Jonathan Last
@johnnythin.bsky.social
What festive sight do we want to see on the Christmas morning dog walk? Donkeys munching holly, you say?
December 25, 2025 at 11:25 AM
What festive sight do we want to see on the Christmas morning dog walk? Donkeys munching holly, you say?
It's a time for forgiving anachronism, so here's wishing a very merry prehistoric Christmas to all hominins and dinos!
December 24, 2025 at 10:25 PM
It's a time for forgiving anachronism, so here's wishing a very merry prehistoric Christmas to all hominins and dinos!
Nativity with spoiler
December 13, 2025 at 8:40 PM
Nativity with spoiler
But how do the BBC know it was a man...? Also, what happened to Beeches Pit as the oldest fire?
That aside, this is fascinating!
That aside, this is fascinating!
The moment the earliest known man-made fire was uncovered - BBC News
Archaeologists in the UK have discovered the world's oldest evidence of humans lighting fires
www.bbc.co.uk
December 10, 2025 at 5:53 PM
But how do the BBC know it was a man...? Also, what happened to Beeches Pit as the oldest fire?
That aside, this is fascinating!
That aside, this is fascinating!
So many archaeological reports these days refer to 'auguring' that I'm starting to think units really are employing soothsayers as a survey method...
December 3, 2025 at 7:07 PM
So many archaeological reports these days refer to 'auguring' that I'm starting to think units really are employing soothsayers as a survey method...
The first broken bauble of Christmas is the one from the Isle of Wight 🎄😢
December 2, 2025 at 8:55 AM
The first broken bauble of Christmas is the one from the Isle of Wight 🎄😢
Exclusive photo from the Doctor Who set following Disney pulling its funding
December 1, 2025 at 6:30 PM
Exclusive photo from the Doctor Who set following Disney pulling its funding
Textures of Calanais for #StandingStoneSunday on #StAndrewsDay
November 30, 2025 at 10:25 AM
Textures of Calanais for #StandingStoneSunday on #StAndrewsDay
I wish I knew more about Stoppard’s plays but I’m prepared to argue this (with his screenplay) is one of the best things the BBC has ever done
Sylvia has dinner with General Campion - Parade's End - Episode 4 - BBC
YouTube video by BBC
www.youtube.com
November 29, 2025 at 7:00 PM
I wish I knew more about Stoppard’s plays but I’m prepared to argue this (with his screenplay) is one of the best things the BBC has ever done
It seems my attempt to revive some interest in Tupper has not gone down well, which I fully intend to take as a judgement on the quality of his verse, not of my post… 😉🏺
The poet and antiquarian Martin Farquhar Tupper died #OTD in 1889. I imagine most people's response to this would be ‘who?’ — Tupper's life as a poet seems an object lesson on the vagaries of fame and fashion, lauded in the 1840s and 1850s, parodied in the 1860s, and in obscurity by the 1870s… 🧵
November 29, 2025 at 5:07 PM
It seems my attempt to revive some interest in Tupper has not gone down well, which I fully intend to take as a judgement on the quality of his verse, not of my post… 😉🏺
The poet and antiquarian Martin Farquhar Tupper died #OTD in 1889. I imagine most people's response to this would be ‘who?’ — Tupper's life as a poet seems an object lesson on the vagaries of fame and fashion, lauded in the 1840s and 1850s, parodied in the 1860s, and in obscurity by the 1870s… 🧵
November 29, 2025 at 8:34 AM
The poet and antiquarian Martin Farquhar Tupper died #OTD in 1889. I imagine most people's response to this would be ‘who?’ — Tupper's life as a poet seems an object lesson on the vagaries of fame and fashion, lauded in the 1840s and 1850s, parodied in the 1860s, and in obscurity by the 1870s… 🧵
Brian Aldiss on Desert Island Discs in 2007 - fascinating insights into his early life in particular, and a delightfully eclectic choice of music
Desert Island Discs Revisited - Centenary Castaways - Brian Aldiss - BBC Sounds
