One of the best known and most quoted finds in western Europe must be that of the ‘princess's burial’ of Vix discovered early in 1953 not far from Châtillon-sur-Seine below the Celtic stronghold of Mont Lassois (Latisco). The contents of the grave are such that classical no less than prehistoric archaeologists have had cause to add to the still increasing literature on the site [I].

Recently, discussion has ranged over two of the foremost problems concerning the Vix burial: first, the question of date and provenance for the great Krater or mixing bowl, at more than 5 feet tall the largest extant bronze vessel of the Greek Archaic period. Second is the matter of the route taken by Greek and Italic imports into Western Europe from their place of manufacture—whether via the Alps or through the entrepôt of Marseilles, founded as Massalia by Phocaian settlers in about 600 B.c.—a debate which has continued since first opened in these pages more than 35 years ago [2]. Ancillary to these two points is the question as to the reason why costly objects made their way into the heart of Celtdom, to what end, with what exchange in mind—what in fact was the status of those native nobles whose graves and settlements have produced the basic clues for such tantalizing investigations?

World's most famous archaeological replica, Lascaux II was replaced in December 2016 by Lascaux IV. IV deserves to inherit the reputation, but it is already struggling to cope as it seeks to outdo II's tally of visitors. The ironies are manifold.

The authors respond to the recent debate piece in Antiquity by González-Ruibal et al., which they claim misrepresents public archaeology by ignoring the dominant practice of cultural resource management (CRM).

Mounded tomb burial for the elite is the hallmark of Japan’s Kofun period (AD 280-700) This is also known to be the period of state formation, and the burials of the paramount chiefs or early kings are concentrated in the present-day prefectures of Nara and Osaka. This centre of power will be referred to in this article as the ‘central court’, in contrast to the surrounding regions of western Honshu such as Kyoto, Hyogo, and Okayama prefectures, which also have many mounded tomb burials. The central court in the 4th century is often called the Miwa Court and in the 5th century the Kawachi Court. The extent of influence or control of the central court over the regions in these centuries is an issue addressed in the following discussion.

This adaptation of Hamlet’s soliloquy describes a "dilemma’: to study and thus destroy or to preserve and thus severely restrict study. And, just as Hamlet was not expecting Rosencrantz and Guildenstern to choose for him the alternative of "not to be’, so we cannot expect a simple right or wrong solution.

Just over 50 years ago, the most magnificent treasure of late Antique silver ever found in Britain was brought out of hiding in a sleepy village in rural Suffolk. The late Roald Dahl, the children's writer, may have held the answer.

Another step has started in trying to figure out just what the collected archaeology of England amounts to — this time, with its change in mind.

The authors show how the Gandharan art of early first millennium Afghanistan used Greek and Roman motifs to give an international context to Buddhist sculpture and reduce tension at home and with the neighbours.

Peculiar to the red clay plain of northwest Syria are the ‘beehive’ villages called ‘Campo di Melle’ by the early Venetian and Genoese traders. The characteristic beehive name and shape is a purely Western concept as the local beehive is a small mud cube. These village houses, built of mud brick, are ideally adapted to their environment ; they are warm in winter and cool in summer. The villages cluster about ancient ‘tells’ or dot the plains from Aleppo south to Homs, occupying a total area of roughly thirty by one hundred and fifty miles (PLATES v and VI). To the north and east this distinctive type of building gives way to the square mud brick house with flat mud roof supported on poles and brush, while to the west the rocky outcrops of the Lebanon range provide an easily worked stone for houses and barns.

Those who witnessed the fires of London in 1940 were occupied with other thoughts and acts than the contemplation of the past. Today remoter skies are aglow, and the quiet and cavernous places of London where busy offices once stood are already planned and regimented for reconstruction. No doubt, as often enough in the past, London will gain functionally if not artistically in the process; the new buildings will be higher and deeper than their predecessors, with air-conditioned basements carried far down into the native clay.

This fine, and deservedly famous, ragstone head from Czechoslovakia makes an appealing piece with its delightful curling moustaches – ‘perhaps the closest that we have to Celtic self-portraiture’. This new study looks at the head in its context, and notes the pieces that may parallel it.

San Vincenzo al Volturno is an early medieval monastery in the high province of Molise, southeast of Rome, and site of most substantial excavations over the last 15 years. The publication of portrait wall-paintings from the crypt of its great church, San Vincenzo Maggiore, is occasion to examine the place of the individual in that religious society.

The rabbit shares one characteristic with the archaeologist—both dig into the earth. Hence the latter, contemplating some object or evidence revealed by his spade, may sometimes be viewing merely the result of the activities of a humbler but much more numerous type of excavator. Is he not warned to ‘always make sure that an apparent post-hole is not a rabbit- or rat-hole’? And does not Professor James Ritchie describe the rabbit as ‘a burrower and a vandal which makes short cuts through the neat layers and classifications of the excavator’? On the other hand, the rabbit's activity or lack of it may on occasion be of service; it was a long patch of virgin turf on Easton Down, untouched by rabbits or moles, which led Dr Stone in 1932 to remove the turf, thus revealing a layer of tightly packed flint nodules covering a Bronze Age urn-field. Hence no apology, we feel, is needed for an article on the rabbit in a journal primarily concerned with archaeological research; particularly as much of the article deals with the status of the rabbit in medieval times, a topic which has already figured briefly in ANTIQUITY.