Standing with Stones

This is a special YouTube edition of our weekly audio only Patreon exclusive podcast, the ‘Monday Moot'. However, as it's a special occasion (the 50th Monday Moot!) we thought we'd share a YouTube version of the recording so you can get a little flavour of some of the exclusive content available to our Patreon supporters. Yes - it's a shameless excuse for a plug of course, and we hope you'll check out the link below to see what else goes on when you support the enterprise by becoming a Prehistory Guys patron. OK - we know - here we go talking about ritual again! We promise to try and not be so predictable in the future but in the meantime, bear with us as we turn our laser like beam to the topic of burning. Inspired by this article about the Arminghall Henge in Norfolk (what is Rupert on about ... Norwich is in Norfolk ... am I missing something? You'll see what I mean), https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-norfolk-63242326 we take to task some of the assumptions made about the occasional association of evidence of burning with ancient monuments.

Every week we make an exclusive short podcast for our Patreon supporters called 'The Monday Moot'. It's a kind of a sandbox where we air our thoughts on aspects of prehistoric archaeology. Sometimes, those thoughts become worthy topics for a wider audience and this is one of those instances. Here, Michael & Rupert ask if the word 'henge' has an impact on the way we view our circular earthworks in the UK. KENNY BROPHY INTERVIEW: https://youtu.be/f6yQcGzqccg

We take you to The Scottish Isles, Bohemia and South Carolina! More fingerprints on pottery have been found at the Ness of Brodgar and it turns out that they all belong to young adult men and that the most recent print to be found belonged to a thirteen year old boy! A team of archaeologists from the University of West Bohemia in Pilsen have discovered a long barrow, built around 3,800BC on the legendary Říp Mountain in the Czech Republic. Machine learning and Artificial Intelligence applied to LIDAR technology has led to the discovery of ancient Shell Rings on Daws Island, South Carolina. 00:00 - Intro & Titles 00:23 - Ness of Brodgar Fingerprints 04:23 - A Long Barrow in the Czech Republic 09:27 - Patreon/Buy Me a Coffee appeal 10:56 - Shell Rings, machine learning and A.I. 15:30 - Finishing up

This is an excerpt from a longer YouTube interview conducted with Professor Timothy Darvill in August 2021. The argument over the A303 Stonehenge Tunnel doesn't go away and although it may seem that the general consensus is that it's a bad idea, that impression is incorrect. One authoritative archaeological voice is that of Tim Darvill's and here we present a view from someone who was in at the inception of the scheme to restore the Stonehenge landscape to be in keeping with the dignity of the site.  

Hope you'll find it in your hearts to excuse the clickbaity title - but then again it is a truly valid use of the word 'alien'. The rocks in question are certainly not where they belong and pose a genuine mystery as to why they are where they have been found - down near Avebury henge in Wiltshire, 280 miles from their origin. We hope you enjoy our discussion, but rocks aside, we're very glad to have this additional leverage into discussing the importance and purpose of the West Kennett palisades and indeed the prehistory of the whole Avebury landscape. We feel we're just lifting the edge of the carpet ...

This is the audio from a Prehistory Guys YouTube video released in March 2022. https://youtu.be/ubMqZv_eozY Back in February we received an email from whoever deals with Tim Darvill's press releases with an embargoed link to his new paper: 'Keeping Time at Stonehenge'. We felt honoured to be included in a trusted circle - and normally would have done something about it by now, but, as you know, circumstances have been difficult lately and so we're a bit late to the game with this one.  Anyway, here is our breakdown of Professor Darvill's hypothesis that Stonehenge (in Stage 2 - 2,500BC) was constructed to be a monumental perpetual calendar whose purpose was to keep in pace with the solar year. We hope we add some clarity to other reports that have been in the press and that you end up with enough information to make a judgement for yourself about the strength of this idea. LINK TO THE ORIGINAL PAPER AT CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journa...

In the episode we dive into some of our favorite jokes from the people behind survival with a smile the web series. 

