Ice Age ‘megafauna’ remains including a mammoth, rhino, hyena and wolf dating back up to 60,000 years are discovered in a Devon cave

The development of Sherford began in 2015 and appeared rather promising. A new town in Devon, England, it would have 5,500 homes and sit near the bustling port city of Plymouth. Fortunately, developers requested archaeologists comb the area before breaking ground — leading to the discovery of animal remains that date back to the Ice Age.

These remains included the tusk, molar tooth, and other bones of a woolly mammoth.

Experts also found the lower jaw and partial skull of a woolly rhinoceros, with a complete wolf skeleton to follow. Other findings include partial remains of a hyena, horse, reindeer, mountain hare, and red fox, plus the bones of bats and shrews.

Led by AC Archaeology and Orion Heritage, the ongoing excavations took place in a cave near old lime kilns and a local quarry. 

According to Sherford officials, the animals died at some point between 30,000 and 60,000 years ago. For the experts involved, this extinct megafauna from Britain’s last Ice Age speaks a thousand words.

“This is a major discovery of national significance — a once-in-a-lifetime experience for those involved,” said lead archaeologist Rob Bourn. “To find such an array of artefacts untouched for so long is a rare and special occurrence. Equally rare is the presence of complete or semi-complete individual animals.”

Fortunately for scientists and historians, requesting heritage institutions to thoroughly search an area prior to construction is commonplace in the United Kingdom.

Sherford Consortium developers did so from the very beginning — thereby preventing the destruction of these priceless remains.

The team has since taken the remains off-site for a thorough examination. While they’ve dated them to the Middle Devensian period, it’s unclear if all the animals involved lived during the same timeframe or died millennia apart. For Victoria Herridge, an expert in fossil elephants at the Natural History Museum in London, much is left to learn:

“Devon then would have been a bitterly cold and dry place to be, even in summer,” she said.

“However, it was also a huge open grassland, capable of supporting vast herds of cold-tolerant animals like the woolly mammoth, the woolly rhino and reindeer, as well as the big carnivores like hyena and wolf that preyed upon them.”

“This is vital knowledge. Scientists are still unravelling what role climate and humans played in the extinction of the woolly mammoth and the woolly rhino — and what we can learn from that to protect species threatened by both today.”

While the fact that these bones were preserved for millennia is astounding, Bourn was more impressed that they stayed intact during the human activity of the modern age: “Construction happening at Sherford is the sole reason these findings have been discovered and it is remarkable that they have laid undisturbed until now.”

On the other hand, the discovery site itself isn’t particularly easy to access for regular folk. It’s likely precisely because of this that the bones remained so well-preserved.

The Sherford Consortium has since guaranteed that this underground area will be closed off, with no public access allowed — or construction atop to follow.

“To have found partial remains of such a range of species here in Devon gives us a brilliant insight into the animals which roamed around Ice Age Britain thousands of years ago, as well as a better understanding of the environment and climate at the time,” said Duncan Wilson, the chief executive of Historic England.

As for the future of these ancient remains themselves, it’s been decided that Plymouth’s new museum The Box will put them on display. With the history of the region safeguarded by those who inhabit it today, museum CEO Victoria Pomery hopes locals will gain warranted insight into their heritage.

“Once all the analysis work is completed it will be a huge honour to care for and display these newly discovered finds, and to play an ongoing part in the public’s understanding of Plymouth and the animals that were here during the Ice Age,” said Pomery.

Whether the animals in question all fell into the pit and died together or merely washed into the cave over time is still a mystery. What is clear, however, is that Devon’s Joint Mitnor cave discovered in 1939 yielded over 4,000 animal bones — and was robbed in 2015 by thieves who stole a 100,000-year-old elephant tooth.

Fortunately, that’s unlikely to occur again, as those in charge appear to be determined to properly guard the newfound site.

Bronze Age Burial Mound Discovered in England

Archaeologists believe they may have found evidence of a 4,000-year-old prehistoric burial mound during the construction of new student flats. The site has already yielded the remains of St Mary’s, a lost 15th Century Oxford University college.

Latest discoveries include a fragment of skull, part of a human jawbone, and remains typical of a Bronze Age barrow used for human burials.

