3,500-year-old loom reveals key aspects of textile revolution in the Bronze Age

 

The finding, published in an article in the journal Antiquity, preserves most of the weights as well as components made from wood and plant fibers

Peer-Reviewed Publication

University of Alicante

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Reconstruction of a Bronze Age loom by Beate Schneider, on display at the Alcoy Archaeological Museum.

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Credit: University of Alicante

Approximately 3,500 years ago, in the Bronze Age settlement of Cabezo Redondo in present-day Villena, a fire razed dwellings and workshops to the ground. However, the same fire that destroyed part of the village also helped preserve an object that is incredibly hard to document in archaeology: a loom with a largely wooden structure.

Recently published in the journal Antiquity, this finding by a team of researchers from several Spanish universities is one of only a few known cases in Mediterranean Europe in which both the set of loom weights and components made from wood and plant fibres have been preserved. The article is authored by University of Alicante (UA) researchers Gabriel García Atiénzar, Paula Martín de la Sierra Pareja, Virginia Barciela González and Mauro S. Hernández Pérez, Ricardo Basso Rial (University of Granada) and Yolanda Carrión Marco (Universitat de València).

UA Professor of Prehistory Gabriel García Atiénzar explains that the fire generated a very specific archaeological context where “the collapse of the ceiling was crucial […] resulting in a sealed space in which the area was suddenly destroyed and immediately buried, enabling its preservation”. The loom components – including charred timbers, clay weights and esparto ropes – were trapped beneath the remains of the collapsed ceiling.

The loom appeared during the excavation of a circulation area on the western slope of the settlement, where the researchers found a raised platform with a dense concentration of clay weights. According to University of Granada predoctoral researcher Ricardo Basso Rial, this evidence allowed the team to identify the device with a high degree of certainty, as “although the loom was recovered from a collapsed area and some pieces were missing, the compact set of 44 cylindrical weights with a central perforation, most of them about 200 grams in weight, is characteristic of a vertical warp-weighted loom”.

Several pine timbers in a parallel arrangement were discovered alongside the weights. Some of the thicker timbers, with a rectangular cross-section, are probably the remains of the upright posts of the loom frame; other narrower pieces, with a rounded cross-section, supposedly constitute the horizontal posts.

The researchers also identified plaited esparto fibres associated with the structure, and even remains of small cords in the perforations of some weights, likely used to warp the warp threads to each loom weight. Thanks to this combination of weights, timbers and fibres, the researchers have been able to accurately determine how the loom worked, which is highly unusual in prehistoric contexts.

The archaeobotanist Yolanda Carrión (Universitat de València) analysed the wooden pieces. “The preservation of the organic elements was due to the fire that charred the remains and to the fact that these remains were practically unaltered later. Paradoxically, the fire both destroyed and preserved the site”, she says.

It was concluded from the microscopic study of the wood that the loom was made from Aleppo pine, widely found in the surrounding area. According to Carrión, the observation of the growth rings suggests that the timbers came from long-lived trees that provided large-diameter pieces of wood, which indicates that the material was carefully selected.  The researcher adds that “the arrangement of wooden components of various sizes, assembled with each other and resting on a wall, and the presence of the weights allow us to develop a robust hypothesis about the morphology of the loom”.

The loom was part of a wider process known as the “textile revolution” in the European Bronze Age, characterised by technological and economic changes in textile production.

For Ricardo Basso, this process was not driven by a single factor: “the textile revolution was the result of a combination of processes, including the expansion of livestock breeding for wool production, technical innovations in looms and spinning and weaving tools, and social changes that led to more intensive and diversified textile production”.

At Cabezo Redondo, these transformations are inferred from the presence of new forms of lighter spindle whorls and various types of loom weights. Some of them are lightweight enough to allow for the production of finer, more complex fabrics, such as twills. However, the fabrics themselves are rarely preserved in archaeological settings, and therefore many of these deductions are based on the indirect study of tools.

For this reason, the loom recovered from Cabezo Redondo is especially valuable, allowing researchers to “go from interpreting isolated loom weights to documenting a working loom with extreme detail: the wooden structure, the ropes, the weights and the architectural context”, Basso argues.