We talk with archaeologist Sue Greaney, Senior Properties Historian with English Heritage and Editor of PAST, the newsletter of the Prehistoric Society about her passion for archaeology and her responsibilities at Stonehenge and other sites managed by English Heritage. The main reason we wanted to get her on, though is that Sue is the author of a fantastic new piece of research on the Mega Henge complex at Mount Pleasant in Dorset.

We're very proud to bring you our interview with Professor Alice Roberts - anatomist and biological anthropologist, author and broadcaster and Professor of Public Engagement in Science at the University of Birmingham. Alice will need no introduction for many of you, but to understand why we were so thrilled that she agreed to be on the show, as per Rupert's intro: Before becoming a writer and presenter, Alice's career began as a medical doctor, she went on to become a university lecturer, teaching human anatomy, developing a particular expertise, and doing a PhD in paleopathology (the study of disease in ancient human remains). Through a circuitous route, this led to her working as a bone specialist with the renowned archaeology series Time Team and then on to presenting SEVERAL OF her own land mark television series. She has won numerous awards, perhaps most notably being the first recipient of the Royal Society David Attenborough Award in 2020. Her books are always a joy to read and her latest title, Ancestors, The Prehistory of Britain in Seven Burials is so relevant to everything the Prehistory Guys are about, that it seemed the perfect time to get her on to talk about that, along with her thoughts about many other aspects of her work. We hope you enjoy our chat as much as we did…  

Our second interview with Tim Darvill and a riveting first-person deep dive through prehistoric archaeology from in-the-moment practical concerns of current practice, through to the more philosophical concerns confronting the modern day antiquarian.  We talk about Stonehenge, long barrows, bluestones, emerging narratives for the Neolithic, prehistory in the press ... and much more!

More for your money in this Prehistory Flash: we've expanded the format to include more than one item to help return us to more of the podcast style delivery. Hope you enjoy! There will be video versions to follow. This time: Pythagorian geometry in Mesopotamia 1,000 before Pythagoras New finds at King Arthur's Stone in Herefordshire and possibly the earliest coin factory in the world!

This is ground breaking research from the Balkans where researchers are piecing together the apparently widespread use of cosmetics as far back as six and a half thousand years ago. Tiny ceramic bottles have been excavated across a wide region of the Balkans and Transdanubia, and as long ago as the 1930s it was suggested that they might be for cosmetics or medicines. So Bine Kramberger from the Institute for the Protection of Cultural Heritage of Slovenia, Christoph Berthold and Cynthianne Spiteri from Eberhard Karls University at Tübingen in Germany have analysed a number of pots from various locations, to try to identify exactly what these tiny vessels contained.  

30,000 years ago, close to the banks of the river Danube, it seems that the saddest of events occurred to a family living there during the Paleolithic period. Michael and Rupert bring you some of the background to this story emerging from the latest aDNA study of remains found in the town of Krems in Austria.

Welcome to another prehistory guys interview, introducing you to archaeologists and historians, all too often hidden behind the scenes, finding out what they're up to while the world isn't watching. This time we're talking with Dr Lee Bray, lead archaeologist for the Dartmoor National Park in Devon, south west England. Lee started out in geology before making the move into archaeology, and to Exeter University where he gained his doctorate in Romano British Iron production on Exmoor. Dartmoor is a special place for us, so we were very much looking forward to this conversation with Dr Bray, who has possibly the best job archaeology can provide. He didn't disappoint. Like what we're doing? There are 2 ways to support our work:

