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The Potteries Museum & Art Gallery in Stoke-on-Trent has secured a rare Bronze Age solid gold dress fastener. The 3,000-year-old jewel with trumpet terminals is one of only seven found in England and Wales, and it’s the first to be found in Britain in over 30 years. It is the first to be found in … Read the full post →“Another local museum acquires Bronze Age gold”

Like many people, I’ve been reading Pope Leo XIV’s first Encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas. It is long, it is expansive, and in many ways, it is daunting. Time will tell whether it is a worthy successor to Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum (1891), but it certainly continues (explicitly) in that tradition. There are already quite a few… Read More →

An exceptional Roman gold ring with an intaglio stone depicting a winged Victory driving a two-horse chariot has been acquired by the South West Heritage Trust and will become part of the permanent collection at The Museum of Somerset. The ring is heavy at 48 grams and is decorated with abstract openwork patterns, niello enamel … Read the full post →“Museum snags Roman gold ring with chariot intaglio”

This week has been pretty slow. I had this plan to write a very ambitious paper that would weave together various Roman period features and finds from the area E.F2 at Polis. As the article took shape — complete with catalogues, stratigraphic descriptions, and comparanda for the various features — it crept toward 25,000 words.… Read More →

During this current academic year I’ve started completing a part-time MA in History. It’s been great being able to learn new things again, whilst also attempting to write essays; although, I’ve struggled at times juggling the course along with work and other commitments. My current module focuses on German history from 1870 to 1945, and […]

My interest in Roman lamps has not grown over the last few years where I’ve been studying them (albeit in a rather desultory way). As readers of this blog know, we have a lamp deposit from Polis and have been working to say something about this odd little assemblage of lamps. The most unusual thing… Read More →

Two babies buried in ancient Roman York were wrapped in cloth of Tyrian purple with gold thread, the apex of luxury in the Roman world. This is the first discovery of the sumptuous purple dye, worth three times the cost of gold, in York, and one of only a few examples found anywhere in the … Read the full post →“Infants in Roman York buried in Tyrian purple”

A finely carved ivory double comb from the 12th century has gone on display at the LWL Museum of Archaeology and Culture in Herne, Germany. One of only 60 known examples, the comb is what is known as a liturgical comb, and the only one ever found in the region of North Rhine-Westphalia. The comb … Read the full post →“Rare Ivory comb returns to Westphalia for exhibition”

It goes without saying that I’m listening to Sonny Rollins and Miles Davis this week. The passing of Sonny Rollins led me to listen to his great album Saxophone Colossus (1957). It’s may well be the greatest hard bop album ever recorded. Everyone knows it, but it’s always worth hearing again: As readers of this… Read More →