urban development

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Cambridge Past, Present & Future

Starting with the opening of the UK’s first science park in 1970, Cambridge has grown from the sleepy market town of 60 years ago into an internationally renowned centre of technical research and innovation at the centre of a metropolis…

Pilgrimage cities

Ritual practices have been part of human life for almost as long as we can trace archaeological remains. The supernatural and inexplicable attract, excite, and worry people, with religion and its associated rituals being one of the main ways through which humans try to make sense of the world, create structure, and seek support

Roman Chester: Excavating the CA archive

Roman Chester – Deva Victrix – is one of the unquestioned ‘great sites’ of Roman Britain. This was a major military centre from its late 1st-century AD origins through to its abandonment in the late 4th/early 5th centuries AD, and significant parts of the town survive beneath the medieval and modern city.

Saving Saranda

Strictly speaking Saranda cannot be saved. When I first came here in September 1993, a year after Albania became a democracy, it was a blissful Ionian seaport. Many of its citizens had left for Greece, so it felt empty, yet…

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A wonder of the world: Wandering along London’s post-medieval waterfront

What can the combination of archaeology, documents, maps, and plans tell us about London’s port in the period between the Great Fire of 1666 and the shift of shipping activity downstream of the City, following the opening of the West India Dock in 1801? A new and highly readable publication brings together the evidence from four sites excavated by the Museum of London between 1974 and 1984, allowing us an insight into the area around London Bridge when it served as the focal point of London’s commercial waterfront. Chris Catling reports.

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.

Wren 300

In CA 373, we lamented the lack of a society ready to take on the task of managing the tercentenary of the death of Sir Christopher Wren. Fortunately, the Georgian Group has put on the mantle of chief co-ordinator of…

Below The Piazza del Campo in Siena. On the right is the city hall, the Palazzo Pubblico, with its distinctive pointed arches. The angular brick façade in the background on the left belongs to the Basilica di San Francesco.

Siena’s medieval monuments

As the Tuscan city of Siena grew in prosperity, its citizens made their mark through magnificent art and architecture, from aristocratic towers to allegorical frescoes. Historian Jane Stevenson takes us on a tour of its medieval monuments.

Left The River Great Stour weaves its way through the centre of Canterbury, creating a much photographed vista from the High Street, where it is overlooked by the five gables of the building known as The Weavers. It is a former Huguenot workshop, with a much restored exterior but a genuine 17th century interior frame.

Lessons from Canterbury: saving heritage with new approaches to urban development

Influential figures in the heritage world are concerned about the scale and height of new buildings proposed for the centre of Canterbury, where the primacy of the cathedral as a focal point of views and the intimacy of historic streets are under threat. Chris Catling reports on a manifesto for the city produced by SAVE Britain’s Heritage, warning against the mistakes of post-war development and recommending a new approach that has lessons for many of our towns and cities.

Street Furniture

Review by AB. The term ‘street furniture’ encompasses a wide range of everyday objects that are found along roads and in towns and cities around the world, from manhole covers and postboxes to bus stops and cabman’s shelters. In this…

BELOW Leicester’s north eastern quarter as it might have looked in the late 3rd century, when the Romano British city’s population was at its maximum. Looking south west, the view takes in a large grey roofed courtyard building and the forum, basilica, and market beyond. Farming and industrial processes are taking place within the city walls, and there are several building sites, showing a city that remains in flux.

Reinventing Ratae: exploring Roman and medieval Leicester

Nearly 50 years of excavations have explored much of Leicester’s north-eastern quarter – and now a newly published thematic volume, Life in Roman and medieval Leicester, draws together the results from these extensive investigations. Covering such a large area, and a time span that starts with the late Iron Age and carries through to the Norman Conquest and beyond, the report looks at the cycles of growth and decline in the life of the town and draws out the similarities and differences between the Roman and medieval settlement, as Chris Catling reports.

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The lost city of al-Qata’i‘

Just decades after it was founded, ibn Tulun’s capital al-Qata’i‘ was razed to the ground. The Great Mosque of ibn Tulun, the oldest mosque in Africa to survive in its original form, still stands in Cairo today, and through its magnificent architecture offers a chance to encounter the former glory of al-Qata’i‘. Nigel Fletcher-Jones is our guide to this lost city.