12th feb 2021 BBc broadcast a programme hosted by Professor Alice Roberts called 'Stonehenge, the Lost Circle Revealed'. Both leading up to and afterwards, there was a flurry of headlines in the press ranging from the reasonably restrained to the outright sensational. To cut to the chase, the end result has been - to the dismay of many in the archaeological community and both Rupert and I - the the perception has been left with the general public that Stonehenge had a previous existence in the south Wales hills before it was transported wholesale to what is now Wiltshire. We followed up that broadcast with a short off-the-cuff show of our own on YouTube that attempted to redress some of the (what we regarded as) misleading elements of that programme. In some eyes, this was interpreted as an attack on the lead archaeologist featured in the BBC show, namely Prof Mike Parker Pearson. It was not. What MPP has done here is amazing and we hope by the time we've got to the end of this section in the podcast, you'll get a sense of the high regard we've got for him. What we were trying to do however is point out that there was so much more nuance to the finds that have been made and the results that have been extracted. Moreover that there are other voices in the field that were ignored by the BBC and that all is not as simple as made out. All that said - the story is amazing, the questions it poses are mind bending and the picture of people in the late Neolithic and what they were up to remains just as enigmatic if not more so than before the gloss of certainty that was painted over this whole question of the origins of the bluestones of Stonehenge by the BBC programme. We just want to make it real again. Strip it back to the actual evidence and leave you - we hope - much more excited by just how much more complex this story is than the impression left by the BBC in this case. As ever - even with the detail we go into here - we've barely scratched the surface. This could have been a very long podcast indeed. However, let us know if you think we should do more on this! Help support us and join our Patreon community See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

"Welcome to another prehistory guys interview, introducing you to people, often hidden in the background, whose work is really making a difference to our understanding of humanity in prehistory "Today we're talking with Dr Kenny Brophy Senior lecturer of archaeology at the University of Glasgow. Kenny's work focuses mainly on the British Neolithic, particularly of Scotland, and he has written copiously about the many cursus monuments to be found there. "Kenny is passionate about bringing archaeology into the public domain and is equally interested in how people have engaged with ancient monuments throughout history. Pursuing this theme, he writes a regular blog under the title of The Urban Prehistorian, exploring the roles that megalithic and other prehistoric sites continue to play within society. "Apart from having directed numerous excavations in Scotland, he lectures widely and is always a captivating speaker. We hope you enjoy the conversation as much as we did." KENNY'S PAGE AT GLASGOW UNIVERSITY: https://www.gla.ac.uk/schools/humanities/staff/kennethbrophy/  THE URBAN PREHISTORIAN:  https://theurbanprehistorian.wordpress.com/  THE COCHNO STONE: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cochno_Stone  Help support us and join our Patreon community See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

IT'S BACK! Rupert & I are delighted to present you with a recording of us producing our first audio podcast after a long break. We're back to our old format with Pushing Back the Boundaries, news, a central topic and finishing off with Stonehead of the Month and a bit of Whimsy. Scroll down for links to some source material. There is a video version of this podcast at https://youtu.be/fEegOLUPfk4 PUSHING BACK THE BOUNDARIES Long distance trading of exotic foods in prehistory https://phys.org/news/2020-12-food-south-asia-revealed-east.html NEWS DNA from Neolithic in present day population in Western Canada https://www.abroadintheyard.com/dna-links-aboriginal-woman-canada-and-200-x-great-grandaughter/ Bronze Age Lovers? https://www.livescience.com/romeo-and-juliet-skeletons-israel.html Baby and Puppy burial https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/15/2000-year-old-remains-of-infant-and-pet-dog-uncovered-in-france MARITIME TRAVEL IN PREHISTORY Seagoing explorers 35,000 years ago - Modern day Japan https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ancient-humans-sea-voyage-japan-ryukyu-island-migration Peopling of the Caribbean Islands https://phys.org/news/2020-09-archaeologists-step-by-step-path-people-caribbean.html Polynesians and Native Americans https://phys.org/news/2020-07-polynesians-native-americans-contact-european.html List of ancient ships on Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ancient_ships STONEHEAD OF THE MONTH: Amanda Hart Coninium Museum https://coriniummuseum.org/ 'Stone Age to Corinium' launch https://youtu.be/M_pcK_kRdY8 WHIMSY Oldest sword known was thought to be medieval https://www.livescience.com/ancient-anatolian-sword-in-venetian-monastery.html The thumbnail image for this video incorporates an image from theTanum petroglyphs, Sweden: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rock_Carvings_in_Tanum Help support us and join our Patreon community See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Despite any number of challenges over the past six years, including more recently the Covid lockdowns of course, Amanda has kept driving the project of giving the museum a complete overhaul and redesign, and with her team has created a breathtaking set of galleries that cover the full span of human history in the Cotswolds. One thing that makes Amanda so rare, is that she is a museum director with archaeology in her veins. She studied archaeology at university and has been involved on excavations of the Bronze Age sites in the Maroni Valley on Cyprus. Ultimately she turned this back to her love of museums, bringing a unique slant on how archaeology could be presented to the public. "We think that what Amanda has achieved at Corinium is nothing short of extraordinary and this interview is our way of helping celebrate her dedication and devotion in bringing prehistory to a wider audience." Corinium Museum website is here: https://coriniummuseum.org/ Watch the online opening of the new museum here:  Help support us and join our Patreon community See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Dr. Tom Booth specialises in analysing ancient DNA from archaeological human remains, teasing out all manner of information from diet and disease to migrations of people in the distant past. In fact, some of Tom’s recent research has even shed light on different funerary practices in the Bronze Age, revealing some fascinating discoveries about ways that people related to, or looked after the remains of their departed. (We first reported on this in a piece in the Prehistory Show #3. https://www.patreon.com/posts/prehistory-show-42771218) Tom's work is really bringing some clarity to the huge genetic shifts which took place in the major transition periods of the past and it’s remarkable how the study of ancient DNA is opening so many windows into the past. As is so often the case, we could have talked long enough to make half a dozen interviews. We hope you enjoy this one.