Sci-fi author Brian Aldiss is castaway by Kirsty Young
www.bbc.co.uk
November 24, 2025 at 8:29 PM
Brian Aldiss on Desert Island Discs in 2007 - fascinating insights into his early life in particular, and a delightfully eclectic choice of music
Also in the press #OTD 100 years ago: continuing the Illustrated London News' interest in recent finds from Palaeolithic sites in Moravia, it looks like Amédée Forestier had some fun drawing these Late Pleistocene beavers 🦣🏺
![Cutting from the Illustrated London News, 21 Nov 1925 - line drawing of beavers with a Palaeolithic human in the background, captioned: "Giant beavers of Eastern Europe over 20,000 years ago: a reconstruction drawing based on skeletons found in Moravia. In our issue of November 7 Professor Absolon described how he found the bones of a whole herd of fossil beavers, which had evidently perished together in a catastrophe, on the banks of an underground river in Moravia. A complete skeleton of one of these extinct animals was illustrated in the same number.—[Reconstruction Drawing by A. Forestier, from Material supplied by Professor D. K. Absolon.]"](https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_thumbnail/plain/did:plc:7ggib3rrlsl4bi5pcrna6o42/bafkreiazv2npb6thmkrhknagsnlkv77nhmailuofhz247ehanvid75twdy@jpeg)
November 21, 2025 at 9:04 AM
Also in the press #OTD 100 years ago: continuing the Illustrated London News' interest in recent finds from Palaeolithic sites in Moravia, it looks like Amédée Forestier had some fun drawing these Late Pleistocene beavers 🦣🏺
Ad in Country Life #OTD 100 years ago: "A guide to a new quest" would be "an ideal gift to open-air folks" - I wonder how many people got 'The Old Straight Track' for Christmas in 1925? (NB 18/- equates to about £70 today)
November 21, 2025 at 8:55 AM
Ad in Country Life #OTD 100 years ago: "A guide to a new quest" would be "an ideal gift to open-air folks" - I wonder how many people got 'The Old Straight Track' for Christmas in 1925? (NB 18/- equates to about £70 today)
Kings aside, this story also resonates with interpretations of perceptions and attitudes to woodland, trees and timber posts in the European Neolithic...
The Hittite king must ask the Storm god for a tree to build with, he must secure permission to cut down a living thing that has taken decades to grow strong and long enough to be used for construction.
And he doesn’t just need permission.
And he doesn’t just need permission.
November 20, 2025 at 12:57 PM
Kings aside, this story also resonates with interpretations of perceptions and attitudes to woodland, trees and timber posts in the European Neolithic...
Suddenly winter arrived
November 19, 2025 at 9:35 AM
Suddenly winter arrived
Autumn evening on The Mall
November 18, 2025 at 6:21 PM
Autumn evening on The Mall
An onslaught on heritage: "Surrey Metal Detecting Club… membership has rocketed… to more than 3,000 in 2025."
"We're not in it for the treasure, we're history finders" says a man who's "found thousands of coins" and has a shelf at home "where it's all Roman - coins, brooches and stuff like that."
"We're not in it for the treasure, we're history finders" says a man who's "found thousands of coins" and has a shelf at home "where it's all Roman - coins, brooches and stuff like that."
The Surrey Metal Detecting Club sees membership leap in six years
Founded with 60 members in 2019, the Surrey club now has more than 3,000 members across the county.
www.bbc.co.uk
November 16, 2025 at 6:46 PM
An onslaught on heritage: "Surrey Metal Detecting Club… membership has rocketed… to more than 3,000 in 2025."
"We're not in it for the treasure, we're history finders" says a man who's "found thousands of coins" and has a shelf at home "where it's all Roman - coins, brooches and stuff like that."
"We're not in it for the treasure, we're history finders" says a man who's "found thousands of coins" and has a shelf at home "where it's all Roman - coins, brooches and stuff like that."
