Before Catholicism was officially adopted in AD 1387, the Lithuanian city of Vilnius was assumed to be largely pagan. Identification of Christian burials within a large medieval cemetery (late thirteenth–fourteenth centuries) in the city was therefore unexpected. Here, the authors employ multiproxy isotopic analyses of bone collagen, dentine and enamel to examine the origins of 15 individuals from the cemetery. Based on the results, the authors argue that males were more socially mobile than females, with one male possibly having immigrated from south-eastern Europe, supporting historical accounts of a multiethnic founder community including immigrant Orthodox Christians and local converts.

Archaeologists often proclaim that they have much to contribute to the ‘global challenges’ of the twenty-first century, yet they find little space at the policymaking table. In this debate article, the authors argue that archaeologists seeking practical relevance must start with a critical, expanded understanding of the contemporary, including how communities, stakeholders and complex policy structures operate to navigate unfolding socioecological crises. They propose a reversed historical directionality grounded in transdisciplinary research design that integrates contemporary challenges and community-defined priorities from the outset to foster a dynamic, future-facing dialogue that more readily informs pathways to tangible impact.

Much work on the archaeology of nautical mobility across the Mediterranean Sea draws on calculations of land visibility that were formulated in 1901 and that have received relatively little critical evaluation. Here, the authors trace the use of this map in archaeology, providing a critique of 2D coastal visibility analyses and presenting a new analysis to quantify coastal visibility in angular terms. The resulting multidimensional visibility datasets (available as online supplementary material) form the basis for an updated coastal visibility map for the Mediterranean Sea, offering a platform for the exploration of more nuanced questions about seafaring and navigation.

This article investigates the 2022 Yahidne war crime, during which Russian forces confined approximately 368 civilians, including 69 children, to the basement of the local school. Drawing on Jacques Derrida’s concept of hauntology, the authors explore satellite images of unfolding events and the enduring material traces of the occupation—drawings, abandoned toys, military rations, propaganda newspapers, spent military equipment and damaged infrastructure. They consider how these traces contribute to processes of collective memory and to the transformation of the site’s significance through public memorialisation, reflecting on the role of contemporary archaeology in documenting and interpreting material legacies of recent conflict.

The analysis of stable carbon and nitrogen isotopes in bone collagen can reveal aspects of diet and how this may change between periods and places. Here, the authors apply a ‘whole-town’ approach to isotopic analysis, to characterise and explore variation in diet within medieval Cambridge and its hinterland. By adopting this approach, and a robust isotopic baseline, the authors argue that the number of confounding variables that typically plague archaeometric research are reduced, allowing for more nuanced interpretation of data. For medieval Cambridge, this nuance comes in the form of inter-site comparisons in the lived experience of social differentiation.

Archaeology is not a solitary discipline concerned only with digging up the past; rather, its wide potential for transdisciplinary collaboration and unique deep-time perspective provide traction for real-world current and future impact. Here, the author proposes integration of systems thinking, small-wins psychology and a more creative interdisciplinary approach as ways for archaeologists to address the existential ‘polycrisis’. Using food security as an example, this article argues that, as archaeologists, we should focus far more attention on the polycrisis than we do at present, that we can make a difference in addressing it and that we have a responsibility to try.

Despite common associations with plague pits and mass graves, many individuals who succumbed to the Black Death in the mid-fourteenth century AD, and to the numerous subsequent outbreaks of plague, were buried in parish cemeteries. This limits the usefulness of contemporaneous cemetery assemblages for the establishment of comparative, non-catastrophic (or ‘attritional’) demographic profiles for medieval populations in Britain. Drawing from three earlier cemeteries, this study reveals similarities in age-at-death and survivorship profiles for adults, offering a characteristic pre-Black Death profile that helps reinforce the distinctiveness of the over-representation of individuals aged 15–24 years among plague burials.

The Covid-19 pandemic widened public awareness of the close links between socioeconomic status and resilience in the face of infection, yet this interplay was already well established in archaeological discourse. Here, the authors combine osteoarchaeological, stable isotope and pathogenomic analyses with archival research to explore the formation of multiple, or ‘plural’, burials at an early hospital in Basel, Switzerland. Identification of a stamped clay pipe, Yersinia pestis DNA and a high proportion of subadults link the burials to an outbreak of plague in 1665–1670, while physiological stress, dietary and pathological insights contribute to our understanding of prior experiences affecting differential mortality.

The skeletal remains of almost 25 700 people excavated in the UK between 1869 and 2008 are unaccounted for. Although their existence is recorded in a human-remains database, their current location is unknown. Here, the authors explore the research, legal and ethical implications of this missing heritage, arguing that difficulties in accessing human remains from smaller sites or under-represented regions stifle research into past lives and contribute to the overuse and potential damage of well-known skeletal collections. To combat this, and to safeguard legacy and future collections, the authors (re)advocate the imperative for a centralised database of human remains.

The discussion on decolonisation is now happening everywhere, yet it should be remembered that this outcome is the result of decades-old struggles and that the prominence of this quest is owed to the broader social movements of the preceding century. Here, the author explores the implications for archaeology, suggesting a shift of emphasis from colonisation to coloniality. The principle that decolonisation should entail substantive material and structural changes is proposed as a necessary starting point. In moving forward, the author argues that our efforts to build a decolonial archaeology should be guided by the concepts of refusal, care and repair.

Assessing the physical integrity of archaeological sites is vital for heritage conservation management. Using the example of Arslantepe, a prehistoric tell site in south-eastern Türkiye, this article demonstrates the application of RUSLE modelling to estimate surface erosion vulnerability, employing ultra-high-resolution photogrammetry and a field-based geoarchaeological framework. The results reveal contained erosion across the site with localised degradation limited to steep trench walls and spoil heaps, indicating remarkably good site conservation and consolidating the effectiveness of RUSLE modelling as a scalable method for evaluating surface processes and informing conservation strategies on individual archaeological sites.

Central governments have controlled cultural heritage management in most African countries since colonial times. Focusing on Tanzania, the authors here argue that heritage sites are at risk from the institutions tasked with managing them, citing an institutional reluctance to protect threatened sites, delegation of responsibility to unqualified organisations, inappropriate development of sites as income-generating entities and a resistance to working with and recognising local community initiatives. The deleterious impacts of such management are explored through four case studies, which the authors hope will help sound an alarm in the international community and provoke calls for a national review of policy.

Methods for extracting archaeological information from large, digital databases of cultural resource management (development-led archaeology) records are frequently quantitative or aggregative. This approach can struggle to capture the details of how archaeological knowledge is produced socially. Here, the authors draw on archival science to describe ‘project biography’ as a means to understand how archaeological records—and their silences—are produced through decisions weighing the risks of development. This approach is illustrated using examples from South Africa’s digital heritage records database (SAHRIS), while also considering ethical entailments and the need to better understand the social worlds of cultural resource management.