The aim of these two chaps is to transform the economy of Caithness, no less - up in the North East corner of Scotland! And the medium by which they're going to achieve this? By building an Iron Age Broch of course! Crazy? Not so fast. There's method in their madness, but you'll have to listen to the podcast to find out why. And/or you could check out the Caithness Broch Project website for a bit more background on their amazing enterprise.

Elizabeth Dale A.K.A. 'The Cornish Bird' can trace her heritage in Cornwall back more than 500 years. As you probably know, from a megalithic point of view, Cornwall is one of the most densely packed areas in the whole of the UK and if you visit Lizzie's blog 'The Cornish Bird' https://cornishbirdblog.com, you're sure to find her writing beautifully about ancient sites both familiar and strange, many well off the beaten track. For a change we thought you'd love to hear from someone who's approach is not academic, someone who appreciates the stones for their own sakes - as they stand in and characterise the landscape in which she lives.

It was an absolute delight talking with Caroline & Tom about their insights into what it was like living in the Iron Age. This is archaeology from the other end of the barrel; actually living and working with the available foods, materials, pigments and technology gives an insight into prehistoric life that simply looking at archaeological remains cannot. The depth of archaeological knowledge these two have, coupled with their experience of hands-on dealing with the realities of day-to-day Iron Age life, illuminates not only a period just before the Romans arrived, but probably way before that, the Bronze Age and maybe even the Neolithic.

We met Seren in 2019 at the Prehistoric Society’s 'Landscapes of the Dead' conference at the Society of Antiquaries in London where she gave a fantastic talk. In fact, the first thing Rupert said to Michael after her presentation was that he really wished she had been one of his lecturers! It really is no surprise that Seren was the youngest person ever to be invited to give the very prestigious Golson Lecture at Australia National University in Canberra in 2018. Seren's specialities are science in archaeology and public archaeology, and her work on the mesolithic neolithic transition is something we’re interested in as well. However, we're particularly fascinated by what she has to say about a site that we're slightly (infamously!) connected to - Bryn Celli Ddu. Together with Ffion Reynolds, she has been lead archaeologist on the excavations there over the last 5 years.

We do try to bring you wide ranging areas of study and this month we’re delighted to be joined by Professor Duncan Garrow of Reading University We met Duncan at the Landscapes of the Dead conference back in November 2019 and knew we had to get him on the show. Apart from being a great speaker, he is another frontline archaeologist who makes you reconsider all sorts of things you thought you knew. Duncan Garrow teaches later European prehistory (with a particular focus on Britain) and archaeological theory. His research interests include the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition; long-term histories of deposition; burial practices; the interpretive potential of radiocarbon dating; the integration of developer-funded and university-based archaeology; archaeological theory; and interdisciplinary approaches to material culture. In this interview, we grill him about Neolithic 'argonauts' and migrations across the Channel and the western seaways, Rupert's favourite: crannogs - and the amazing UK Grave Goods project he is involved with in assocation with the British Museum.

