Two thousand years ago the Richborough Roman Fort stood on the Isle of Thanet, off the coast of Kent, separated from the mainland by the strategically important Wantsum Channel. This area of land,...
The original Leiston Abbey was once the home of pirating monks, but today the ruins of the second Leiston Abbey, showcasing some of the finest and most complete monastic remains in the south of...
The towering ruins of the Priory of Our Lady at Thetford recalls in the words of English Heritage, “ one of the largest and richest foundations in medieval East Anglia ,” yet the ravaged stones of...
Not all castles are occupied by fairy princesses. In the 14th century, Elizabeth de Clare was one of the wealthiest and most powerful women of her time, who defied her king to defend her lands. Today...
Letters previously thought to have been Italian texts from the 16th century, turned out to be written by Mary Queen of Scotts, when she was held prisoner by her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I. This...
The imposing ruins of Fountains Abbey dominate the rural landscape around the village of Aldfield, three miles (4.8 kilometers) west of the town of Ripon in North Yorkshire, England. The largest...
One of the most remarkable maritime archaeological discoveries of the 21st century was the discovery of the ghostly timbers of a medieval ship, embedded in the mud, when renovations of an arts centre...
Was Ivar the Boneless, son of Ragnar Lothbrock, buried at Repton in Derbyshire county, England? At first glance the small village of Repton, with its gentle village green does not seem at all...
The Danish island of Zealand is home to the city of Roskilde, the capital of Denmark from the 11th century until 1443. Roskilde was at the heart of numerous Viking land and trading routes, exerting...
Today the sleepy village of Caistor St Edmund in the country of Norfolk with its typical church spire and green, seems unremarkable but 2,000 years ago the terrain helped shaped the future of the...
The first Viking raids recorded in Ireland date to 795 AD, and then they rapidly appear in the historic record. Traditionally the early Viking activity in Ireland falls into three phases, the first...
Sitting proudly on the line of Hadrian's Wall in northern England, just south of the Scottish border, the Roman fort of Vindolanda has dominated the landscape for nearly 2,000 years. Originally built...
Reading Abbey was once one of the largest monastic complexes in the British Isles. It was one of the pinnacles of religious life in England and the burial place of King Henry I . Located on a pilgrim...
16th-Century monks in Britain had a blast! They were the first to experiment with the recipe of saltpeter, Sulphur and charcoal to produce gunpowder in Britain. In the Battle of Crecy in 1346 the...
No trace of the medieval Colne Priory in Essex remains above ground, as the site is now occupied by a later building of the same name, and in private ownership. However, for decades archaeologists...
Britain's Iron Age landscape conceals many secrets and has many tales to tell and few stories are more dramatic than that of the Brigantes and their queen Cartimandua, when the Romans arrived in...