This paper presents an overview of the results of two brief excavation seasons (2008 and 2010) at Foxhole Cave, Gower, south Wales, placing them into the wider context of mid-Holocene Britain. No prehistoric pottery was found and the few pieces of worked flint recovered are diagnostic of the Mesolithic period. Typically for the Carboniferous limestone caves of Gower, bone was well preserved, however, and though much of the material in the heavily disturbed upper metre or so of the deposits was modern sheep and rabbit, scattered fragments representing the remains of at least six humans were also recovered, of which two have been directly radiocarbon-dated using accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS 14C) to the Late Mesolithic and two to the earlier Neolithic (the remaining two providing Romano-British and medieval dates). Their associated stable carbon and nitrogen isotope values indicate a significant difference in diet between the two periods (contrary to the results from an earlier excavation in 1997), with marine foods contributing around half of the protein for the Mesolithic individuals and little or none for the Neolithic individuals. The new results are consistent with those from Caldey Island, Pembrokeshire, some 30km to the west. The floor of the cave has still not been reached at around 2m depth; limited investigation of the lowermost levels has yielded a Pleistocene fauna (including reindeer, aurochs or bison and collared lemming) with dates back to approx 33,500 cal bc, though with no definite evidence for human activity so far. A small, dark-stained fragment of human cranium was recovered from what may be pre-Holocene levels, but this failed to produce sufficient collagen for dating. In addition to a marked dietary shift, the combined stable isotope and dating programme provides further support for an equally striking temporal gap of some two millennia between the Mesolithic and Neolithic use of caves for burial.

Damascening, defined in this context as the inlay of one metal into a different metal base, is a rare decorative technique in the Early Bronze Age, known only from seven bronze artefacts found north of the Alps. This paper reports on the first thorough scientific examination of one such find, the axe from Thun-Renzenbühl grave no. 1. This interdisciplinary project involving several institutions in Germany and Switzerland investigated the axe by means of neutron radiographic imaging and X-ray microprobe methods, supported by microscopic examination. The result is an attempt to reconstruct the fabrication and decoration process and to reconsider the enigmatic question of the origins of the damascene technique north of the Alps.

This paper describes a Late Bronze Age midden settlement and a later Iron Age ritual complex on Godwin Ridge, a sand ridge that formerly lay mid-stream within the lower reaches of the River Great Ouse, in the Cambridgeshire fens. Numerous ritual deposits and significant quantities of human remains were recovered; some of the latter show signs of having been modified or dismembered. The ritual focus of the ridge was a riverside platform; associated with this was an important assemblage of wetland bird bone. The paper explores the implications of these practices and compares the finds to those from neighbouring and regional later prehistoric settlements, including those with major bird bone assemblages. The ridge-end's findings clearly resonate with human remains retrieved from other watery contexts, such as those associated with the River Thames. The evidence suggests that Godwin Ridge was, during the later Iron Age, a major site for mortuary rites involving riverine interment.

It is suggested that the name generally accepted as the Romano-British name of Cirencester, *Corinium, the traditional spelling deriving from a Latin rendering of that in Ptolemy's Geography, is mistaken, and that for philologically sound reasons the authentic name is more likely to have been Cironium, as recorded in the Ravenna Cosmography.

This paper seeks to characterise through elemental analysis some unusual gold glass tesserae said to have been found at a Roman villa site in Southwick, West Sussex. The site is no longer accessible, being underneath a Methodist chapel, but it has been excavated, to some extent, on several occasions. Glass tesserae are not common in a British setting but they are by no means unusual in Roman mosaics. Gold glass tesserae, however, in which gold leaf is sandwiched between two layers of glass, are very unusual: fewer than twenty such tesserae are known from Roman Britain and the seven examples from Southwick make up the largest single group. However, the provenance of these Southwick tesserae remains doubtful and so they were analysed and compared to gold glass tesserae from Roman London to try and establish whether they are compositionally related to typical Roman glass. For comparative reasons, the handful of coloured glass tesserae from Southwick were also analysed. Our results suggest that the tesserae said to be from Southwick are anomalous in relation to the other material and cannot be assigned to the Roman period.

Anglo-Saxon monastic archaeology has been constrained by the limited scale of past investigations and their overriding emphasis on core buildings. This paper draws upon the results of an ongoing campaign of archaeological research that is redressing the balance through an ambitious programme of open-area excavation at Lyminge, Kent, the site of a royal double monastery founded in the seventh century ad. The results of five completed fieldwork seasons are assessed and contextualised in a narrative sequence emphasising the dynamic character of Lyminge as an Anglo-Saxon monastic settlement. In so doing, the study brings into sharp focus how early medieval monasteries were emplaced in the landscape, with specific reference to Anglo-Saxon Kent, a regional context offering key insights into how the process of monastic foundation redefined antecedent central places of long-standing politico-religious significance and social action.

This paper outlines the place-name, archaeological and topographical evidence for a special class of Anglo-Saxon open-air assembly site, which we call a ‘hanging promontory’. Discussion of a series of these sites serves to describe the main characteristics of the class as well as their geographical distribution. Consideration is given to the possible functions and dating of the use of hanging promontories. In conclusion, comparisons are drawn with other forms of open-air assembly site to suggest a possible hierarchy of the administrative territories existing in the early medieval period in England.