True to form, The Prehistory Guys chase down another media headline to find the hidden treasure! In this case, news of a new date for old London conceals the real story: the first use of a new and exciting archaeological dating technique for pottery.

We were saddened to learn of the passing of the great archaeologist. For megalithic enthusiasts, his influence has been profound and that holds true for us and the podcasts and films we make. We couldn't let the moment pass without saying a few words.

The Prehistory Guys talk to environmental archaeologist and conchologist (snail expert) Dr Mike Allen, lecturer at Oxford University and research fellow at Bournemouth University. In the late 1990s, he began questioning the prevailing archaeological belief that the chalk grasslands of Wiltshire around Stonehenge were blanketed in postglacial woodland. His investigations had shown him that the snail record pointed instead to a landscape of open grassland with open-grown fruiting trees and shrubs. It is his work that has informed the stunning visual displays depicting the evolution of the chalk landscape in the new museum at Stonehenge. We talk of his beginnings in archaeology, the ancient landscapes of the chalk downs, monuments and people, chronology and the Cerne Abbas Giant.

In December 2019 reports began to appear in the media about the discovery of an anomaly in the Callanish landscape on Lewis that pointed to a 5,000 year old lightning strike being the inspiration for the famous monument. The discovery was made by the Calanais Virtual Reconstruction Project, a joint venture led by the University of St Andrews with standing stones trust Urras nan Tursachan and the University of Bradford and supported by funding from Highlands and Islands Enterprise. They were not on the hunt for ancient lightning strikes however. The anomaly was thrown up by a magnetometry scan of one of the Callanish sites - Airigh na Beinne Bige, otherwise know as Site XI. Can we infer that the whole Callanish site was erected because of a lightning strike? It's a nice idea - but can it withstand the merciless glare of investigation by The Prehistory Guys?

A couple of podcasts back, we interviewed Professor Bruce Bradley - he of the Solutrean Hypothesis in Paleolithic America. Truth be told, the impetus to contact Bruce Bradley came about because we'd noticed that an outfit called 'Seven Ages Research Associates' in the States had just published an interview with him. It was a bit "if they can - why don't we?" - so we did. Well, one thing led to another and one day we got an invitation from Jason Pentrail, one of the three associates, to hook up and produce some back-to-back interviews with each other. They'd interview us for their podcast and we'd interview them for ours. Here's our side of the deal! Although their remit is very much broader than ours (histrory, archaeology, science and culture) it turns out we are very much on the same page as far as communicating what may be going on behind the scenes in academia within our spheres of interest. If this chat is anything to go by, there is much for us to exchange and we feel that we've barely scratched the surface as far as us talking to each other is concerned. Watch this space. In this brief chat, we talk about their various areas of interest, Bruce Bradley, bridging the gap between amateur and professional archaeologists and their favourite archaeological sites in the USA and more. Enjoy.

  In 1980, archaeologist Julian Richards was invited to direct the 'Stonehenge Environs Project' which had been conceived to better understand the landscape surrounding the monument and to work out ways in which it could be better managed and preserved for the future. Part of the work involved the partial excavation of a small henge on Coneybury Hill, to the south-east of Stonehenge. This proved fruitful in many ways and the Coneybury Henge now stands as a significant monument in its own right. However, lying just outside the henge, the magnetometer survey revealed an 'anomaly' which turned out to be a large pit, 2 metres across and 1.2 metres deep containing a huge collection of Neolithic pottery, animal bones and flint tools, deposited around 3900BC, over a thousand years before the henge was built. The sheer volume of the deposits is intriguing, but the unique mix of lithics and animal bones in the pit perhaps tell the story of one particular event that happened in this landscape one day, six thousand years ago. The paper from which we have taken our information “A Meeting in the Forest: Hunters and Farmers at the Coneybury ‘Anomaly’, Wiltshire can be accessed at Cambridge University Press.  

