The archaeological excavations in advance of A14 Road Improvement Scheme in Cambridgeshire are among the biggest and most complex ever undertaken in the UK, revealing important archaeology of prehistoric, Roman, early medieval and medieval date.The fifty finds in this book have been chosen for the stories they tell us. These artefacts are often the only evidence for many of the thousands of people who lived here before us. Some stand out as beautiful or rare, treasured heirlooms left as grave goods for the dead. Others tell us about ancient industry, and the lives of ordinary people from prehistory to today. Between them, we get a glimpse into the diversity of Cambridgeshire’s ancient past, and the vast scale of the A14 scheme.

In 1979, a pipe trench at the military airbase RAF Lakenheath in the historic parish of Eriswell, Suffolk, revealed the presence of possible inhumation graves of the Early Anglo-Saxon period not far from the group of 33 burials excavated in the 1950s and published as the cemetery of Little Eriswell. Extensive redevelopment starting in the late 1990s led to the excavation of what appears to be a remarkable group of three discrete but contemporary burial grounds in close proximity, here labelled the West, Central and East sites — the latter including the Little Eriswell graves. While it is not certain that the Central and East burial grounds are fully separate, these two areas do differ markedly in layout and focus and in aspects of grave furnishing. Burial began in the West site with cremation around the middle of the 5th century. All three burial grounds were used for inhumation from the second half of the 5th to the late 6th century. For a further century, only the West site remained in use; this site was abandoned in the late 7th century when burial commenced at a ‘Middle Anglo-Saxon’ cemetery 300m to the south at Lord’s Walk. By the late 6th century the size of the burying population had apparently fallen by as much as 80%, from a hundred or more to maybe only twenty. The quality of the archaeological evidence allows for detailed examination and reconstruction of burial practice in terms of grave structure and how the bodies were laid in them. Soil conditions create some variance in skeletal preservation, but generally good survival reveals a naturally structured community, and allows for observation of its pathologies. Isotope and pioneering aDNA analyses identify an essentially local population but with one early female grave that is credibly that of a 5th-century immigrant from across the North Sea, and also demonstrating cross-generational descent within the community. The grave goods illustrate social differentiation, primarily by sex and age although exceptionally richly furnished and elaborately constructed graves such as the horse and ‘warrior’ burial embody additional status differentials. A series of expert scientific analyses have been targeted at revealing how this community made use of the principal resources available to it; how it could live and function in this topographical niche at this period. It is clearly demonstrated that there is a very solid foundation in all of the evidence from this site for continuing specialised research, not least as new techniques of analysis and research perspectives develop.

Des spécialistes de l’ensemble de l’Europe décrivent les enjeux politiques et scientifiques auxquelles a présidé la fondation des musées d’archéologie entre 1848 et 1914. Au travers de personnalités éminentes, le livre restitue un tour d’horizon européen des institutions muséales abritant les vestiges issus du sol. Au-delà d’une histoire de l’institution, il s’agit de montrer comment une pensée politique et des conceptions historiques se sont retrouvées reflétées dans les musées, en retraçant aussi bien une histoire scientifique que toute une société savante et l’esprit d’une époque. Entre hier et aujourd’hui, quels musées au sein d’une même nation, quelles réalités et quelles politiques ? Les musées d’archéologie doivent-ils toujours raconter l’histoire de la nation, et quelle histoire ? Comment gèrent-ils la contradiction qui pèse entre la recherche scientifique, en perpétuelle interrogation, et le désir de se rattacher à des racines ancrées dans un socle identitaire stable ? Aujourd’hui au cœur d’un nouveau paysage des musées d’archéologie, réel ou idéal, ces questions sont également abordées.English abstractSpecialists from across Europe describe the political and scientific challenges that accompanied the foundation of archaeological museums between 1848 and 1914. Through eminent personalities, the book provides a European overview of museum institutions housing artifacts derived from the ground. Beyond the history of the institution, the aim is to demonstrate how political thought and historical conceptions found reflection in museums, tracing not only a scientific history but also an entire scholarly society and the spirit of an era.Between the past and the present, which museums exist within a nation, what realities, and what policies? Should archaeological museums always narrate the history of the nation, and which history should that be? How do they manage the contradiction that arises from the perpetual questioning of scientific research and the desire to connect with roots firmly entrenched in a stable identity? Today, at the heart of a new landscape of archaeological museums, whether real or ideal, these questions are also addressed.