The context in which the loom appeared also provides information on the social organisation of work. The device was located in an outdoor space shared by several households, which suggests that production was a cooperative effort. “This indicates that different household groups may have collaborated on activities such as spinning, weaving and milling”, as noted by Paula Martín de la Sierra, a predoctoral researcher at the UA Institute for Archaeology and Heritage Research (INAPH) and research team member. “Other artisanal activities in the village, such as metalwork or ivory craftsmanship, seem to have been concentrated in specialised areas”, she adds.

Bioanthropological evidence also points to a central role of women in textile activities. In several graves at the site, teeth recovered from female remains have a degree of wear characteristically associated with spinning and weaving, as these women probably used their incisors to hold fibres in place or cut threads.

Cabezo Redondo settlement

Cabezo Redondo was not an isolated village, but a key regional hub. Its size and continued occupation, as well as the presence of monumental structures, suggest that it had a major political and economic role in the south-eastern area of the Iberian Peninsula during the second millennium BCE.

While there are similarities to the well-known Argaric culture, the researchers think that the settlement dates from a later, “post-Argaric” period. The famous Cabezo Redondo treasure is likely contemporary to the loom.

In the researchers’ view, the finding opens up new lines of research. Future studies may include archaeometric analyses of microscopic fibres or isotopic studies of sheep to determine the origin of the raw materials and the degree of specialisation of textile production.

In the meantime, the Cabezo Redondo loom is already one of the most complete examples of textile technology in the European Bronze Age. As pointed out by Basso, the settlement has become “an exceptional laboratory to study the technical and social evolution of textiles in the second millennium BCE”.

Cabezo Redondo is a major Bronze Age settlement in the south-east of the Iberian Peninsula. Systematic excavations started in 1960 under the direction of local researcher José María Soler, who intervened to prevent the destruction of the site by gypsum quarries.

From 1987 onwards, excavation campaigns at the site were led by Mauro S. Hernández. A team made up of INAPH researchers Gabriel García Atiénzar, Virginia Barciela González and others was set up afterwards.

Occupied approximately between 2100 and 1250 BCE, the settlement had a size of up to one hectare. The dwellings, built on a series of terraces on the slope of the hill, had workbenches, fireplaces, silos and receptacles for storage. The analysis of plant and animal remains indicates that the economy was based on intensive farming.

Moreover, numerous findings such as gold, silver and ivory ornaments or glass and seashell beads, among others, prove that the settlement was part of large exchange networks that connected it with other areas of the Iberian Peninsula, the Eastern Mediterranean and even Central Europe.

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Journal

Antiquity

DOI

10.15184/aqy.2026.10312 

Surprising similarities among ancient writing systems from Africa and the Caucasus region of Eurasia

  

Caption

From left, characters in the Ethiopic (portions only), Armenian, Georgian and Caucasian Albanian alphabets. 

Credit

Daniel Zemene, Esatu Zemene, Atharv Sankpal, Eskinder Sahle, Vyshak Athreya Bellur Keshavamurthy, Samuel Kinde Kassegne, Machine learning techniques for exploring influence, commonalities, and shared origin of scripts: cases of Ethiopic, Armenian, Georgian, and Caucasian Albanian scripts, Digital Scholarship in the Humanities, 2026;, fqag029, https://doi.org/10.1093/llc/fqag029

With artificial intelligence (AI) as an essential tool, San Diego State University researchers have discovered surprising similarities among ancient writing systems from Africa and the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Their study suggests the Armenian alphabet may be more closely related in structure to the ancient Ethiopic writing system than linguists and historians previously thought.

For many years, historians noticed some Armenian, Georgian and Caucasian Albanian letters look similar to letters from Ethiopic, also known as Ge’ez, a writing system developed in the Horn of Africa more than 1,600 years ago. 

Most of these early studies, however, relied on scholars’ own visual inspection of the letters to determine whether they appeared alike.