Please support The Prehistory Guys on Patreon.https://www.patreon.com/theprehistoryguys Though we say this ourselves, this interview with Professor Timothy Darvill OBE, should be required listening for all serious students of archaeology and fascinated amateurs alike. From his own early childhood beginnings in the discipline, to his thoughts on the purpose and future of archaeology, Tim delves into the detail of his work on the Cotswold Long Barrows, the Neolithic Isle of Man, the Preseli Bluestones and, of course, Stonehenge itself. We were privileged to record this interview with Professor Darvill in his home in Bournemouth where he is Professor Of Archaeology And Director Of The Centre For Archaeology And Anthropology at Bournemouth University. We are so pleased to be able to share this intensive journey across the landscape of British prehistoric archaeology of the past decades in the company of one of its foremost influencers. 

We have to confess we are not as knowledgable about American prehistory as we would like to be. But how could we have done better to begin educating ourselves than to talk to celebrated American archaeologist, Professor Bruce Bradley? Until recently Emeritus Professor of Prehistory and Director of the Experimental Archaeology Masters Programme at the University of Exeter, Bruce has a remarkable c.v., having involved himself with stone-age technologies and experimental archaeology, the archaeology of the North American Southwest and Great Plains, the Upper Palaeolithic of Russia and France and is currently focused on the early peopling of the Americas. He is one of the foremost flint knapping experts in the world and the insights into prehistoric lithic working practises perfectly placed him to formulate the 'Solutrean Hypothesis', his controversial theory that some parts of the North Eastern coast of America could have been populated by migrating people from the region of the Pyrenees and Northern Spain during the last glacial maximum. We talk to him about his career, his current work and outline the story of Clovis and Pre-Clovis culture in the Americas as it is currently understood. We then turn to the idea for which he is best known, the 'Solutrean Hypothesis'.

The Prehistory Guys are very proud to share with you this fantastic interview with Dr. Alison Sheridan, recently retired Principal Archaeological Research Curator at the National Museums of Scotland. As you'll find out in the first minutes of this podcast, Alison's C.V. is simply spectacular. If there's such a thing as an A-List archaeologist, she is a prime example of what that looks like - not only in terms of her output and influence, but in the extraordinary breadth of her study. Her special area however, is the crossover period between the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods in Britain and Ireland. In this interview you'll find out what makes her thesis on how the Neolithic 'package' made it across from the continent 6,000 years ago both compelling and controversial and discover her passion for the life archaeological!

  Ancient craft and brewing specialist Merryn Dineley, together with her brewing expert husband Graham join us to discus how the general unawareness of the way beer is brewed leads to the evidence for it in prehistory being overlooked. Once the process is understood, then the existence of large vessels, like the Grooved Ware pot from Durrington Walls above, suddenly makes sense, as do some of the details inside many excavated ancient and Neolithic buildings up and down Britain and beyond.

Earlier in December, news articles began to show up reporting the discovery of very old cave art on the island of Sulawesi in Indonesia. What is significant about the find is that it pushes back the date of the earliest figurative painting a long way, such that this REPRESENTATIVE cave art in Indonesia is of a similar age to the first know ABSTRACT art in Europe. True to form, Rupert and Michael dig a little deeper, celebrating the find, but making sure we don't get bogged down in some of the assumptions and presumptions that may skew our understanding of what this represents.

We're kicking off our regular interview features with our good friend and colleague Dr. Rick Pettigrew of the Archaeological Legacy Institute in Eugene, Oregon. The photo above is of Rick standing in front of West Kennet long barrow back in September this year when we were on the 'Backbone of Neolithic Britain' tour. The tour was instigated by Rick and we were delighted to collaborate with him organising this huge adventure and we're delighted to say that we'll be doing it again next year. The point is though that we got to know Rick rather better and found out that (as well as being a great guy!) he's quite a mover and shaker in the world of archaeology and very much aligned to our way of thinking in terms of how it gets communicated. And communication is really something that shines out in this conversation as (via the Columbia River, obsidian dating, Iran, prehistoric migration, and Malta) we arrive at the subject of the development of language in prehistory.

Does our ancient landscape lie to us? Well, there is a sense in which we are deceived ... or is it we who deceive ourselves? Michael and Rupert discuss how our natural instinct for creating meaning out of what we see might lead us a little astray. All this and the regular magazine slots in the latest episode of what is now THE PREHISTORY GUYS podcast!