The research presented in this book results from an international interdisciplinary research program in Hayonim cave (Israel) from 1992 to 2000, directed by Prof O. Bar-Yosef (Harvard University) and L. Meignen (CNRS, France), and focusing on a long archaeological sequence dated to circa 300-140 000 years ago. The intensive fieldwork and research following it allowed us to document an essential period of human history in the Levant: the end of the Lower Palaeolithic and Early Middle Palaeolithic, during which recent discoveries showed that the early H. sapiens, expanding out of Africa, reached SW Asia around 180-190 000 y ago.This book brings together the impressive findings of nine years of excavations and analysis by an interdisciplinary team of well-known scholars from US universities (Harvard, Boston, University of Arizona), Weizmann Institute (Israel) as well as from the French CNRS.Several complementary approaches are implemented to understand early human economic, cultural and behavioral changes observed at this crucial period. It is based on detailed studies of lithic artifact technology, the remains of systematic fire use and cave occupation by early humans, and foraging strategies that include the early development of human adaptations for hunting large prey. In the context of the highly debated cultural break observed at the end of the Lower Palaeolithic, we propose new interpretations based on these innovative results.This volume will provide a cornerstone for the history of humankind in a critical geographic region, at the crossroads between Africa and Eurasia.

As central places of human interaction, cities influence the reality of our lives like no other phenomenon. They are in a highly complex, reciprocal relationship with changing environmental, social, political, economic and religious constellations. Accordingly, the demands placed on cities and the ideas associated with them are often subject to highly dynamic change. Especially against the backdrop of increasingly rapid urbanisation, shaping this change is one of today’s central challenges and it deserves a prominent position in public discourse.The booklet “Urban Design” aims to show the complexity of this discourse. It invites reflection on the possibilities of designing cities and their impact on the present and the future. To this end, it brings together contributions from very different disciplines, each of which provides their own perspectives on the phenomenon of the city.A basic idea here is that contemporary cities cannot be designed without a deeper understanding of their historical dimension. On a practical level, this entails the (selective) visualisation of the archaeological cultural heritage, with its implications for identity politics. But its is also concerned with the dependence of historical city images on contemporary discourses, for example, religious ideas and their political utilisation or literary imaginations of the urban.Moreover, the booklet also wants to inquire about the direct effects of material urban design on the residents. For instance, design characteristics influence orientation and movement in urban space and thus determine the movement options of handicapped and elderly people. The urban environment also has a direct impact on human health.The extent to which current discourses on environmental problems and climate change are changing the requirements for urban design is exemplified by contributions on the topics of transport and climate-neutral construction. It is to be expected that innovative ideas in these areas, in particular, will change the appearance of the cities of the future in the long term.

Silchester (Calleva) experienced major disruption in the late first century A.D. as the Iron Age oppidum was transformed into the Roman city responsible for the administration of the civitas of the Atrebates. Aligned on the cardinal points, a rectilinear street grid was laid across the settlement replacing the late Iron Age network of streets and lanes oriented north-west/south-east and north-east/south-west. While the pre-existing property boundaries within Insula IX were retained there was a total re-build within them. The excavated area contained one complete property and fragments of three of its neighbours. Rather than conform to the new grid all the buildings were constructed at 45 degrees to it, reasserting the late Iron Age orientations. The timber-framed buildings within the complete property consisted of a row of three — a rectangular kitchen, a town-house and a roundhouse — separated by a yard from a re-built taberna, also diagonal to the street on which it fronted. The surgical and writing instruments associated with the circular building suggested it functioned as a healer’s and/or teacher’s house. This volume completes the publication of the excavations in Insula IX, 1997–2014.