Researchers from the Department of Mechanical Engineering in the College of Engineering tested this idea using AI instead of human judgment. They trained a computer program to study more than 28,000 images of Ethiopic characters so it could learn the basic shapes and patterns in the writing system. The program learned to recognize curves, straight lines, angles and the overall structure of each letter.

Importantly, the computer had no data on history, religion, geography or culture. It only looked at shapes. After learning the Ethiopic characters, the program compared them to letters from the Armenian, Georgian and Caucasian Albanian alphabets. It then calculated how similar the shapes were.

The results, published March 25 in Digital Scholarship in the Humanities, were striking. 

Among the three alphabets tested, Armenian letters showed the strongest similarity to Ethiopic letters. Caucasian Albanian letters showed a moderate level of similarity, while Georgian letters showed some similarities but were less consistent. As a comparison, the researchers also tested the Latin alphabet — the one used in English — and found it showed much lower similarity.

“Our aim was to move beyond visual impressions that are difficult to test or replicate,” said Sam Kassegne, a professor of mechanical engineering and lead investigator. “By making our criteria explicit and mathematical, we introduced an objective computational approach that is easily reproducible. We believe that this reproducibility is the key contribution of our method.”

New findings

One of the most surprising findings was that the Armenian alphabet appeared almost as similar to Ethiopic as Ethiopic is to its own earlier version. That suggests the resemblance may not be accidental.

The Armenian alphabet was created around 405 CE. Around that same time, the Ethiopic writing system was expanding and becoming more widely used. Historical records show people from Ethiopia traveled to such places as Jerusalem, Egypt and Syria during this period. The creator of the Armenian alphabet, Mesrop Mashtots, also traveled through parts of the Middle East. While the study does not prove one writing system copied the other, it suggests cultural contact and influence between these regions may have been possible.

The study also shows how modern technology can help answer ancient questions. 

We are already familiar with AI being used for self-driving cars and medical imaging. In this case, it was used to study the shapes of letters from ages ago revealing some level of historical cultural interactions. By teaching a computer to carefully measure similarities, researchers were able to move beyond the limitations of visual impressions and provide numerical evidence.

Daniel Zemene, an SDSU graduate student and AI and machine learning researcher at SDSU’s NanoFAB Lab, emphasized the broader implications of the findings.

“What makes the research significant is that computational geometry and historical scholarship converge on the same scripts and time period,” said Zemene, the study’s first author. 

“The model had no access to historical records, yet it learned purely from visual and structural data and identified Armenian as the closest structural match to Ethiopic within the very timeframe historians have long debated. That convergence between computation and history is powerful.”

The researchers emphasize similarity does not automatically mean direct borrowing. However, the findings make it more reasonable to consider that these cultures may have influenced one another. Throughout history, societies have shared ideas, including systems of writing. Greek, Roman, Persian and Arabic civilizations all influenced one another in different ways.

This new research suggests Ethiopia’s ancient writing culture may also have played a meaningful role in the exchange of ideas across regions. It also shows AI is not just about modern technology, but a tool that can help us understand literary heritage with a new level of precision.
 

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Journal

Digital Scholarship in the Humanities

DOI

10.1093/llc/fqag029 

Ancient DNA reveals earliest known dogs lived alongside Ice Age humans

 

Peer-Reviewed Publication

University of York

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14,300-year-old dog jawbone from Gough’s Cave, UK © The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London

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Credit: The Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London

The bond between humans and dogs is one of nature’s most enduring partnerships, but exactly when it began has long been a mystery. Now, a new study has turned back the clock. 

By uncovering the earliest genetic evidence of domestic dogs to date, researchers have found that our 'best friends' were already living alongside us more than 14,000 years ago - redefining our understanding of how this ancient relationship first took root.

The international research team uncovered the earliest genetic evidence for the existence of dogs, suggesting they were already living alongside humans more than 14,000 years ago.

Researchers analysed ancient DNA from animal remains found at archaeological sites in the UK and Türkiye, dating to the Late Upper Palaeolithic period, long before the advent of farming.

They found that bones recovered from Gough’s Cave and Pınarbaşı belonged to early dogs, pushing back confirmed evidence of domesticated dogs by more than 5,000 years.