When things don't seem so great in the present, it's easy to idealise the past. Not so fast! Archaeology has thrown light on some remarkable and truly brutal events in European prehistory recently. It seems that 7,000 years ago a particular phase of angst and conflict in the Neolithic 'Linearbandkeramik' (LBK) culture of central Europe was kicking off and led to some horrific examples of man's inhumanity to man being left in the archaeological record. Rupert and Michael duck the crime scene tape and take a peek under the sheet ...

If we're talking about standing stones and the Neolithic, then we have to talk about origins ... and if we talk about origins we have to talk about the Middle East and Anatolia. If we talk about the Middle East and Anatolia, the names Çatalhöyük and Göbekli Tepe seem to come up. But Tell Qaramel? Tell es-Sultan? Motza? Maybe nearer to home on the Danube; Lepinski Vir? By merely scratching the surface of the subject of ancient settlements, Michael & Rupert have their minds quietly blown taking on the implications of the timescales involved in relation to our own, home-grown developments in the British Neolithic.

It seems ages since we last posted a podcast. But it's only just over a month - it must be that we've been incredibly busy! And some of that business is down to Michael's excursion to Orkney to take part in a three-day field archaeology course at the Cairns Broch dig on South Ronaldsay. Yes, the new trowel was well and truly broken in and in this episode, Rupert grills Michael about his adventure and actually manages to extract some interesting information from him about the dig and his hands-on archaeological experience. (Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition). NOTE: if you're interested in following up on the background to the topics covered in this podcast, for the monthly subscription rate of $1 a month, you can have access to the show notes for this show, and much more content besides, by becoming a member on Patreon. Go to the Patreon page for this podcast and become one of our valued Patreon supporters now! 

Since we began this podcast in March 2018, archaeological facts and finds have been coming at us fast and furious - so much so that it's becoming hard to keep track of what happened where and in what order! So, in an effort to claw back some clarity, we've begun compiling a Timeline of Prehistory. The simple question: "what was going on in the rest of the world when megalith building was happening in Britain?" has thrown up some surprising facts. In order to give some context to the Neolithic and early Bronze Age this side of the Channel, we explore what was going on in the world from 8,000 to 2,000 BC.  We hope you find it as eye-opening as we did!

Back in November 2018, we found ourselves sitting on the front row for the a lecture in the Wiltshire Museum by Dr. Katharine Walker of Bournemouth University entitled 'Taking Sides, Scandinavian Flint Axe type in Britain'. This wasn't really an accident because, as you probably know, the subject of axe-heads, their meaning, production and trade is one that we find ourselves returning to often in the podcast. We kept in communication with Dr. Walker after the talk and we were very pleased when she agreed to do a Standing with Stones podcast interview with us. In it, we chat about her work, her experiences and the insights that pursuing her fascination with neolithic axeheads has given her. Dr Katharine Walker is a prehistorian specialising in the Neolithic of northwest Europe and is a Visiting Research Fellow at Bournemouth University. She gained a first class degree in Archaeology from the University of Bristol; an MA in the European Neolithic from Cardiff University, funded by the AHRC; and a PhD from the University of Southampton entitled ‘Axe-heads and Identity: an Investigation into theRoles of Identity Formation in Neolithic Britain.’ And that’s about all you need to know for the time being - Oh, that and the fact that we recorded the interview in the saloon of a 43 ft sailing boat in Southampton marina.    

We tend to thing of our ancient monuments as being special, unique places. But when you begin to count them, it slowly dawns on you that for our ancestors, they were commonplace. In Standing with Stones podcast number 14, Michael and Rupert discuss this aspect of our heritage - and ask whether appreciation of their ubiquity changes our appreciation of them. As well as our regular features, 'Question Time' this month sparks a debate as to the utility of the Aubrey Holes at Stonehenge; were they used to predict lunar and solar eclipses? Or is there number and form merely contingent on chance and location? NOTE: if you're interested in following up on the background to the topics covered in this podcast, for the monthly subscription rate of $1 a month, you can have access to the notes for this show, and much more content besides, by becoming a member on Patreon. Go to the Patreon page for this podcast and become one of our valued Patreon supporters now! 

