Archaeology

The rewards of ruin

Societal downfalls loom large in history and popular culture but, for the 99 per cent, collapse often had its upsides

Luke Kemp

At a prehistoric pigment mine, researchers glimpse our earliest moments in the Americas

25 minutes

Animals taught us culture

Prehistoric humans didn’t create art and architecture out of nothing. They took inspiration from the nonhuman world

Sarah Newman

Deep time and the revenant

In enigmatic burials, crafted to bind the bodies within, we can see how truly ancient our fears of the undead must be

Rebecca Batley

Vikings on the Silk Roads

The Norse ravaged much of Europe for centuries. They were also cosmopolitan explorers who followed trade winds into the Far East

Neil Price

What’s an ancient Greek brick doing in a Sumerian city? An archeological investigation

16 minutes

What did the first people who entered Tutankhamun’s tomb see?

5 minutes

There are fragments of Romani Gypsy history all over the UK – if one knows where to look

3 minutes

How researchers finally solved the puzzle of the oldest known map of the world

18 minutes

Beyond kingdoms and empires

A revolution in archaeology is transforming our picture of past populations and the scope of human freedoms

David Wengrow

Why make art in the dark?

New research transports us back to the shadowy firelight of ancient caves, imagining the minds and feelings of the artists

Izzy Wisher

The secret life of Druids

The Greeks and Romans portrayed these elusive priests as bogeymen who bathed in their victims’ blood. Who were they really?

Miranda Aldhouse-Green

The horrors of Pompeii

The name ‘Eutychis’ was etched into a wall 2,000 years ago. Finding out who she was illuminates the dark side of Rome

Guy D Middleton

Children of the Ice Age

With the help of new archaeological approaches, our picture of young lives in the Palaeolithic is now marvellously vivid

April Nowell

What the tablets say

Some 3,700 years ago, an enslaved girl, a barber, and a king crossed paths in a city by the Euphrates. This is their story

Amanda H Podany

The other Cleopatra

Daughter of Cleopatra and Mark Antony, she became the influential queen of a mysterious, abundant North African kingdom

Jane Draycott

From Roman pots to glass eyes, the shore of the river Thames teems with surprises

8 minutes

Finding the First Americans

Archaeology and genetics can’t yet agree on when humans first arrived in the Americas. That’s good science and here’s why

Jennifer Raff

The pharaoh’s trumpet

The truly wondrous treasures of Tutankhamun’s tomb are not made of gold. They are the mundane things of everyday life

Toby Wilkinson

Ancient Greek sculptures were colourful. Why does the white marble ideal persist?

6 minutes