Hala Ghellali was eighteen years old when her father first took her to the market to buy her first silver bracelets. They visited traditional jewelers in the madina al-qadima, the old walled city of Tripoli. This single event in 1975, ignited her lifelong passion for traditional jewelry and costume items and she has been collecting objects and stories ever since. Her unique stories, personal observations, research and firsthand information about jewelry design and silversmithing fill this book. ‘Jewelry and adornment of Libya' aims to share with its readers a lifetime passion for the jewelry made in Tripoli and other areas of Libya. It includes a section dedicated solely to the role of jewelry and costume in Tripoli with narratives of traditional weddings, and traditions linked to jewelry gifting in the city. The book is dedicated to the local jewelers and masters of weaving and embroidery who have almost all disappeared, their art and skills not being passed on to the present generation.

A prequel to his ‘World’s end’: British military outposts in the ‘ring fence’ around Australia 1824–1849, this book by prize-winning historian and keen sailor Alan Powell celebrates the small ships of Australia’s colonial navy. Brigs, cutters, schooners and sloops were pressed into service in a rag-tag assembly of ‘seagoing maids of all work’, cramped and overloaded with provisions, building materials, livestock and even convicts. The crews of these ‘doughty little craft’ sailed with courage and often blind faith in their ultimate survival as they toiled through some of the world’s most treacherous seas to deliver life-preserving supplies to the military outposts that ringed Australia in the early nineteenth century.

The Beaker People: isotopes, mobility and diet in prehistoric Britain presents the results of a major project that sought to address a century-old question about the people who were buried with Beakers a – the distinctive pottery of Continental origin that was current, predominantly in equally distinctive burials, in Britain from around 2450 BC. Who were these people? Were they immigrants and how far did they move around? What did they eat? What was their lifestyle? How do they compare with Britain’s earlier inhabitants and with contemporaries who did not use Beaker pottery? An international team of leading archaeologists and scientists, led by Professor Mike Parker Pearson, was assembled to address these questions.Around 300 skeletons were subjected to isotope analysis to explore patterns of mobility and diet, and 150 new radiocarbon dates were obtained. Dental microwear was examined for 64 individuals to provide further information about the food they had eaten, and new information on the sex and age of 201 people obtained. A comparative study was undertaken of the shape and size of Beaker users’ skulls and those of Neolithic people in the Peak District of England, to examine the long-held claim that there was a switch from long-headed to round-headed people with the appearance of Beakers. Tantalizing evidence for head-binding among Neolithic people was found. The range of objects found in Beaker graves was reviewed.In addition, the Beaker People Project was able to incorporate the results of another project, focusing on Beaker users in north-east Scotland (The Beakers and Bodies Project) along with other recently obtained data, including ancient DNA results. Overall, new light has been shed on 369 people: 333 Beaker and non-Beaker users from the core 2500–1500 BC period, along with 17 from the Neolithic and 19 from after 1500 BC. While the genetic data provide convincing evidence for immigration by Continental Beaker users, the isotopic data indicate a more detailed picture of movements, mostly of fairly short distances within Britain, by the descendants of the first Beaker users. This lavishly illustrated book presents a body of data that will be vital to studies of Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age Britain for decades to come.

