Christopher Hervez

My photo shows a museum display with colourful Minoan pottery cups arranged on three clear shelves, one above the other. These cups, known as Kamares Ware, are from Phaistos, Crete. They were made in palace workshops, c. 1800-1700 BC. The cups range in shape and size from conic and cylindrical cups (top and middle shelves) to hemispherical and carinated shaped cups (bottom shelf). They are decorated with multi-coloured geometric motifs; with spirals and swirls painted in red and white pigment on black.

Sipping my coffee ☕️ and thinking about these marvellous Minoan cups!

They look so modern it’s incredible to think they were made during the Bronze Age some 3,800 years ago!

Heraklion Archaeological Museum, Crete. 📷 by me

#Archaeology

Vast scale of overseas human remains held in UK museums decried by MPs and experts Exclusive: Guardian study finds UK museums hold more than 260,000 items of remains, often in sacrilegious ways

www.theguardian.com/world/2026/m...

Femme scientifique en blouse blanche, regardant dans un microscope.

"Plus on monte dans la hiérarchie, plus la présence masculine s’accentue, même dans des disciplines très féminisées !"

👉 À l'approche du #8Mars, la chercheuse Laura Verquere analyse les inégalités de genre dans le monde scientifique et donne des pistes pour les combattre : https://swll.to/01wszp

Book now for next week's embroidery workshop inspired by the Bai aprons from Yunnan, China in the museum. The workshop is led by Yiran Duan, founder of Yi Crafts, dedicated to preserving & sharing traditional craftsmanship from China's ethnic minority communities. Sat 14 March. £85.

bit.ly/3Y4Inmb

Blue on white Victorian-era Transferware sherd, seen in my gloved hand on the Thames Foreshore. The broken fragment shows a sweet little scene of people being rowed across a river or lake.

A bigger Transferware sherd from a Victorian-era plate showing more of the scene in the previous photo - we can now see a high status building in the background, with pillars surrounding a doorway, and four people in a gondola style vessel crossing a river, canal or lake.

From the Thames Foreshore in SW London this week, blue on white Victorian-era Transferware sherd showing a sweet little scene of people being rowed across a river or lake. It can be hard to ID the complete design at times but a fellow mudlark has managed to do this.

The Black Death’s counterintuitive effect: as human numbers fell, so did plant diversity New study finds that plant biodiversity collapsed in landscapes where arable production was abandoned during and after the Black Death era.

Very interesting! Thank you @beccyscottuk.bsky.social

theconversation.com/the-black-de...

Title card with the season and episode number and the title Opening the Box of Delights

OUT NOW!

Season 11 Episode 189

OPENING THE BOX OF DELIGHTS

On your podcast app, on the website at
www.thefolklorepodcast.com/episode-189....

or for the full experience watch an extended edition at youtu.be/UOO6GZ5NJlM

A feature length episode on the Box of Delights with special expert panel

Does the Ancient World include microfiche readers? I can't remember that last time I saw one. When someone asks my age I usually reply "ancient".

How do you build a giant wickerman? 🧐🔥

This month on the Butser Plus blog, we sat down with the innovative duo behind our Beltain wickerman.

What does it take to build a 30ft willow sculpture? And how does it feel to see months of work burn to ash?

www.butserancientfarm.co.uk/butserplus-blog-home

Nigel Farage to discuss Chagos Islands deal at Mar-a-Lago dinner with Donald Trump tonight - UK politics live Reform UK leader told a ‘Save Chagos Boat Party’ yesterday he would be raising the issue in his meeting with the president

Those interested in foreign interference in UK democracy might not have the best grasp of this. They should probably be looking to the west as well as the east.

www.theguardian.com/politics/liv...

I just talked to a Stone Age priestess and it could change everything « Archaeology# « Cambridge Core Blog In our new, game-based dissemination experiment, you can enter a mysterious Stone Age world with megalithic graves where life and death are more fluent concepts than today. But whatever you do, don’t ...

www.cambridge.org/core/blog/20...
The real game changer is that archaeologists and heritage specialists control the narrative by feeding curated knowledge to the characters, which they can update as new insights appear.

Read these words from 100 years ago about immigrants in Britain – and see how history is chillingly repeating itself | George Monbiot Shabana Mahmood’s new rights clampdown looks outlandish until we remember that this kind of hardline action is part of our country’s fabric, says George Monbiot

What's surprising is that there isn't a greater attempt to draw attention to this and what the consequences were. We celebrate the Kindertransport as if the action of a small group of dedicated people can exonerate the UK from the massive rejection of Jews.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

How to Make Prehistoric Concrete | Rebuilding the Bronze Age - Part 5 YouTube video by Butser Ancient Farm

How do you make prehistoric concrete? 🧐

In Part 5 of our Bronze Age mini-series with Operation Nightingale, the team bashed up chalk to make clunch for the roundhouse walls!

