News
MK ARCHAEOLOGY DAY 2025
Join us this Saturday for Milton Keynes Archaeology Day! PCA will be out in force at this year’s event, with a full display and hands-on activities in the morning, plus an afternoon talk by Mark Hinman, Judy Mlynarska and Jenn Hulse:“Cups, Coins, and Cows: Unravelling the Late Iron Age at MK East.” When: 1 November…
Read MoreBermondsey Square: Prehistoric and Roman Settlement, Medieval Abbey and Post-Medieval Mansion
Alistair Douglas will be presenting PCA’s work at Bermondsey Square in a lecture hosted by LAMAS next month. Date: 11 November 2025 Time: 18:30–19:30 Venue: Lecture Theatre G6, Institute of Archaeology, UCL, 31-34 Gordon Square, London, WC1H 0PY The lecture will be available via zoom as well as in person, click here to book . Alistair’s lecture…
Read MoreA11 and Wangford Warren Excavations at the Suffolk Institute Autumn Conference
We’re pleased to share that Tom Woolhouse and Tom Lucking will be speaking at the Wheeler Conference 2025, organised by the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology & History, on Saturday 18 October. This year’s theme Re-envisaging Suffolk’s Past: New Discoveries from Development-led Archaeology brings together some of the most recent and significant fieldwork from across the…
Read More26th Annual BABAO Conference
PCA has worked on burial sites for more than thirty years, uncovering thousands of skeletons across Britain. Most reflect expected health patterns, but every so often individuals with striking and uncommon pathologies emerge. At the 26th Annual Conference of the British Association for Biological Anthropology and Osteoarchaeology (BABAO) this week (18-20 September), PCA osteologists James…
Read MoreTower of London Discoveries Featured in National Geographic
We’re delighted to see PCA’s work at the Tower of London featured in National Geographic! It’s always exciting when the stories we help uncover reach such a wide audience. This #FindsFriday, we’re sharing one of the most tantalising discoveries from the site, a pair of medieval funerary incense pots (c.1150–1250). As Alfred Hawkins, Curator, says…
Read MoreAn Irish Comb in Worcestershire
For #FindsFriday, a decorated comb from an Early to Middle Anglo-Saxon settlement in Worcestershire, though it may not be local. The comb’s trapezoidal connecting plates, along with its elaborate decoration (sawn-out openwork X designs and undulating chains of overlapping ring-and-dot) match Mairéad Dunlevy’s class C2 Irish combs, dated to the 7th–early 8th centuries. Irish combs…
Read MoreWorld Photography Day
Photography has been central to the archaeological record since the earliest excavations, from fragile glass plate negatives to today’s vast digital archives. Each image helps preserve context, capture discoveries, and record the evolution of sites over time. Drones have taken this further, revealing entire landscapes, showing scale at a glance, and offering perspectives once impossible. This…
Read MoreFrom Civil War Bridges to Medieval Garderobes: New finds at Newark Castle
PCA archaeologists from the Newark office have been busy over the last few weeks at Newark Castle in Nottinghamshire, and the work has been turning up some unexpected finds. Adjacent to the Gatehouse, a substantial section of walling was revealed during monitoring. Early thoughts were that this was a possible outer gatehouse; however, after visits from a Castle expert…
Read MoreA Tonne of Pottery: what 72,000 sherds can tell us
In archaeology, individual finds are valuable, but it’s often the bigger picture that tells the real story. Assemblages, or groups of objects found together, can reveal patterns of behaviour, trade, and chronology in ways that isolated finds simply can’t. Too often, limited sampling or tight excavation windows mean specialists don’t get the volume of material…
Read More#FindsFriday | Saint Peter ad Vincula Feast Day
Today, August 1st, is the Feast of Saint Peter ad Vincula, the saint to whom the Tower of London’s chapel is dedicated, and the timing couldn’t be more fitting. During our recent excavation, in collaboration with the independent charity Historic Royal Palaces, PCA uncovered the footings of Henry I’s 12th-century chapel, along with a contemporary stone…
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