The Hadrian’s Wall Community Archaeology Project (WallCAP) conducted a series of fieldwork projects along the Hadrian’s Wall corridor between 2019 and 2021. The work focused on sites that were poorly understood or under particular threat and aimed to improve understanding of them so they could be better managed in future. At several sites excavation was followed by conservation and consolidation work. This volume brings together the final reports of these excavations, at seven Roman sites in the Wall corridor. As the sites were spread along the length of the Wall the character and afterlife of the Wall in very different landscape locations could be compared. An assessment of the Vallum at Heddon on the Wall identified how earthwork archaeology survived in a sloped, heavily ploughed landscape. Three excavations investigated the condition of the stone Wall curtain at Port Carlisle, Walltown Crags, and Steel Rigg and Cats Stairs. At each site the Wall builders had responded to the demands of the local terrain and made use of local resources. It is also clear how at each site the Wall had a different post-Roman history. Excavations at the bridging point of the Cam Beck revealed for the first time how the Wall was carried over a ‘minor’ watercourse, and discovered traces of the Turf Wall. Small buildings were also identified just south of the Wall as it approached the bridge. At Corbridge Roman town, excavations on the northern periphery of the settlement demonstrated that from early in its history the most northerly town in Europe was of considerable extent. The area investigated showed that, even at the edge of town, shops lined the roads alongside well-appointed houses with bustling yards. Later on in the Roman period the town contracted behind walls and cremation burials were inserted by the road.Each site is reported on independently, presenting the primary data for each investigation. The volume concludes with a synthetic analysis of what the results of these excavations together reveal about Hadrian’s Wall, considering, amongst other things, construction details and the decay and destruction of the monument in the centuries following Roman occupation.

Initial remote sensing survey at Tlachtga, Co. Meath in 2011–12 highlighted the presence of multiple, partially overlapping phases of enclosure at the site. Three subsequent seasons of excavation provided critical interpretive evidence, with over 15,000 fragments of animal bone, human remains, charred plant material, evidence of metalworking, and a hoard of Anglo-Saxon silver coins dating to the late 10th century AD. The main activity at the site spans four broad periods and two main phases of monumental construction: a late Bronze Age to early Iron Age ‘Hillfort Phase’ (1100–400 BC) and a late Iron Age to early medieval (AD 400–600) ringfort phase associated with a smaller foundation enclosure – the ‘Southern Enclosure’. This ringfort phase was remodelled later in the early medieval period (9th–10th century AD) and augmented by a phase of mound construction in the mid-10th century AD. This is contemporary with the deposition of the coin hoard east of the main complex in an apparent craft-working area. The final phase of the central mound indicates the construction of a timber stockade, most likely in the 12th century, again with significant craft activity.This volume represents the excavation of at least four loci within the broader monumental landscape of Tlachtga, charting its progression from Bronze Age hillfort to pre-Anglo Norman power display mound.The excavations at the Hill of Ward and this publication were made possible through funding by the National Monuments Service via the Royal Irish Academy archaeological research excavation grants, and by Meath County Council, with additional support by the Office of Public Works and the Heritage Council.

A few scatters of Mesolithic and Neolithic flint were found across the development area. Slightly more extensive evidence for Neolithic occupation was represented by a small number of pits from which flint-tempered Neolithic pottery, worked flint, charred plant remains and animal bone were recovered. During the later Bronze Age and Iron Age the first permanent settlements were established. They were characterized by post-built circular structures, pits and cremation burials. Settlement began in the river valley and the western edge of the clay plateau but during the Iron Age settlement shifted onto the clay plateau with eh creation of a five-sided enclosure. By the Late Iron Age and Roman period a farmstead and managed fields were established. This farmstead has been defined as a complex-type farmstead and seems to have been involved in the large-scale production of spelt. Limited evidence was identified for Saxon activity but a few features, including the remains of a tree-lined avenue, may have been associated with the 17th century Hadham and Wickham Halls which were owned by the Capel family. This volume describes the archaeological remains as well as the artefacts and ecofactual material recovered from the excavations.

This volume collects different case studies of rediscovery of Christian antiquities between 1860-1930 in Spain, in order to stimulate reflections about the impact of these rediscoveries on our culture in a period of great political transition.By turning the light on lesser-known stories on a national horizon, this book gives a strong contribution to the history of Christian archaeology. All articles deal with many topics of the field (museology, cultural heritage protection law, history of religion, field archaeology), and therefore offer a strong interdisciplinary cut. This book is second product of the international online workshop series “Revealing Christian Heritage. Talks on the rediscovery of Christian archaeology between 1860-1930”.