Michael Ayrton died 50 years ago today aged just 54. Daedalus & the Minotaur were recurring figures in the sculptural, graphic & literary outputs of the latter part of his career. Here's his bronze "Minotaur" (1973) at the Barbican & the cover of his Daedalus 'autobiography' "The Maze Maker" (1967)
November 16, 2025 at 3:34 PM
Michael Ayrton died 50 years ago today aged just 54. Daedalus & the Minotaur were recurring figures in the sculptural, graphic & literary outputs of the latter part of his career. Here's his bronze "Minotaur" (1973) at the Barbican & the cover of his Daedalus 'autobiography' "The Maze Maker" (1967)
On Horsell Common
November 15, 2025 at 10:33 AM
On Horsell Common
Sadly not at the Bronze Age Forum this year but I've still got this design classic from 2011!
November 14, 2025 at 11:53 AM
Sadly not at the Bronze Age Forum this year but I've still got this design classic from 2011!
My personal views only, but I'd suggest the following:
(1) a blanket ban on detecting on land that's in any form of environmental stewardship or landscape recovery scheme - because heritage is part of the environment those measures are meant to be protecting
🧵
(1) a blanket ban on detecting on land that's in any form of environmental stewardship or landscape recovery scheme - because heritage is part of the environment those measures are meant to be protecting
🧵
How about "Where is our heritage demonstrably most risk from metal detecting"? It isn't lost, it's part of the archaeological record.
Cc @Tess_Machling🏺
#FindsFriday
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...
Cc @Tess_Machling🏺
#FindsFriday
www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home...
Where in the UK is the greatest amount of hidden treasure?
Objects uncovered have included precious Viking coins and a Roman earwax scoop
www.independent.co.uk
November 14, 2025 at 9:22 AM
My personal views only, but I'd suggest the following:
(1) a blanket ban on detecting on land that's in any form of environmental stewardship or landscape recovery scheme - because heritage is part of the environment those measures are meant to be protecting
🧵
(1) a blanket ban on detecting on land that's in any form of environmental stewardship or landscape recovery scheme - because heritage is part of the environment those measures are meant to be protecting
🧵
Reposted by Jonathan Last
Anwen Cooper & Tina Roushannafas @ox.ac.uk have just published a beautiful piece in Archaeological Dialogues @universitypress.cambridge.org on how archaeological work can realign to meet the needs of pressing environmental agendas and be part of #nature #recovery projects. doi.org/10.1017/S138...
People and time in nature: Positioning archaeology in an ecoclimate crisis | Archaeological Dialogues | Cambridge Core
People and time in nature: Positioning archaeology in an ecoclimate crisis
doi.org
November 12, 2025 at 5:52 AM
Anwen Cooper & Tina Roushannafas @ox.ac.uk have just published a beautiful piece in Archaeological Dialogues @universitypress.cambridge.org on how archaeological work can realign to meet the needs of pressing environmental agendas and be part of #nature #recovery projects. doi.org/10.1017/S138...
A poem for #TombTuesday on 11 Nov: Kipling's 'London Stone'. There's nothing jingoistic in this bitter reflection on loss. The Stone is the Cenotaph, but I wonder if he also had in mind that older London Stone, the legendary protector of the city, which Blake saw as a place of sacrifice...
November 11, 2025 at 6:53 PM
A poem for #TombTuesday on 11 Nov: Kipling's 'London Stone'. There's nothing jingoistic in this bitter reflection on loss. The Stone is the Cenotaph, but I wonder if he also had in mind that older London Stone, the legendary protector of the city, which Blake saw as a place of sacrifice...
"Today we remember, or boast that we remember. But do we as a nation remember? We may ask ourselves whether we have been faithful keepers of the trust given us by those who paid the greater price. We look out over a troubled world, a tired world, a world hungry for peace & denied it…" #ArmisticeDay
November 11, 2025 at 8:13 AM
"Today we remember, or boast that we remember. But do we as a nation remember? We may ask ourselves whether we have been faithful keepers of the trust given us by those who paid the greater price. We look out over a troubled world, a tired world, a world hungry for peace & denied it…" #ArmisticeDay