Archaeology Data Service – The Archaeology Data Service based at the University of York has a searchable database where you can find sites from all periods in your area. You can also find a free pamphlet on burial in prehistory.

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British Archaeology – The Council for British Archaeology’s bi-monthly magazine with many items about prehistory – recommended.

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The Portable Antiquities Scheme – Homepage of the Portable Antiquities Scheme. Includes a searchable database of finds recorded here. Useful to find local material from all periods.

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Archaeology at the BBC – Archaeological selections from the BBC archives.

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Stone Age Tools – A good example of what a keen amateur archaeologist can do.

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The Prehistoric Society – The Society is made up of professionals, amateurs, students and more! Plenty of resources to help you find your way around prehistory.

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ScARF – The Scottish Archaeological Research Framework (ScARF). The sites states “It should be seen as a live document that will be constantly updated, edited and improved.” If you want to know anything about Scotland’s past, you’ll probably find it here.

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The Culture Grid – Around 3 million items from hundreds of collections on all topics and easily searched!

Derbyshire Archaeological Society – Most, if not all, counties as well as some towns and cities have an archaeological society. We’ve put this one in because its local to us! Have a look on the web for your area.

Ancient Lands is a new site which it says “aims to present archaeological and historical information from sites, museums and research investigations to a global audience using computer-aided reconstructions.” Mostly Orkney sites so far, but looks promising.

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Crossrail have recently launched a new website that has 360º views of excavations, artefacts and more which is great! From Roman through medieval and beyond it provides a fascinating look at the major project in London.

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National Library of Scotland has a great online collection of maps from the 19th century to the present day. You can explore by year, county and parish to see what has changed where you are. It is also possible to compare old maps with aerial imagery side-by-side! 

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Brick to the Past is a great site from Lego! A special team has put together a website and blog which recreates a number of prehistoric and historic sites using the bricks you and children know so well. They include Must Farm (see below), brochs from Caithness, Hadrian’s Wall and even The Peterloo Massacre.

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Archaeodeath is a blog and YouTube channel from Prof Howard Williams of the University of Chester. Don't be put off by Howard's job title, his material is easy to watch/listen to/read and covers a range of subjects. Ok, there's a lot of death involved, but archaeology is like that. The link will take you to a post about Vikings, but there's lots more!

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Aerial Archaeology Mapping Explorer This is a great resource from Historic England. It allows you to use the massive catalogue of photographs and more of the archaeology that has been identified, mapped and recorded using aerial photographs and other aerial sources across England. Historic England has made the results of over 30 years of aerial photograph mapping projects freely available online. Use it to explore heritage from ancient settlements to secret Cold War military installations, or to see the complex archaeological landscapes of Hadrian’s Wall, Stonehenge and so much in between.

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Aerial Photo Explorer Is also from Historic England and it allows you to explore 100 years of aerial photographs. It uses over 400,000 digitised images to let you see changes that have happened over the century. Ideal for local studies too!

The British Museum – Gateway to a world of world knowledge!

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Natural History Museum – Explore the Natural History Museum’s pages on human evolution

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National Museum of Wales – The museum has articles, images etc to help teach the Stone Age to Iron Age.

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The Archaeology of Childhood is a joint venture between The Museum of Archaeology & Anthropology (MAA), Cambridge and Cambridgeshire County Council’s Historic Environment Team who, with HLF funding, produced an exhibition about the archaeology of childhood.

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Potteries Museum & Art Gallery has a number of short videos about some of their collection. This one is on Wetton Mill Rock Shelter in the Manifold valley which had archaeological remains from the end of the Ice Age to the 19th century.

The Ice Age – Clear and concise account of the extent of the last ice age with excellent maps.

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PalaeoTHOUGHTS – Blog by Dr Andy Shuttleworth of Liverpool University. Interesting reading on the Palaeolithic on a global scale.

Ancient Human Occupation of Britain – Website of the project which has been working on . . . early human occupation of Britain. Academic but useful in places.

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Boxgrove – An outstanding Palaeolithic site in West Sussex.

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Palaeolithic Cave Art and Dating the Cave Art – A report on the Cathole Cave in S Wales and dating the art found there.

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Creswell Crags – The museum website with all you need to know about the site! There is also a short piece by one of the research team on the cave art here – Creswell Cave Art

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The English Rivers Project – Research on the rivers of ancient Britain – you may be surprised!

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Pakefield and Happisburgh – The stories behind the discovery and excavations of some of the oldest evidence of humans in Britain between 700,000 and 800,00 years old!

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Dinaledi Cave VR Experience From the Perot Museum in Dallas come this app which allows you to explore the excavations of the Dinaledi Chamber where fossils of an approximately 250,000-year-old hominin, Homo naledi were found. Dinaledi VR, a virtual reality app, brings the story of the discovery and our ancient relative to life in an interactive way and features narration by project scientists in six languages. Can be used with the Google Cardboard viewer!

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Cave Art

Art from the Ice Age is more than cave paintings, and the Bradshaw Foundation site has excellent images of some of the earliest human sculpture ever made.

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Lascaux  caves in France is perhaps the most famous cave art site in the world, and here is their website. Explore the art!

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Palaeolithic Cave Art and Dating the Cave Art – A report on the Cathole Cave in S Wales and dating the art found there.

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There is also a short piece on the cave art at – Creswell Cave Art

 

Neanderthals

The Quest for Fire – An interesting blog which discusses the changing image of Neanderthals and other human ancestors over time.

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The Rocks Remain – A good blog on the Palaeolithic, Neanderthals and more.

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Paviland Cave – A multi-period site which includes of one of the earliest known human burials in Europe.