The late twelfth-century aisled hall at Oakham Castle, Rutland, is well known as the earliest and most complete building of its type in England. This study, based on detailed fabric analysis and little-known excavations of the 1950s, puts forward a new theory for the building's development. It is proposed that the original hall had attached lean-to buildings at both gable ends, probably built of timber, housing services and other lesser rooms. Like other early halls, the principal chamber at Oakham took the form of a free-standing chamber block, some of whose features have been later incorporated in the surviving hall, including its great east window. Tree-ring dating has shown that, although the roof was rebuilt around 1737, many original timbers survive from the 1180s. A comparative study of other early halls is made, to set Oakham into its wider Anglo-Norman context.

A gilt-bronze belt buckle fragment recently found in Cambridgeshire has its closest parallel in a well-known and better-preserved example now in Stockholm, discovered among the Dune hoard on Gotland. This fourteenth-century deposition contains a wide range of metalwork of mixed date and origin. Scholars have long debated the attributions of many of its constituent pieces, including the belt buckle. The discovery at Soham reinforces the suggestion made sixty years ago by Hanns Swarzenski that the Dune buckle might have come from England rather than Continental Europe. This paper reviews the implications of the recent find for the date and subject matter of the Dune buckle and another buckle from the same period, now in New York.

This paper describes and analyses a previously unrecorded Sarum book of hours of considerable artistic and textual interest. Seven of its pages have bar-frame borders illuminated in a distinctive and remarkable style. Four of these pages also have initials with figure-subjects, some of which are contextually unusual or unique. There is also an initial with a coat of arms displaying a black engrailed cross on a gold field (the arms of Mohun of Dunster in west Somerset). While the manuscript cannot be linked to a member of the Mohun family, the occurrence of a Somerset toponym in an obit dated 1429 in the calendar and the early addition to the litany of St Urith of Chittlehampton show that it was owned by someone who lived in Somerset or Devon in the early fifteenth century. Indeed, the book may also have been made in this region. Several features of its border illumination are paralleled in the Sherborne Missal (London, British Library, Additional ms 74236), produced in north Dorset or Somerset in the decade c 1398–c 1408. The parallels suggest a relationship (not necessarily direct) between the two manuscripts. Certainly, the book of hours discussed here is closer in style to the missal than it is to manuscripts made in or around London in the same period.

Between 1559 and 1563 William, Lord Paget, commissioned schemes for a new house at Burton-on-Trent, intending to make partial use of buildings and materials from Burton's former Benedictine abbey. Although they were never executed, three sets of plans have survived, with accompanying estimates from a variety of craftsmen. These throw unusual light on contemporary practice in calculating the costs of a building and on the degree of involvement of Lord Paget as patron. In addition, changes to the design of the intended house can be traced as they evolve from a scheme that begins as conservative and provincial ends up being one of the most progressive of its day in terms of its layout and in sacrificing traditional social hierarchies to advanced ideals of architectural symmetry.

Vienna's Museum für Völkerkunde holds in its collections a rare sixteenth-century Taíno cotton belt from Hispaniola (today's Dominican Republic/Haiti) – one of only two surviving Taíno cotton artefacts to feature European ‘exotics’, including mirrors, jet beads and brass. This complex woven structure – a wearable work of art – offers a rare window on to one of the most prestigious of Taíno valuables, a personal ornament that literally wrapped the wearer in wealth, status and spiritual power. The paper charts the original context and use of Taíno belts, and provides a detailed account of the Vienna belt's collection history, its construction and its chronological placement (radiocarbon-dated using accelerator mass spectrometry (AMS) to ad 1475–1635). The question of how and when the European materials were incorporated into the belt is explored, critically engaging the entangled histories of association between the two.

Studies of creole material cultures in historical archaeological frameworks in the Americas and Caribbean from the sixteenth century onwards emphasise the diversity and dynamism of cultural traits that are rooted in a range of different backgrounds: indigenous, African and European. Using a case study based upon recent historical and multidisciplinary archaeological research in north-western Barbados, this paper seeks to chart the development of a distinct vernacular Barbadian creole material culture over the period 1650–1900. It is argued here that the evolution of a strong and characteristic local cultural identity, as evidenced by recent archaeological research, counters the usual perception, common among historians of the period, that the plantocracy and its associated agents merely sought to reproduce English culture in the tropics. In fact the cultural picture as presented here is far more nuanced, and has implications for wider historical archaeological studies in the region.

The part played by William Stukeley in the evolution of English garden design has aroused much interest in recent years, though little research has been carried out into his gardening and architectural activities while resident in Stamford, Lincolnshire, from 1730 to 1747. This was an important period in Stukeley's life and the influence of his archaeological work at Stonehenge and Avebury and his ideas on religion and the early British druids are clearly reflected in his garden designs. Previous work on this period in Stukeley's life has been hampered by imprecision over the various gardens or houses occupied in Stamford by Stukeley. The gardens and his residences are here identified and a mystery concerning his Barn Hill house that has puzzled architectural historians for five decades is solved: what was thought to be a remodelling of the house is here shown to be a scheme for a triumphal arch over the road immediately outside his house.

This paper describes the contents of an album of photographs taken in 1861–2 by the seventeen-year-old third son of the renowned architect George Gilbert Scott. The album is evidence of the growing popularity of photography as a hobby for amateurs in the 1850s and 1860s as a result of technical developments that made the equipment easier to transport and use in the field. Analysis of the subjects in the album reveals a pioneering interest in vernacular architecture; the album also contains rare and early photographs of railway subjects and the only known portrait of George Gilbert Scott's wife, Caroline Oldrid.