The JiscMail Britarch forum closed on the 3rd April 2023. As closure approached without any replacment materialising, this webpage was created by Mike Haseler together with the forum. However things got strange: not only did the CBA shut down the old Britarch discussion forum, but posts informing users about new site(s) were blocked. That led to ...
A collection of more than 800 Iron Age artefacts found in a North Yorkshire field will go on public display for the first time.
The Melsonby Hoard is believed to be one of the UK's largest finds from the period, and, following a fundraising campaign, was acquired by the Yorkshire Museum.
The collection, which features chariot wheels, cauldrons and spears, will displayed in an exhibition at the museum in York from May onwards.
Posted on 11 February 2026 | 8:22 pm
The British Museum has successfully raised £3.5m to keep a gold pendant linked to King Henry VIII's marriage to his first wife, Katherine (also Catherine) of Aragon.
The central London museum launched a fundraising appeal in October so it could permanently acquire the Tudor Heart, found by a metal detectorist in a Warwickshire field in 2019.
It has now announced that it reached its fundraising goal after receiving £360,000 in public donations and a string of donations from grants, trusts and arts organisations.
Museum director Nicholas Cullinan said: "The success of the campaign shows the power of history to spark the imagination and why objects like the Tudor Heart should be in a museum."
Posted on 10 February 2026 | 2:02 pm
Part of a historic shipwreck has been revealed on a beach in the wake of Storm Chandra.
The exposed timbers were discovered at the National Trust-owned Studland Bay, in Dorset, on 28 January.
Maritime archaeologists from Bournemouth University believe it forms a missing piece of the Swash Channel wreck that was first discovered in the 1990s in a key shipping approach to Poole Harbour.
It is thought that the wreck is most likely the Fame from Hoorn, an armed Dutch merchant ship that ran aground and sank in 1631.
Posted on 9 February 2026 | 2:05 pm
A rare terracotta Roman head has been unearthed during excavations by volunteers and archaeologists at a fort in Northumberland.
Rinske de Kok and Hilda Gribbin made the striking find while digging at Magna Roman Fort's northern defences.
Measuring 78 mm (3 ins) by 67 mm (2.6ins), the remnant depicts an unknown but regal-looking female figure with a centrally parted, four-strand plaited hairstyle - with some experts suggesting it could be a goddess.
Linsay Allason-Jones, a roman artefact specialist, said the find appeared to be "a practice piece made by an inexpert hand" which was likely made at the fort, near Haltwhistle.
She said while terracotta face pots are common in Roman Britain, free-standing heads are rare, and recalled a second, more accomplished terracotta head found at the Magna site in the 19th century.
Posted on 7 February 2026 | 12:33 pm
The skeleton of a young 6ft 5in-tall (1.9m) Viking-era man who had undergone trepanation has been found in a mass grave.
A hole had been bored in his skull while he was alive. It had signs of healing before his remains were flung into a burial pit with nine other men, some dismembered.
Bone expert Dr Trish Biers suspects he had suffered from a pituitary gland tumour "causing headaches that the trepanning may have been an attempt to alleviate".
The grisly discoveries were found during a University of Cambridge training dig just outside the city last year and will feature on BBC Two's Digging for Britain.
Posted on 4 February 2026 | 8:51 am
The National Trust has said it has raised £330,000 in 60 days to buy land surrounding the Cerne Abbas Giant.
The target was set in December to help fund the £2m purchase of 138 hectares (341 acres) around the ancient naked figure in Dorset.
The trust said gifts of up to £32,000 had been received from countries across the world, including Australia and Japan.
Posted on 3 February 2026 | 4:23 pm