Professor Oliver Craig, from the University of York’s Department of Archaeology and Director of the BioArch Centre, explains: “We have long believed dogs evolved from grey wolves during the last Ice Age, but physical evidence of their association with humans has been difficult to confirm.

“During the earliest stages of domestication, dogs and wolves looked almost identical, and behavioural differences do not show up in the archaeological record.”

Previous studies relied on small DNA fragments and skeletal measurements. This new study, however, was able to reconstruct whole genomes from remains more than 10,000 years old and compared them with over 1,000 modern and ancient canids.

The findings confirmed that dogs were already widespread across Europe and western Asia by at least 14,000 years ago.

At the University of York, scientists conducted a dietary analysis of dog, human and wolf remains from the same archaeological sites.

By measuring carbon and nitrogen isotopes preserved in bone collagen – chemical signatures that reflect long-term diet – they were able to reconstruct what these animals and people ate.

Lizzie Hodgson, PhD student from the University of York’s Department of Archaeology, said: “A key finding came from Pınarbaşı, where the data showed that domestic dogs consumed a diet rich in fish, closely matching that of local humans.

“It is unlikely dogs were catching significant amounts of fish themselves, suggesting they were being actively fed by people.”

This shared diet provides strong evidence of a close and cooperative relationship between humans and dogs during the Ice Age.

Dr William Marsh, from the Natural History Museum, said: “These specimens allowed us to identify additional ancient dogs from sites in Germany, Italy and Switzerland, showing they were already widely dispersed across Europe and Türkiye by at-least 14,000 years ago.”

The study suggests that dogs were present among different hunter-gatherer groups, including Epigravettian and Magdalenian communities, towards the end of the Ice Age.

Genetic analysis revealed that these early dogs were more closely related to the ancestors of modern European and Middle Eastern breeds than to Arctic dogs.

Dr Lachie Scarsbrook, from LMU Munich, said this indicates that major dog lineages were already established around 15,000 years ago. He said: “Dogs with very different ancestries already existed across Eurasia, from Somerset to Siberia.”

Experts say this raises the possibility that dogs were domesticated more than 10,000 years before any other animals or plants.

Alongside the genetic work, researchers also examined how these early dogs and humans may have lived together. While the exact role of these early dogs remains unclear, researchers believe they were closely integrated into human communities.

Further evidence, including intentional burial of dogs, points to possible emotional or cultural significance.

A dog jawbone from Gough’s Cave – dating to around 15,000 years ago – is now considered the earliest known domesticated dog in the UK.  Researchers say the discovery highlights the deep and long-standing relationship between humans and dogs, stretching back to the end of the last Ice Age.

Dr Sophy Charlton, from the University of York’s Department of Archaeology, said: “This study reveals the beginnings of a human and canine bond that continues to this day. It’s a narrative that began towards the end of the Ice Age but was foundational to many of the modern breeds we see today.”

The study, titled Dogs were widely distributed in Western Eurasia during the Palaeolithic, is published in the journal Nature, alongside related research exploring the genetic history of early dogs across Europe.

Samuel Pepys censored his links to slavery

 

 

Fear of corruption allegations drove Samuel Pepys to censor official correspondence connecting the Royal Navy, slave trading companies and his own slaves, new research shows.

 

‘your meriting well of the thing is the only present that shall ever operate with me’

(Samuel Pepys to John Howe, 1675)

 

That Samuel Pepys owned at least two enslaved people in 17th-century London is no secret. In some of his personal letters he was unashamedly open about this. In September 1688, he told a ship’s captain that neither ‘whipping or fetters’ had reformed a ‘mischievous’ slave in his household. He asked the captain to feed the man on ‘hard meat, till you can dispose of him in some plantation as a rogue’.

But in a study published today in The Historical Journal, Cambridge University historian Dr Michael Edwards shows that Pepys both erased and preserved details of his connections to slavery to protect his reputation and political career. In a particularly high-stakes episode, Pepys carefully recorded rejecting the offer of an enslaved boy as a bribe.