Thirty flats are being developed at Brasenose College’s Frewin Annexe.

Oxford Archaeology’s senior project manager, Ben Ford, said St Mary’s College, which had already been a “significant archaeological discovery”, appeared to have been built above a circular burial mound.

He added: “These intriguing discoveries strongly suggest a prehistoric burial mound was on this site thousands of years before Oxford even existed.

“The jawbone is robust and clearly from an individual of some stature. The mound is built from reddish colour soils and natural gravel – its survival is very unusual.

“We are now searching for the circular ditch which would have surrounded it, and the remaining bones of the individual.”

During the Bronze Age, important people were commemorated under large earthen mounds as part of an extensive burial ground in the region.

Mr Ford said: “Frewin Hall is one of the oldest buildings still in use in the city, and when we started this project, we hoped to uncover evidence of Oxford’s earliest years as a fortified Saxon town, as well as its later use as the residence of some of the Oxfords most powerful Norman families.

“However, it had not been previously documented that there was a prehistoric burial site here.”

He said the “rare discovery” had brought a “new dimension” to a “rich archaeological area”.

Artefacts previously found at the site include ceramic beer jugs, coins, glass vessels, highly decorated window glass, and decorated floor tiles.

At a recent open day, 500 visitors came to see some of the excavations.

Skulls suggest Romans in London enjoyed human blood sports

A joint research project between the Museum of London and the Natural History Museum has re-evaluated human remains discovered under the London Wall in 1988.

The majority of the remains were recovered from an industrial site in the Walbrook Valley and have been curated by the Museum of London.

Because the skull is the first body part to disarticulate, it was first thought that these were skull bones that had separated from the rest of the bodies over time and been washed out from graves. Similar crania are often found in the River Thames.

Evidence of violent injury

Museum forensic anthropologist Dr Heather Bonney, who analysed the skulls, however, found that many of the individuals had sustained blunt force trauma in the facial area and on the side of their heads around the time of their death.

Army trophies

This would suggest several theories, which include that these remains could be the heads of people executed in the amphitheatre near the burial site, or the heads of enemies kept as trophies by the Roman army from the frontiers of Britain, stationed in Roman London.

Roman amphitheatres were typically used for gladiator combat and judicial execution.

Human games

Only a few of the human remains showed signs of the type of decapitation you would expect in judicial execution.

The human remains were deposited between AD 120-AD160, which was a time of prosperity and peace in the province, rather than a period of war when human remains exhibiting violent death would have been more typical.  

Violent Londinium

Dr Rebecca Redfern from the Museum of London, said, ‘There is no evidence for social unrest, warfare or other acts of organised violence, during the period that this human remains date from.

The view of bloodthirsty Romans has wide currency, but this is the first time that we have evidence of these types of violence in London.’

Dr Bonney said that similar burial sites for the victims of gladiatorial combat have been found in Europe, but not previously identified in Britain. ‘We know gladiator contests went on in London but not the extent of such contests,’ she said.

 ‘The prevalence of trauma and young adult males from this site indicates that they probably met a violent end, and their heads were then separated and deposited. Signs of violent injuries sustained during life also provide a fascinating insight into violent activities in Roman London.’

The research team said that the next step was to investigate where the people buried in the site came from.

Lavish Roman mosaic is biggest found in London for 50 years

Archaeologists have uncovered the largest area of Roman mosaic found in London for more than half a century. The two highly decorated panels feature large, colourful flowers, geometric patterns and elaborate motifs in a style unique to the capital.

It is thought it once decorated the floor of a Roman dining room.

The Museum of London Archaeology (MOLA) find came during excavations as part of the construction of a regeneration project near the Shard in Southwark.

MOLA site supervisor, Antonietta Lerz, said: “This is a once-in-a-lifetime find in London.

It has been a privilege to work on such a large site where the Roman archaeology is largely undisturbed by later activity – when the first flashes of colour started to emerge through the soil everyone on site was very excited.”

It is made up of two panels, with the largest showing large, colourful flowers surrounded by bands of intertwining strands – a motif known as a guilloche.

There are also lotus flowers and several different geometric elements, including a pattern known as Solomon’s knot, which is made of two interlaced loops.