Find out how they got on & subscribe to the rest of the series on our YouTube channel: www.youtube.com/watch?v=KKY4...

A big fat view of the north wing of Fishbourne roman palace including walkways, mosaics, and happy visitors. And crucially no insanity whatsoever.

We're happy to announce that we are the last place on earth that hasn't gone *absolutely insane* and are open for visitors.

(This is a time-limited offer)

Mysterious men-only Mithras cult site found by German archaeologists German archaeologists have discovered new insights into Bavaria's Roman past from an ancient buried temple where Roman legionaries once worshipped the sun god Mithras.

The cult of Mithras: Archaeologists find signs of ancient men-only mysterious religion in Germany
www.euronews.com/culture/2026...

Great piece of work!

‘Thought it was a collapsed drain’: golf course sinkhole exposes lost wine cellar Groundsman stumbles across room, sealed for more than 100 years, that was part of 12th-century Manchester hall

www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026...

Im really into purchasing Spanish things right now :)

Theatre group seeks tales from the Avon riverbank Stories about the Avon through Warwickshire are needed for a show in Stratford-upon-Avon in August.

My first memory of the Avon is rowing with my uncle and father at the age of 3 or 4. There was a photo of me taking the oars, an adult guiding me with his pipe clamped in his mouth. I was already being taught that the banks were dangerous as they're undercut.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

What's the frequency Kenneth?

I've never read this. Looking forward to it.

My mother worked for the Labour Party just after Word War II and knew Tony Benn. I've no idea why she detested him so much; she found some republican views within the party intolerable. Her opinions fed into my formation. I can't remember at what point I knew she and I were so wrong.

I guess once it becomes apparent you're never going to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize you go and do something which demonstrates why you were never going to be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize...

Words are like lines of code, place them in the right order and you can break or build something.

Attack of the badger-men: can women find a place in the violent and wine-soaked carnivals of southern France? At the start of Lent, men dressed as rampaging creatures pursue women through medieval villages. The families who maintain these traditions are sceptical of change, but increasingly female revellers w...

The first time I encountered this I was unprepared; I couldn't believe my eyes. The zombie invasion wouldn't have been more shocked.

Attack of the badger-men: can women find a place in the violent and wine-soaked carnivals of southern France? | France | The Guardian share.google/ew8ko0kDx6W9...

The picture shows two dolls with movable shoulders, elbows, hips and knee joints. The legs of both dolls are partially broken off. One doll's arm is almost completely missing. The limbs and torso are very long, the breasts small. The faces are largely destroyed. The hair is combed back behind the ears, reaching down to the shoulders at the nape. The ivory, which is actually white, has turned brown over time.

Beloved #toys: a pair of #Roman ivory #dolls with articulated arms and legs found in a tomb of a little #girl from a wealthy family in Emona, Ljubljana/Slovenia.

The majority of the dolls in Roman times were made of less valuable materials such as clay, wood or linen. 🧵1/2

🏺 #archaeology

Aerial view into a valley, with agricultural terraces cut into its sloping sides and rectilinear enclosed field systems on the valley floor.

How did Spanish colonialism affect agriculture in Peru?
Archaeological evidence suggests it deintensified, with elaborate Inka farming infrastructure declining as private ownership prioritised land use for profit over communal subsistence.

🔗 from 2025 🆓 doi.org/10.15184/aqy...

🏺 #Archaeology

Image of Berta Caceres looking to the right. Open speech mark: "Wake up, wake up humanity! There's no time left." Berta Cáceres, Lenca People, Honduras.

#OnThisDay 10 years ago, Berta Cáceres was shot dead for successfully defending her people's land in Honduras from the world's largest dam builder.

She was one of countless other #Indigenous people to be killed across the world in the fight for their rights. #BertaCaceres #JusticeForBerta

Greenpeace response to strikes on Iran by the US and Israel - Greenpeace International Greenpeace International is deeply concerned by the joint military strike on Iran by the US and Israel.

Bombing Iran risks deepening suffering, fuelling retaliation, and destabilising an already fragile region

All parties must immediately halt further military action and return to structured, good-faith negotiations under credible international oversight

A well-preserved Roman leather shoe with elaborate cutout patterns. The design features a high ankle and open section

An adorable #Roman shoe, made for a #baby too young to walk. The shoe imitates the footwear of Roman soldiers (caligae). The cut-out design would have shown off the kid’s socks!

From Bordeaux, dating 1st/2nd AD.

📷 Bordeaux, Musée d’Aquitaine

🏺 #archaeology