“Pepys had so many connections within England’s African trading companies as well as in the Navy,” says Dr Edwards, a Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge. “Combined, these connections put him in a privileged position to acquire enslaved people. This part of the story has gone mostly untold.”

Dr Edwards examines, for the first time, how Pepys and his trusted clerks carefully ‘curated’ his official and personal correspondence to shape and limit our knowledge of his slave dealings. The historian consulted hundreds of records in The Pepys Library at Magdalene College, Cambridge; The National Archives; and the Bodleian Library in Oxford.

One of the study’s most startling findings concerns the loan of a ship and the subsequent offer of a human bribe.

 

The boy bribe

 

As part of his senior roles in the Royal Navy in the 1670s and 80s, Pepys arranged the loan of ships to support the Royal African Company’s (RAC) mercantile operations, including slave trading, off the west coast of Africa. This brought Pepys into frequent contact with RAC officers and with the captains of ships transporting enslaved people from Africa to the Caribbean.

Pepys arranged for the navy ship Phoenix to be lent to the RAC and dispatched to the west African coast in the summer of 1674. It then took enslaved people to Barbados. Arriving in November 1674, its log records the deaths of 19 enslaved people, all of whom were thrown overboard. The ship returned to England in April 1675.

At this point, the ship’s naval officer John Howe complained to the Navy commissioners that he had been unjustly deprived of the ship’s command following the death of its captain. Pepys agreed and on 23rd April he confirmed Howe’s command. Unaware of this decision, however, Howe took steps to win Pepys over.

An ally, Richard Rowe, wrote to Pepys on 24th April recommending Howe as ‘a man deserving and knows how to acknowledge favours’. Rowe suggested that Howe wished to give Pepys ‘An hon[our]able present for you and I hope worth your acceptance’.

The nature of this present was revealed six days later. Now aware that Pepys had favoured him, Howe wrote directly to ‘crave your acceptance’ of a ‘small’ enslaved boy, which ‘I brought home on board for your honour, & intend to present you with at the first conveniency … Hoping he is so well seasoned to endure the cold weather as to live in England.’

Pepys indignantly rejected Howe’s offer and Rowe’s intervention. On 5th May he rebuked Howe for ‘your thinking that any consideration of benefit to my self, or expectation of reward from you should be of any inducement with me’. Without describing the gift, Pepys asked Howe to ‘reserve that sort of argument for such as will be guided by it, and know that your meriting well of the thing is the only present that shall ever operate with me.’

Dr Edwards argues that Pepys’ sensitivity may have been provoked by an unnerving recent experience in parliament. After taking his seat as MP for Castle Rising in late 1673, Pepys had been attacked by the Earl of Shaftesbury and his allies for alleged Catholic sympathies.

“Responding to this offer of a bribe, Pepys felt he needed to demonstrate his probity, but he also wanted evidence of this recorded in his archive,” Dr Edwards says.

Pepys’ clerk, William Hewer, indexed and organised the correspondence on this matter in such a way that Pepys’ innocence was preserved while the enslaved child at the heart of the bribe was erased as an irrelevance.

“Pepys wasn’t concerned about the morality of slavery. He’s only interested in his reputation at a time when he’s under scrutiny for corruption,” Dr Edwards says.

“He had good reason to be cautious. Pepys was Secretary to the Admiralty, so he was running one of the biggest parts of the state in this period. The Navy involved enormous amounts of money and was highly politicised. Pepys had lots of political enemies and a few years later, in 1679, he was imprisoned in the Tower of London, following charges of corruption and popery.”

 

Did Pepys accept the bribe?

 

Pepys appears to have accepted many bribes during his career and biographers have generally assumed that he did accept Howe’s enslaved boy. It has been assumed that this was the same individual Pepys arranged to be sold in Tangier in the summer of 1680.

“It’s really hard to tell,” Edwards says, “but my instinct is that Pepys did not accept Howe’s bribe and that these were different people. I think Pepys might have been too worried about being caught out. But unless new documents come to light, we’ll never know for sure.”

 

Selling a slave after time in the Tower

 

In late 1679 Pepys arranged to sell an enslaved male through another of his naval contacts, Captain John Wyborne, a friend.