Dr David Neal, the former archaeologist with English Heritage and leading expert in Roman mosaic, has attributed this design to the “Acanthus group” – a team of mosaicists working in London who developed their own unique local style.

While the largest mosaic panel can be dated to the late 2nd to early 3rd century AD, traces of an earlier mosaic underneath the one currently visible have been identified which shows the room was refurbished over the years.

It was located on the outskirts of Roman Londinium, an area centred on the north bank of the Thames which roughly corresponds to the modern City of London.

A spokesperson for MOLA added the room it was situated in would have contained dining couches, where people would have reclined to eat and it might have been part of a Roman mansio – an upmarket “motel” for state couriers and officials travelling to and from London.

The excavations are part of the Liberty of Southwark regeneration project, which will comprise homes, workspace, shops and restaurants.

The mosaics will be carefully recorded and assessed by an expert team of conservators before being transported off-site, to enable more detailed conservation work to take place. Future plans for the public display of the mosaics are currently being determined.

Inscribed Medieval Gold Brooch Recovered in England

A metal detectorist has discovered a medieval gold brooch with a series of Latin and Hebrew inscriptions. The artefact, found in Wiltshire in the U.K., may have mixed religion and magic in an attempt to give its user protection against illness or supernatural events. 

The Latin inscriptions translate to “Hail Mary full of grace the lord/ is with thee/ blessed art thou amongst women/ and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. Amen.” The Hebrew initials for “AGLA” are also inscribed on the brooch and represent Hebrew words that mean “Thou art mighty forever, O Lord.” 

The gold brooch dates to sometime between A.D. 1150 and 1400 and may have been used in an attempt to prevent fever, according to a brief report on the brooch published online by the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS) and written by Sophie Hawke, a finds liaison officer for PAS. In England and Wales, metal detectorists report their discoveries to the PAS, a government-sponsored organization that publishes reports and images of the finds on its website and sometimes in scholarly journals.

What was it used for? 

Live Science talked with a number of scholars with expertise in medieval history and magic to get their thoughts on what the brooch might have been used for. 

The Hebrew initials that represent the phrase “Thou art mighty forever, O Lord” may be important to the brooch’s purpose, some of the scholars said. This phrase “figures prominently in medieval magic,” Richard Kieckhefer, a professor of religious studies at Northwestern University, told Live Science in an email. 

He noted that the other prayers engraved on the brooch were common religious prayers at the time. “What I would want to emphasize is that this sort of combination of ‘religion’ and ‘magic’ is not unusual,” Kieckhefer said, noting that the mixture of religious and magical meanings would have given the brooch special powers in the eyes of the person who created it. 

The Hebrew initials for “AGLA” were “very commonly used in magic, from high ritual magic to protective amulets and charms,” Frank Klaassen, a history professor at the University of Saskatchewan, told Live Science in an email. “It is one of many divine names or words of power common in medieval traditions.” 

But why would someone wear such a brooch?

“Wearing Bible quotes like this was sometimes done as a way of protecting a person against misfortune,” such as fire, sudden death or supernatural forces such as demons, Catherine Rider, a professor of medieval history at the University of Exeter in the U.K., wrote in an email. “It’s hard to be sure that it’s magical — it’s perhaps more in a grey area between what we’d see as magic and religion.”

Given the brooch’s small size and mention of the Virgin Mary, the person wearing it may have been a woman. With its “small, though elegant, size, I would guess it was used on a woman’s garments of some light fabric,” Karen Jolly, a history professor at the University of Hawaii at Manoa, told Live Science in an email. “This woman was of sufficient means to have the object or have been given it. Whether she was literate or not, she would know what it said and what it meant,” Jolly said, adding that perhaps the brooch served a protective purpose related to pregnancy and childbirth. 

The brooch, with its tiny engraved inscriptions, was well crafted. “My main reaction to the brooch is that it was made by somebody who was highly skilled and that its first owner, at least, was a pious person who recorded on it both devotion to the Virgin and a charm to protect them against various threats,” Anne Lawrence-Mathers, a history professor at the University of Reading in the U.K., wrote in an email. 

The brooch is now going through the Treasure Act, as required by British law. It’s a process by which a determination is made as to what will happen to the artefact. It may end up being placed in a local museum depending on a number of factors. For instance, one possible outcome is that the metal detectorist may be given a monetary reward and the artefact may be handed over to the government, which could place it in a museum. 

