Working with the National Trust and the Defence Archaeology Group’s Operation Nightingale, archaeologists from ULAS have recently undertaken an archaeological excavation at Reynard’s Kitchen, Dovedale, Derbyshire. The programme of controlled excavation work took place within a small cave set into the Dovedale gorge walls following the chance find of four Iron Age and Roman Republican…
Category: Projects
Rare decorated Iron Age chariot fittings found at Burrough Hill hillfort
University of Leicester archaeologists have made a ‘once-in-a-career’ discovery of the decorated bronze remains of an Iron Age chariot. A team from ULAS and the University’s School of Archaeology and Ancient History has unearthed a hoard of rare bronze fittings from a 2nd or 3rd century BC chariot which appears to have been buried as…
Exploring the ponds of Grace Dieu Priory, Leicestershire
This summer, ULAS carried out a small archaeological investigation of a large earthwork bank, part of a medieval/post-medieval fishpond, next to the ruins of Grace Dieu Priory in north-west Leicestershire. This was to try and explain why water is being lost from the pond so that the Friends of Grace Dieu Priory can implement repairs…
Iron Age and Roman occupation unearthed at the new Stamford AFC Stadium
Last year, ULAS undertook an archaeological excavation at the proposed new Stamford AFC stadium at Ryhall Road, north of Stamford, Lincolnshire. The work was commissioned by the Burghley House Preservation Trust with R G Carter as the main site contractor. Features discovered date to the late Iron Age and early Roman period. Two large boundary…
Iron Age settlement excavated near Lutterworth
During the autumn of 2013 ULAS carried out an archaeological excavation on land at Leaders Farm, on the south-western edge of Lutterworth in Leicestershire, for Bellway Homes (East Midlands) Ltd. prior to construction of a new residential development to be known as Whittle Fields. An evaluation carried out by ULAS in 2012 identified two areas containing…
Burrough Hill 2014
After five years, this summer saw the final season of excavations at Burrough Hill. John Thomas reports: this year, the Project aimed to tie up a few niggling questions that have developed over the years and have another look at the external settlement, previously looked at in 2011. Trench 10 was located in the centre…
‘Bloody will be thine end’ – Perimortem trauma in King Richard III
Today the fifth peer-reviewed paper on Richard III is published in The Lancet, providing a blow-by-blow account of the injuries inflicted on King Richard III’s body at the Battle of Bosworth Field on August 22, 1485. The remains of King Richard III—the last English monarch to die in battle—were found under a car park in…
Hallaton’s Lost Chapel
ULAS archaeologists have been working with local volunteers to uncover the lost chapel of St Morrell overlooking the small village of Hallaton in east Leicestershire. The Fourth year of excavations with the Hallaton Fieldwork Group (HFWG) has revealed the full plan of the chapel as well as the cemetery and evidence that the hillside has…
Icknield Way and Roman settlement excavated at Aston Clinton, Buckinghamshire
Over the summer, a team of archaeologists from ULAS led by Mathew Morris and Roger Kipling have been excavating a nine-acre site in Aston Clinton, Buckinghamshire. Commissioned by developers Taylor Wimpey, the work is being carried out before work begins on a new housing development. So far, the excavation has found evidence of Iron Age…
Evidence of Ice Age hunters found in Bradgate Park, Leicestershire
In February, Bradgate Park Trust commissioned ULAS to investigate remains found at the Little Matlock Gorge site – a project that, by its conclusion two weeks later has revealed that Ice Age hunters targeted Bradgate Park as an ideal hunting ground. The gradual erosion of a footpath at the eastern end of the site in…
Roman ‘smoke-house’ found at Pineham, Northamptonshire
From April to November 2013 one of the largest (7.5ha) single-phase ULAS excavations took place at Pineham, Northamptonshire. Directed by James Harvey and Dr Gavin Speed the site is located in the Nene Valley, 4km south-west of Northampton. The excavation revealed evidence for human activity from Upper Palaeolithic artefacts through to post-medieval ploughing, with the…
Iron Age activity found near Broughton Astley
Roger Kipling has recently completed a 71 trench evaluation of two areas to the east and west of Broughton Way at Broughton Astley, Leicestershire. As anticipated by a previously undertaken geophysical survey, a small ditched enclosure of Iron Age date was located in the central eastern area. Its fourth (eastern) side was absent, likely due…
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