In his personal correspondence to Wyborne on the matter, Pepys felt able to speak openly.

On 4th December 1679, while his slave was onboard Wyborne’s ship, the Bristol, Pepys wrote: ‘Pray not my black-boy add any thing to your care, your kindness to me on my own score having been already too burthensome to you.’

Pepys had been released from the Tower in July the same year and was no longer secretary to the Admiralty commission. Pepys moved to the house of his friend and former clerk William Hewer in Buckingham Street. In these comfortable but reduced circumstances, Pepys may not have felt he needed a slave but Dr Edwards believes political prudence may also have played a part.

“After his 1679 arrest, in which a resentful former butler played a key role, Pepys may have wanted to remove an unwilling member of his household to avoid further trouble.”

Once Wyborne had arranged the sale in Tangier, Pepys wrote: ‘I am much obliged to you for the bargain you have made for me, & if I may choose, could be well contented you would at your return from Spain buy me a little good sherry with the proceed of it, & a little good chocolaty against winter.’

Dr Edwards says: “In some ways this is a very 17th-century story. Pepys would be bemused about our attitudes to enslavement. But powerful people have always thought about their image and tried to shape their reputation.”

Tropical archaeology: advanced dating method reveals age of Pacific coral architecture

 

Precise timescales make a big difference for interpreting the past

A team of archaeologists has used an advanced dating technique to establish the first precise construction timeline for houses built out of  in French Polynesia. The findings reveal previously hidden patterns of architectural development and cultural life in Pacific societies. 

The University of Sydney-led study, published in the prestigious journal Antiquity, marks the first time uranium–thorium dating, also known as U-Th dating, has been applied to date historical coral architecture. This method produces precise age estimates without the need for extensive excavation, enabling archaeologists to better understand how European colonisers impacted local cultures across diverse landscapes worldwide. 

Associate Professor James Flexner, an ARC Future Fellow in the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences and member of the Vere Gordon Childe Centre, led the research on Mangareva, a group of islands in French Polynesia in the South Pacific, where coral was the main material for houses before timber became dominant in the 1870s. 

“Mangarevan people learned the building technique from French Catholic missionaries who arrived on the island in the 1830s and commenced a large construction program,” Associate Professor Flexner said. “They built cathedrals, churches, schools, communal bread ovens, watch towers and small stone cottages out of locally sourced coral from nearby shore reefs, as well as beach rock corals from exposed formations on land.” 

Europeans kept detailed records of their own buildings but wrote almost nothing about the everyday homes constructed by local Mangarevan families. 

“Using the uranium-thorium dating method, we can date the construction materials used in the buildings with remarkable accuracy, giving us more clues to cultural and domestic life in the Pacific and deepening our understanding of colonial heritage,” he said. 

“Smaller timescales can make a big difference for interpreting the past.” 

Coral and culture 

Mangareva sits within an archipelago of ancient volcanic peaks, located within a lagoon surrounded by a fringing reef that includes several long and narrow motu, or coral islets. 

Ten coral samples from the Mangarevan structures were dated by the University of Queensland’s Radiogenic Isotope Facility. The results open new avenues for understanding how Pacific people adapted building technologies introduced by the Europeans. 

“What surprised us was that several coral blocks returned dates earlier than expected,” Associate Professor Flexner said. “A few even pre-dated European arrival, suggesting the builders may have reused older coral taken from nearby sites. But none of the examples showed centuries long age differences, challenging earlier theories that coral from ancient structures was widely repurposed for 19th century buildings.” 

Composite of detail photos of branch coral samples. Photo: James Flexner 

Dating the coral helped the researchers track how everyday life in the Pacific evolved following European contact and continues to be shaped by ongoing colonial influences. 

“Some of the evidence we found within the walls of the coral structures, including glassware, cooking pots and ceramics, indicated activities such as feasting events, whereas others pointed to changes in habits of everyday domestic life, from how a family prepares and eats meals together, to how people move throughout the home, how they might pray and worship, or how they sleep. 

“These coral cottages are a microcosm of life itself. They are a huge potential source of information on the social, cultural and cosmological ways of being for Pacific peoples.” 