Archaeologists puzzled how ‘big clue’ over Cerne Abbas Giant’s age was missed

Carved into the hillside of rural Dorset is a 55-metre tall naked man wielding a huge club in his right hand. With an 11-metre erection on full display, he is England’s largest and rudest chalk hill figure.  Situated near the village of Cerne Abbas, he was created by scouring away at grass to reveal the white chalk below and filling the trenches with more chalk from nearby quarries. Alongside the Long Man of Wilmington in East Sussex, he is one of two remaining human hill figures in England.

Both have scheduled monument status, giving them protection against unauthorised change. Yet both have been the source of intense mystery and fascination for many hundreds of years. Until recently, nobody knew who created him, or when, or why. Archaeologists and camera crews from the BBC’s Digging for Britain series headed to the southwest to carry out their own analysis. Though the earliest written record dates back to the late 17th Century, antiquarians speculated it could have been a Saxon deity, while others believed it could have been a Roman-made figure.

In July 2020, a survey of snail shells unearthed at the site suggested that the Giant is “medieval or later”, as no snails from the Roman period were found at the site. A further survey, using optically stimulated luminescence, analysed samples from the deepest layers of sediment, pointing to a construction date of 700-1100AD — the early medieval and late Anglo-Saxon period. Professor Alice Roberts, the Digging for Britain presenter, said archaeologists might have missed a “big clue” right under their noses when investigating the Giant’s age. Dr Mike Allen, an environmental archaeologist, told the documentary: “That’s one thing that archaeologists are normally very good at — saying why they’re there, what was happening and what date they are.”

He added: “Everyone seems to have been carried away with his nakedness and the member. Carved into the hillside of rural Dorset is a 55-metre tall naked man wielding a huge club in his right hand. With an 11-metre erection on full display, he is England’s largest and rudest chalk hill figure. Situated near the village of Cerne Abbas, he was created by scouring away at grass to reveal the white chalk below and filling the trenches with more chalk from nearby quarries.

Alongside the Long Man of Wilmington in East Sussex, he is one of two remaining human hill figures in England. Both have scheduled monument status, giving them protection against unauthorised change. Yet both have been the source of intense mystery and fascination for many hundreds of years.

Until recently, nobody knew who created him, or when, or why.

Archaeologists and camera crews from the BBC’s Digging for Britain series headed to the southwest to carry out their own analysis. Though the earliest written record dates back to the late 17th Century, antiquarians speculated it could have been a Saxon deity, while others believed it could have been a Roman-made figure. In July 2020, a survey of snail shells unearthed at the site suggested that the Giant is “medieval or later”, as no snails from the Roman period were found at the site. A further survey, using optically stimulated luminescence, analysed samples from the deepest layers of sediment, pointing to a construction date of 700-1100AD — the early medieval and late Anglo-Saxon period.

Professor Alice Roberts, the Digging for Britain presenter, said archaeologists might have missed a “big clue” right under their noses when investigating the Giant’s age.

Dr Mike Allen, an environmental archaeologist, told the documentary: “That’s one thing that archaeologists are normally very good at — saying why they’re there, what was happening and what date they are.”

He added: “Everyone seems to have been carried away with his nakedness and the member.

“No one had really talked about the obvious — the Abbey sitting behind us.”

Prof Roberts explained that below the Giant once lay Cerne Abbey, founded in 987AD, right in the middle of the period archaeologists now know the Giant was created. She asked Martin Papworth, a National Trust archaeologist, what connection a huge naked figure might have to a Benedictine monastery.

He explained: “Just right next to his outstretched hand is, in fact, the abbey, which was established at the same time.”

The Abbey’s wealth was created predominantly by pilgrims worshipping the local holy man, St Eadwold of Cerne. Legend has it that he lived as a hermit on a nearby hill after he planted his wooden staff on the ground there, and it miraculously grew into a tree. Prof Roberts suggested the Giant’s club could actually be a staff sprouting leaves.

Mr Papworth asked: “Is he St Eadwold? What do I think? I don’t know who he is.

“But this medieval date makes all sorts of theories possible.”

