Legend has it that one of the departmental geographers liaised with the architect who designed the Nottingham room, because he (cynically?) suspected estates might remove freestanding cabinets to free up space. So he had them built into the walls, floor to ceiling, making them hard to take away.

Not many of these places left unfortunately. Nottingham is an exception and the brilliant cartographer there, Elaine Watts, was showing me some maps last summer. It got "rediscovered" a few years ago after central timetabling tried to get their hands on the room...

Can you give a clue to the nearest order of magnitude?

At least they have got Ukraine correct.

Brilliant! Do you mind sharing who you went with and whether you needed extra insulation? Asking for a friend.

Congratulations Richard!

I certainly had no idea that author names get translated before today!

I was about to write "not again!", but entirely understandable at the moment.

10/10 agreed for this case.

That sounds plausible and makes me wonder what's happening in areas that look like they're doing well in Europe. Very much hope the edgelands you've been studying are a special case, but clearly there's a warning here that they might not be. Thanks also for the news article.

V interesting, thanks for sharing. Do you think the conclusions are applicable elsewhere too? In Mediterranean Europe (esp N Italy) the opposite trend of succession is occurring and biodiversity is increasing, esp with headline species like wolves and other large mammals. Unsure about other species.

This article makes some good points about the need to review human tissue samples on display in museums (e.g. in some anthropological collections), but I don't think it's useful to piggyback this onto Egyptology. The picture also shows coffins and not human remains.

If only...