An untapped archive 

The U-Th dating method was originally used in Polynesia to date prehistoric coral and cave formations, including the initial discovery of the Tonga archipelago and Mangareva Islands, Hawaiian sacred sites, and coral blocks from marae, ancient temples in Mo’orea. 

Unlike radiocarbon dating, which is unreliable for materials less than 500 years old, uranium–thorium dating yields results accurate to within a few years. 

“Expanding the U-Th method to date coral houses as we have done in Mangareva could revolutionise the study of undocumented architecture and people in other pre-European as well as colonial contexts beyond Oceania, including Africa and the Caribbean,” Associate Professor Flexner said. 

Precisely dating coral buildings may also eventually help researchers understand historical reef conditions. 

“People think of coral mainly in the context of bleaching and climate change today, but each coral block used for the construction of these houses retains a chemical record of the environment in which the coral grew, offering a historical archive of coral reefs and past ecological change,” he said. 

“Along with uncovering the cultural histories of colonial landscapes, accessing this archive could prove invaluable for understanding changes to reef systems over time, particularly those resulting from human impact. 

Associate Professor Flexner hopes future collaborations will extend the work to neighbouring archipelagos where coral construction also flourished. 

"We are actively partnering with communities and local authorities to strengthen conservation and heritage protection in these regions so we can continue to piece together the stories of the past and build a more informed and sustainable future,” he said. 

-ENDS- 

RESEARCH 

Flexner, J. ‘Direct dating of colonial-era building materials using the U-Th method in the Mangareva Islands, French Polynesia’ (Antiquity, 2026) 

DOI: https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2026.10325 (this link will go live when the embargo lifts) 

English history’s biggest march is a myth – King Harold sailed to the Battle of Hastings

 

New research from the University of East Anglia (UEA) reveals that King Harold’s legendary 200‑mile march to the Battle of Hastings in 1066 never happened.

Instead, the journey was made largely by sea.

The findings overturn one of the most iconic stories in English history – altering how the Norman Conquest is understood in classrooms, museums, and public memory.

The news comes as the Bayeux Tapestry prepares to travel from France to the UK for display at the British Museum later this year.

For more than two centuries, historians have repeated a misinterpretation of the Anglo‑Saxon Chronicle - one of the earliest and most complete written records of English history.

The Chronicle seems to imply that Harold dismissed his fleet in early September 1066, leaving him no choice but to rush his troops south from Stamford Bridge in Yorkshire on foot.

It records that the ships “came home” - a phrase Victorian historians mistakenly interpreted as meaning he disbanded the navy. And it was this narrative that shaped later accounts of the Norman Conquest.

Prof Tom Licence, Professor of Medieval History and Literature at UEA has now shown that the ships returned to London, their home base, and remained operational throughout the year.

He said: “I noticed multiple contemporary writers referring to Harold's fleet, while modern historians were dismissing those references or trying to explain them away.

“I checked the evidence for him having sent the fleet home and found that it was just a misunderstanding. I went looking in the sources for evidence of a forced march and found there wasn't any.”

Prof Licence is keen to present King Harold’s actions in a new light in the face of William’s invasion.

He said: “Harold’s campaign was not a desperate dash across England, it was a sophisticated land‑sea operation. The idea of a heroic march is a Victorian invention that has shaped our understanding, or misunderstanding, of 1066 for far too long.”

Contemporary sources describe Harold sending hundreds of ships to block Duke William after the Norman landing. These references previously caused confusion because historians assumed Harold had no fleet left.

Prof Licence said: “Harold's ‘missing’ fleet was used to defend the south coast, then to support his campaign against Harald Hardrada, and finally to rush back south after the Battle of Stamford Bridge ready to face Duke William of Normandy.”

Prof Michael Lewis, Head of the Portable Antiquities Scheme at the British Museum, and Curator: Bayeux Tapestry Exhibition, said: “With the Bayeux Tapestry coming to the British Museum later this year, Prof Tom Licence's research shows there is much still to be learned about the events of 1066.