Others, however, have speculated on different theories.

Alison Sheridan, a freelance archaeological consultant, told the New Scientist: “It would almost seem to be an act of resistance by local people to create this fantastically rude pagan image on the hillside. It’s like a big two fingers to the abbey.”

National Trust researchers flew sophisticated drones over the Giant in July 2020 and carefully examined the images afterwards. Their findings hinted the Giant’s phallus might not be original, and subtle shifts in the earthworks may have been made around the 18th Century.

He told the Washington Post that “there appears to be an outline of a belt”, suggesting that once upon a time he might not have been naked at all.

Either way, more research is required to get to the bottom of this long-lasting source of fascination. The Cerne Abbas Giant, regardless of its age, has become a crucial part of local culture and folklore. In 2007, a giant Homer Simpson brandishing a doughnut was drawn next to the Giant as a publicity stunt for the opening of The Simpsons Movie.

In 2012, pupils and members of the local community recreated the Olympic torch on the Giant, marking the passing of the official torch in the build-up to the London 20212 Olympics. He has appeared in several films and TV programmes too, and his image has been reproduced on various souvenirs and local food produce labels.

He has remained a prominent tourist attraction in the region, with most tourist guides recommending a ground view from the ‘Giant’s View’ lay-by and car park just off the A352.

Treasures and lead coffin found in the ancient Roman mausoleum

An ancient mausoleum with the largest illegal silversmithing site in Roman Britain has been discovered. Archaeologists found a huge amount of litharge – a lead oxide and by-product of silver extraction – which suggests a clan was melting down metal to get at its precious material. The 15 kilos of litharge discovered at Grange Farm, an excavation site in Gillingham, Kent, is the largest amount ever uncovered at a Roman Britain site.

The 15-year research project was triggered following excavations in 2005 and 2006, prior to a house-building. The earliest evidence for occupation at Grange Farm occurs during the Late Iron Age, about 100BC before the site grew into a small Roman rural settlement in the late first century AD, and the settlement evolved until the 5th Century AD when it was abandoned.

Metal extraction took place at one end of a building, with fireplaces in the middle, and at the other end high-status domestic use. Researchers say that it was likely a large clan who were also working the land, hunting, raising animals and metalworking.

As the 3rd and 4th centuries in the Roman world operated on a gold and silver economy, the control of those metals was closely tied to imperial taxation.

This is why the investigators believe the silversmithing may have been done illicitly. Dr James Gerrard, senior lecturer in Roman Archaeology at Newcastle University, said: ‘Was that legal? Was that supervised?’

‘Quite why people were refining silver from silver-rich base metal alloys is a mystery.

‘Quite what the objects being melted down were is a mystery too.

‘They probably weren’t coins, as the bronze coinage had too little silver in it.

‘We might expect that the refining of silver here was either being done officially by the ‘Roman state’ or perhaps illicitly. It’s an unusual aspect of the site.

‘Maybe they were making silver objects like the ingots in the Canterbury Treasure.’

The investigators also discovered a monument, which would have stood at almost the height of a two-storey house, proving the occupant was very high-status. In the lead coffin, investigators found a middle-aged to elderly woman, who may have been a leader or chief of the clan.

Dr Gerrard said: ‘The mausoleum is a house for the dead.

‘It’s basically a funerary monument. It probably dates back to the late 3rd Century or early 4th Century AD, and it was a stone building structure, probably with a tile roof. It was probably quite tall – certainly visible from the Medway – perhaps about the height of a two-storey house or a little less. It’s quite unusual in that it had a tessellated pavement of plain mosaic – a plain red colour – which is really unusual for Roman Britain.

‘This middle-aged to the elderly lady was buried there in a lead-lined coffin. She was probably local from the isotope analysis we did on the teeth. The silver suggests wealth. The mausoleum is wealth. It takes resources to build the structure like the mausoleum and it takes resources to put someone in a lead coffin. She had quite a hard life though. She had osteoarthritis but she lived to a good age and was buried with reverence. I think she was quite a high status. She was no peasant and she was someone with clout locally. Further evidence of wealth comes from gold jewellery found in the rubble of the mausoleum – including a necklace or bracelet made of gold filigree double-loop links threaded with polyhedral faceted beads of variscite.

