Antiquity 78 (300)

The development of geophysical survey remains a priority for new research and cultural resource management alike, since geophysics can find and map sites without destroying them. However there are current weaknesses of sensitivity and resolution -- the instruments cannot easily `see' small features like graves and post-holes of which so many ancient sites are principally composed. Great hopes have been invested in caesium vapour magnetometers, which the Centre for Archaeology has been promoting in England -- perhaps nowhere with such success as at Stanton Drew, Somerset. Here, geophysical techniques have brought to light the lines of broad circles belonging to a previously unrecognised henge monument, and the caesium magnetometer showed these circles to be composed of individual pits about 1.4 m in diameter. The fine focus achieved for these buried features augers well for the discovery and preservation of similar sites and monuments in the future.

An interdisciplinary project undertaken to determine the environmental factors affecting the deterioration of archaeological bronzes while they still lie underground. The method was to examine 3,200 prehistoric bronze artefacts from museum collections and compare the condition of specimens dug up in different areas at different times. Scandinavian data.

Comments arising from the Report of the Working Group on Human Remains (DCMS 2003), dealing with the current legal status of human remains held in publicly funded collections and the issue of their return or repatriation.

Review of Buried treasure: finding our past, an exhibition at the British Museum (2003--04) focussing on the importance of reporting finds by metal detectorists and other members of the public and on the impact of recent antiquities legislation and initiatives, in particular the 1996 Treasure Act and the Portable Antiquities Scheme.

An update on the Palaeolithic cave art discovered in 2003, describing more engravings and bas-relief figures of birds and animals revealed since the initial discovery. Approximately ninety figures have been identified so far.