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Pontnewydd Cave – A Neanderthal site dating back 230,000 years.

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La Cotte de St Brelade – Recent public lecture on excavations by Dr Matt Pope of UCL. You can also download from iTunes U. 

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Neanderthals in the West is a short talk by Dr Becky Wragg Sykes from 2021. Her excellent, award-winning book 'Kindred: Neanderthal Life, Love, Death and Art' is well worth reading!

Star Carr Fieldwork – Homepage of the project which has told us so much about Mesolithic Britain.

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Mesolithic Lifestyles – An excellent piece on the Mesolithic in Scotland.

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Mesolithic in Central & Western Scotland is a very readable piece by Dr Nyree Finlay of Glasgow University.

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Mesolithic in Western Scotland 

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Of course no webilography is complete with a mention of possibly the most famous archaeological sites of all!

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Avebury & Orkney - Join two of our leading Archaeologists of the Neolithic Dr Alison Sheridan and Prof. Josh Pollard as they discuss links between two of the most iconic sites in British Archaeology. Well worth the time!

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Stonehenge – The English Heritage website with all you need to know, including up-to-date research!

 

Avebury and Stonehenge – Blog from the National Trust archaeology team.

 

Neolithic Houses – Details of a project which has re-created houses from the time of Stonehenge.

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Stones of Stonehenge – Really useful site which has lots of images of all the stones!

 

Stonehenge 100 – has 100 pictures of Stonehenge from the early days of photography.

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The Stonehenge World Heritage Site Landscape – an interactive resource which has research reports from projects in the area. There is also a new site which offers an interactive map to find out more on burial mounds at The Stonehenge Barrow Map.

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There’s now a podcast on BBC Sounds featuring Dr Jim Leary and Dr Penny Bickle (who appear in that order!) who talk about the Neolithic, Stonehenge, Durrington Walls and feasting. Part of the Free Thinking series.

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National Museum of Scotland has a great collection of Carved Stone Balls which have now been rendered as 3D images by our friend Dr Hugo Anderson-Whymark. If you don’t know what they are Hugo has written a  short blog on them.

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Staying in Scotland, if you thought Skara Brae was impressive then have a look at the Ness of Brodgar site in Orkney. It has a great website which shows the on-going work there including excavations. There is an animated film out soon made especially for children – check the website for details. There is also an update from Dr Nick Card on the site which shows just how important the site was in the Neolithic and today.

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Dorstone Hill – a Neolithic site in Herefordshire which is unique. Ian has been a member of the team for several years, and you can read his blog from a season’s work.

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Great Orme Mines – The site of a copper mine dated to the Bronze Age, and you can visit it!

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Must Farm – A fantastic site near Peterborough which is still being analysed. Huge amount of material found in a settlement built on stilts on the edge of a waterway.

Durotriges Big Dig – Run by the University of Bournemouth this project is examining the transition between the Late Iron Age and the coming of the Romans in southern Britain. If you are aged over 16 you can even take part!

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The Broch Project – A broch is an Iron Age period structure built of stone are local to Scotland. This site details a project based in Caithness in the far north.

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The Cairns Project – Another Scottish site, this time looking at a project on South Ronaldsay in Orkney.

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Celtic Studies Resources – a wide ranging blog that gives useful insights into ‘The Celts’.

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History Today – often features Iron Age and/or Roman material including this review of the BBC’s Blood Iron & Sacrifice by Dr Rachel Pope of University of Liverpool.

The Rural Settlement of Roman Britain - An excellent on-line resource with a searchable database allowing you to find Roman settlements in your area – n.b. not towns!

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What did the Romans do for us? From Experimental Archaeologist and Master potter Graham Taylor, is a good explanation about the arrival of the 'potter's wheel' in Britain with the Romans and why it's use was limited before and after them.

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Historic England have produced a series of resources on heritage assets. One is on Roman Forts and Fortresses. This is a really useful guide and should be a great resource for teachers.

Anglo-Saxon Archaeology – Blog of freelance archaeologist David Beard. Focus is on Anglo-Saxons but other periods get a look-in too!

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The Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Stone Sculpture is a somewhat academic site that catalogued known Anglo-Saxon sculpture in the form of crosses, fonts and other stonework. Worth a visit as it details locations and has good images!

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Anglo-Saxon crosses - we have been busy making 3D scans of Anglo-Saxon crosses which you can see on Sketchfab. You can view them in the classroom and download them!

Jorvik – The really popular and excellent Jorvik Centre in York. We visited with our children and they were impressed too!

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Vikings in Repton, Derbyshire - Here's an easy to read article by Dr Cat Jarman who recently excavated in this Derbyshire village and nearby. A mass grave and more!

Bayeux Tapestry - Everything you need to know about the most famous tapestry in the world. Don’t forget, it is coming to the British Museum in 2022.

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Romanesque Sculpture is an online catalogue of Medieval stone sculpture which can be searched. There bound to some near you!

The Pill Box Study Group is a volunteer led group looking at WW2 Pill Boxes around the country. It has a gazetteer so check if there are any near you.

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The Defence of Britain is a project that detailed surviving structures from WW2 and more. The project created searchable databases created from field and documentary work carried out between April 1995 and December 2001. One purpose of the project was to record the 20th century militarised landscape of the United Kingdom.

10 little known facts about the ever popular Ancient Egyptians. You may well be surprised!

 

Of course you know about Ancient Egyptian mummies, but they also mummified a range of animals too. There’s a Mummified cat you can see for a start!

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We are also interested in the question of how the past is represented, and the Ancient Egyptians are a very popular group we see a great deal of in the media. We’re not the first to think about the Ancient Egyptians – see what Shakespeare said of Cleopatra.