Evidence of wear and modification suggests it may have been a necklace turned into a bracelet for a child, and it’s not known if it would have come from the mausoleum itself or sarcophagi possibly located next to it. Unusually, the mausoleum stayed intact until the 11th or 12th Century with the Anglo-Saxons left the ancient Roman structure alone. But it was not unoccupied, as the researchers found the mausoleum had been taken over by owls.

Dr Gerrard said: ‘We think during the 5th Century the grave is disturbed.

‘We don’t know why that was – and then the building stayed up until the Norman Conquest.’

‘We’ve got tawny owl pellets. The building becomes ruinous and then you’ve got owls living here.

‘It’s the end of the Roman Empire, the mausoleum is abandoned and the owls take up residence – we can’t be too precise about when that was but it would have been somewhere between the 5th and 10th Century. The researcher said he believes the monument was left alone by the Anglo-Saxons who may have used it as a navigational structure for people coming down the River Medway.

Dr Gerrard said: ‘If the building is visible from the Medway it might be a navigational structure for people coming down the river. It’s the 5th Century and water was more important as a means of travel.’

At the site, the team uncovered in all 453 Roman coins, 20,000 fragments of pottery weighing a quarter of a ton, and 8,000 animal bones. The mausoleum was moved after Domesday in 1086 when the land – recorded as having pasture, a tidal mill and six unfree peasants – was given to Bishop Odo of Bayeaux, half-brother of William the Conqueror.

Dr Gerrard said: ‘The site then becomes the medieval manor.

‘Probably what happened was they reused the stone from the building to build a chapel. At 1122, the manor was called Grenic, then Grenech in 1198, Grenge in the 14th Century, and more recently it became known simply as Grange Farm.

Dr Gerrard added: ‘It’s the end of a long process,’ he said. ‘I started my involvement in 2005 as a site assistant and digger on a short-term contract. I was in my late 20s. It’s 15 years later and I’m in my early 40s and I’m a senior lecturer at Newcastle University. It’s been with me a long time – it’s part of my career. For all the other people in the report, it’s been a huge part of our lives..’

World War II POW Camp Excavated in England

The German Second World War soldiers were imprisoned close to the Park Hall military camp, near Oswestry. Excavations have been taking place at Mile End where work is continuing on the multi-million pound revamp of the A5/A483 junction to the south of the town.

Experts from Wessex Archaeology, who carried out the excavations, said the evidence they have found suggests that the camp was in use between 1940 and 1948 and believe it will give them an insight into what life was like as a prisoner of war in Shropshire.

Among the finds were a loaded German pistol and a spent .303 cartridge as well as signs of comfort including beer bottles from the now-defunct Border Breweries in Wrexham.

John Winfer, project manager at Wessex Archaeology, said: “What we have revealed is surprising evidence of some (relatively speaking) comfortable conditions for the inmates.

“We know from our documentary research that the Red Cross, which visited many POW camps across Europe during the Second World War, came to assess conditions at the Mile End camp.

“The visit report highlights the range of facilities and activities on offer to the prisoners, which is supported by the archaeological evidence we uncovered.”

He said the prisoners benefited from sports pitches, musical performances, electricity to power lights and heating, enough toilets available for everyone at the camp, and several hot and cold showers and washbasins.

Many of the prisoners would have been employed in carpentry workshops, with younger inmates given time off to study at the camp’s school, he said,

“Those overseeing the camp enjoyed more spacious accommodation, and our work uncovered military issue ceramic tableware accompanied by beer glasses. This all paints a civilised and rather unexpected picture of a POW camp,” Mr Winfer said.

Artefacts giving more personal insights to those living at the camp include a lead alloy toy camel and toiletries including toothbrushes.

But it is an aluminium metal identification tag from a German soldier that has excited archaeologists the most.

Mr Winfer said: “This is an intriguing find with so much potential. In the event of death during the war, the tag would have been snapped, with one half-buried with the body for later identification and the other given to unit administrators for recording.

“In this case, it tells us that the German POW in question belonged to the 3rd Company, Landesschützen Battalion XI/I marking the capture of this prisoner early in the war, September 1939 to 1940.

“We know his serial number too, so we’ll be doing further research to reveal the full story.”