As you'll have guessed already, this month we're off to Cumbria and the Lake District to wander the Great Stone Circles, ponder their purpose and hopefully enlighten you about their grandeur and importance. Oh, and of course, there'll be a boundary pushed, some news, a new stonehead, a question answered and a little whimsey.  By the way, if you're interested in the show notes, we've moved them to the Patreon page for this podcast and will be continuing to do so in the future. Patreon supporters will have exclusive access to them from now on as a reward for their support (along with many other perks!). If you want to access the show notes, follow the link and become one of our valued Patreon supporters now! It needn't cost you more than $1 a month. SHOW NOTES HERE.

"Dartmoor is one of my favourite places in the whole of England, and I've been exploring here for over twenty years. Three hundred and sixty five square miles of rolling moors, with a huge variety of prehistoric structures. It's so unspoilt - in archaeological terms - it gives us a much clearer idea of what the whole country used to be like". So says Rupert at the beginning of the Dartmoor segment of our 2008 film 'Standing with Stones'. Twelve years on from the making of the film, we muse on what's special about this magical place and give some useful pointers about getting the most out of a visit to the moors. PLUS: domesticated dogs from 14,000 years ago; megaliths of the Westrn Sahara; Secrets of the Ice; 12,000 year old petroglyphs from India - and, of course, our regular features. SHOW NOTES AT STANDINGSTONES.NET

A few weeks ago in the middle of February 2019, articles began appearing in the media linking Stonehenge, sailors and the megalithic culture of Brittany. To us, something didn't smell quite right about that and it didn’t take long to find out that most of these articles were, in one way or another, misrepresenting, and at worst completely mangling a serious, deep and very painstaking piece of academic research by Dr. Bettina Schulz Paulsson of the University of Gothenburg, Sweden. In a book published in 2015 and in a recent short paper, Dr. Schulz Paulsson describes how the radio carbon dates taken from nearly two and a half thousand megalithic and pre-megalithic sites in Western Europe show a radiation of a megalithic culture in the 5th and 4th millenia BC  from North West France and in particular coastal Brittany down the Atlantic seaboard and round into the Mediterranean. How better to clear up any misunderstandings than to talk to the source of the work herself? And so it was a great honour when Dr. Schulz Paulsson agreed to be on our show.

This month we take an inward look at part of the process that went into the making of Standing with Stones; just how did we choose which sites to include in the film? It's a response to the oft-asked question: "Why the heck did you leave (insert personal favourite site here) out?" We do our best to answer. PLUS:  A VERY ancient tiara, a submerged settlement in the Hebrides, a 4,000 year old child's rattle and for the grown-ups - a 4,000 year old board game. Oh, and the Stonehead of the Month is a dog.

Was there a Beaker revolution? Both Rupert and Michael are surprised to find that despite a lot of detailed archaeological and genetic evidence, there is much confusion as to what exactly was going on in Britain and Northern/Central Europe 4,500 years ago. However, what is clear is that big changes happened, especially in Britain - where wholesale population change occurred over a few hundred years. What are we to make of this? Plus:Neolithic beasts of burden, Mesolithic chewing gum, The Folkton Drums and an exhibition of archaeological howlers. And Michael and Rupert fight for the "Grouchy Hat'!

In a very special 1 hour 45 minute extended episode (you have been warned), Michael & Rupert explore the science of archaeoastronomy and surprise themselves at how long they are able to talk on the subject. However, there's still time for pushing a boundary, some news, a question, a Stonehead of the Month and a fascinating bit of neolithic audio whimsey. Show notes not available at time of publication but will be available soon at https://www.standingstones.net/sws-009-archaeoastronomy

At last! Megalithic podcast No. 8! All the regular slots - pushing back boundaries, news, Stonehead of the Month etc. PLUS: We know that Neolithic trade took place; the question is how? Rupert & Michael perform a reverse 2½ somersault with 2½ twists and attempt some answers to the question.  For full show notes, please go to STANDINGSTONES.NET