In 2020 and 2021 the Research Group on Storage in Ancient Egypt and Sudan organised two online workshops focusing on earthen storage buildings in ancient Egypt and Nubia. Following these two meetings, the nine contributions of this volume present often unpublished case studies (from the IVth millennium BCE to the Greco-Roman Period), as well as issues and perspectives of current research. They are authored by archaeologists working in Egypt, Sudan and Western Africa as well as architects specialised in earthen architecture. The interdisciplinary approach adopted to investigate storage strategies along the ancient Nile Valley effectively address the subject’s complexity and the socioeconomic issues involved, which not only pertain to the ancient world but are also relevant to modern-day societies. Throughout the volume, functional and technical analysis of the architectural and archaeological remains helps understand how specific layouts, building materials and techniques were employed in the past to create suitable conditions for short-, medium- and long-term storage. Ethnographic and ethnoarchaeological comparisons with West African vernacular traditions are used as a fruitful line of research for better understand of building practices, storage strategies and possible volumes of archaeological remains. Furthermore, extending the scope of the research to other geographical areas shows how different human groups may have used similar responses to overcome similar technical problems. Ancient and traditional practices and know-how, on the other hand, proved effective in a contemporary onion storehouse project in Senegal to find sustainable, low-cost solutions to protection and development of local products.The volume also include the preliminary results of an experimental archaeology project which led to the construction of a mud-brick silo – according to ancient Egyptian techniques – and further ensiling. The issue is highly topical since these ancient earthen facilities offer valuable information for the current debates on sustainable strategies for foodstuff storage.

In the final decades of the twentieth century, the advent of evolutionary developmental biology (evo-devo) offered a revolutionary new perspective that transformed the classical neo-Darwinian, gene-centered study of evolution. In The Architecture of Evolution, Marco Tamborini demonstrates how this radical innovation was made possible by the largely forgotten study of morphology. Despite the key role morphology played in the development of evolutionary biology since the 1940s, the architecture of organisms was excluded from the Modern Evolutionary Synthesis. And yet, from the beginning of the twentieth century to the 1970s and ’80s, morphologists sought to understand how organisms were built and how organismal forms could be generated and controlled. The generation of organic form was, they believed, essential to understanding the mechanisms of evolution. Tamborini explores how the development of evo-devo and the recent organismal turn in biology involved not only the work of morphologists but those outside the biological community with whom they exchanged their data, knowledge, and practices. Together with architects and engineers, they worked to establish a mathematical and theoretical basis for the study of organic form as a mode of construction, developing and reinterpreting important notions that would play a central role in the development of evolutionary developmental biology in the late 1980s. This book sheds light not only on the interdisciplinary basis for many of the key concepts in current developmental biology but also on contributions to the study of organic form outside the English-speaking world.PRAISE"Marco Tamborini’s book is a much-needed history of morphological thought in the twentieth century. It provides an engaging intellectual journey, leading us through biology, architecture, philosophy, engineering, mathematics, politics, and art. This is a highly original contribution that shows how the science of form emerged from an international and interdisciplinary enterprise." ~Maurizio Esposito, University of Lisbon, Portugal

This book is a general introduction to archaeological site management and museology in Egypt. It was written with the aim to let archaeologists and site managers preserve the archaeological heritage in their care for future generations and present it in a meaningful way to the public. The book is a useful tool for anyone working in the field of heritage management. It is also a direct reflection of the site management and museological training projects that were organized between 2017 and 2020 by the Embassy of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Cairo and the Netherlands-Flemish Institute in Cairo (NVIC) for the Egyptian Ministry of Antiquities (MoA) and several heritage professionals from Egypt and the Netherlands.