pendant bearing imagery associated with the court of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon has achieved its goal. Discovered by a…
New research published in the British Dental Journal (240, January 2026: 45-50) reveals that, although limited, ancient Egyptian and Graeco-Roman dentistry was surprisingly inventive. Prescriptions recorded in the medical papyri provide a fascinating glimpse into how dental care was approached…
Workshops from the Late Period and early Ptolemaic era have been discovered by an Egyptian-Italian (University of Padua) team working at the interconnected Kom al-Ahmar and Kom Wasit sites in the Western Delta (Beheira Governorate). The workshops consist of at…
Dr Hourig Sourouzian, Director of the Colossi of Memnon and Amenhotep III Temple Conservation Project in Luxor, was recently honoured by Sherif Fathy, the Minister of Tourism, for her outstanding contributions to the restoration of the mortuary temple. The ceremony…