News Round Up

Whether they chronicle the victories of the Second World War or highlight how close we were to disaster in the Cold War, these top-secret underground locations have fascinating stories to tell. Here are some of our favourites. Churchill War Rooms…

Extreme weather has exposed the wreck of a ship, believed to have sunk 150 years ago off the coast of North Wales. Storms in July at Pensarn Beach, Abergele, removed the sandbanks covering the wreck, revealing the ship lying on its keel near a tidal…

Let’s consult the oracle… National Museum of Scotland explores a fascinating collection of Chinese oracle bones For reasons yet to be fully understood, the ancient Chinese practice of oracle bone divination fell into obscurity with the demise of the…

You can now sift through the visitors to Winston Churchill’s house Chartwell via a digitised version of Winston’s visitors book As you might imagine, the visitor’s book at Winston Churchill’s country pile, Chartwell in Kent, is filled to bursting…

A stunning collection of 19th century figureheads from Royal Navy ships is heading back to Plymouth where they were made A series of once proud and colourful ship’s figureheads have been saved from decay and are now heading to their new home in a…

This a handsome and well-researched volume on the history and archaeology of the German High Seas Fleet. It presents the results of the latest underwater survey techniques. The post Review – Scapa 1919: the archaeology of a scuttled fleet appeared…

Once a year here at the ADS we let all of our cats free for a week into the world. There they do whatever fills their little hearts with joy. Playing with mice, relaxing in the warmth of monitors, and making changes to facilitate better archival of…

GÖTTINGEN, GERMANY—Science Magazine reports that 31 objects thought to have belonged to one warrior have been found in a cache in northeastern Germany’s Tollense Valley, where an intense battle was fought by as many as 2,000 warriors some 3,300…

VINKOVCI, CROATIA—Total Croatia News reports that a two-wheeled chariot and the remains of harnessed horses were discovered in a burial mound in eastern Croatia, in what was the Roman province of Pannonia. Boris Kratofil of the Museum of Vinkovci…

OULU, FINLAND—Maxime Pelletier of the University of Oulu and his colleagues analyzed more than 16,000 butchered rabbit and hare bones uncovered at France’s Pié Lombard site, according to a Cosmos Magazine report. Pelletier said the bones, which were…

NARBONNE, FRANCE—According to an Art Daily report, a team of researchers from France's National Institute of Preventive Archaeological Research (INRAP) are investigating a 2,100-year-old necropolis in southern France that was buried under nearly 10…

August saw the first ever archaeological excavation to be carried out at the iconic north Wales prehistoric coastal fort of Dinas Dinlle, owned by the National Trust. The hillfort, which is mentioned in the Welsh legends of the Mabinogi, is being…

This report describes excavations by MOLA (Museum of London Archaeology) on the edge of Daventry. The archaeology was concentrated in three areas, each remarkably different in character. The post Review – Early Neolithic, Iron Age, and Roman…

CAIRO, EGYPT—The Associated Press reports that more than 20 painted wooden coffins were discovered in the Al-Asasif necropolis, which is located on Luxor’s West Bank, at the ancient town of West Thebes. Mostafa Waziri of the Supreme Council of…

SENDAI, JAPAN—The Mainichi reports that stone wall foundations that may have been part of an original route leading to Sendai Castle’s Tatsumi Gate have been unearthed in northeastern Japan. Completed in A.D. 1637, the castle served as an…

BRITISH COLUMBIA, CANADA—According to a Cosmos Magazine report, Ginevra Toniello of Simon Fraser University and her colleagues examined paleoecological, archaeological, and modern records of butter clams (Saxidomus gigantean) living in the northern…

The enjoyment of food and drink, the essence of life, was deeply ingrained in Roman society. Beyond mere nutrition, food and wine played vital roles in people’s social lives, business lives, spiritual lives, and afterlives. We have details about…

Excavations in a once-forgotten city are bringing its inhabitants’ stories to light, as Oliver Gilkes reveals. The wide, high, rolling plains and hills of Kosovo are a sudden change from the soaring peaks and rugged hills of the Balkan Mountains.…

This is a thoroughly revised, weighty second edition, and can be regarded as a companion piece to Richard Bradley’s recently co-authored and more broadly focused The Later Prehistory of North-west Europe (2015). This book concentrates on those few…

The most recent season of surveying at Brú na Bóinne in County Meath, Ireland, has proven very successful, identifying 40 previously unrecorded structures (one is pictured below) and demonstrating just how prominent this landscape was throughout…