“It is clearly a fascinating discovery that following the Battle of Stamford Bridge, Harold took an easier, more logical, trip south by ship to meet Duke William in battle, rather than a long trek overland, as has long been supposed.

“Hopefully this new research inspires people to also come and see the Tapestry whilst it is in London.”

Why the new research matters

The findings challenge one of the best‑known narratives in English history, altering how the Norman Conquest is understood in classrooms, museums, and public memory.

Prof Licence said: “Harold was not a reactive, exhausted commander, he was a strategist using England’s naval assets to wage a coordinated defence.

“This reframes the events of 1066 and highlights a previously overlooked aspect of Anglo‑Saxon maritime capability.”

Prof Licence re‑examined the Anglo‑Saxon Chronicle, which survives today in nine manuscript versions, alongside other 11th‑century sources, correcting the error popularised by Edward Augustus Freeman in the 19th century.

By restoring the fleet to its central role, the research reconstructs Harold’s real strategic choices - from his northern campaign against Harald Hardrada to his planned naval interception of William before Hastings.

Roy Porter, English Heritage Senior Curator of Properties, who oversees Battle Abbey and the Hastings battlefield, said: “Professor Licence’s research shows the immense value of testing received wisdoms, and his conclusions are certain to sustain debate about the circumstances of England’s most famous battle.

“What we know about Harold’s previous military campaigns fits with the idea that he used naval forces to transport soldiers, and threaten William, and there are references in accounts of the Norman invasion which also lend weight to that possibility.

“It’s exciting to consider that Harold’s response may have been far more sophisticated than previously understood, and William’s awareness of this may have informed when he chose to fight.”

Key findings:

Harold never disbanded his fleet

The research demonstrates that Harold’s ships were not dismissed in early September 1066, as long believed. The Anglo‑Saxon Chronicle states that Harold himself returned to London “off ship,” that is, from the south coast, when he heard of Harald Hardrada’s arrival.

The famous 200‑mile march is a Victorian invention

No contemporary source describes a forced march. The term was introduced by Victorian historians and became received wisdom. A sea voyage from the Humber to London was faster, safer, and far more consistent with the Chronicle’s account.

Comparative evidence shows the march is unrealistic, with even well‑equipped American Civil War forces only covering around 100 miles in five days under exceptional conditions.

Prof Licence said: “Harold’s weary, unmounted men covering nearly 200 miles in ten days and then continuing straight to the Hastings peninsula is implausible given medieval roads and the aftermath of battle.

“Only a mad general would have sent all his men on foot in this way if ship transports were available.”

Past criticism of Harold marching south with ‘reckless and impulsive haste’, as one historian puts it, is therefore unfounded. His men had time to rest.

Harold used the fleet against Harald Hardrada

The Chronicle uses the Old English term lið, normally translated as “fleet” to describe the force Harold gathered at Tadcaster before marching on Stamford Bridge.

This indicates the English king deployed both naval and land forces against Harald Hardrada – a detail that has caused much confusion because historians wrongly believed the fleet was already scattered.

Harold attempted a naval pincer movement against Duke William

Early accounts describe Harold sending hundreds of ships south after William’s landing. Far from marching alone, Harold was coordinating a land‑sea pincer designed to trap the Normans in the Hastings peninsula.

The fleet likely arrived too late, costing Harold his archers and cutting‑edge troops.

Evidence suggests a naval battle in early October 1066

The study also revives evidence for a forgotten naval clash. Both Domesday Book and the Annales Altahenses hint at an English sea engagement during the campaign.

These references were previously hard to explain, but now, reconsidered alongside this research, become plausible and historically significant. The English fleet arrived too late to save the day but may have clashed with William’s ships guarding his base at Hastings.

Making the findings public

Prof Tom Licence will present his findings at the University of Oxford on 24 March at The Maritime and Political World of 1066 conference.

In his talk, he will explain how a series of misunderstandings gave rise to the famous “forced march” story, reveal new evidence for Harold’s active fleet, and discuss how these findings reshape the story of 1066 taught in classrooms, displayed in museums, depicted in the recent BBC drama King and Conqueror, and told in the Bayeux Tapestry