The Later Prehistoric Finds Group welcomes you to the annual online symposium 2025, held via Microsoft Teams.
Itinerary
10:00: Introduction and welcome: Matt Hitchcock (LPFG chair)
10:15-11:00: Session 1: Lightning Talks
Andrew Lamb (University of Edinburgh) and Matt Hitchcock (University of Leicester) – An Iron Age silver brooch from Whitchurch, Hampshire.
Hannah Curry (University of Leicester) – Weird times in tin mines: exploring unusual histories in Cornish streamworks.
Andrew Ward (Kent Archaeological Society) – A mystery object.
Jacob Metson (University of Leicester) – A rock in a hoard place.
Kate Sumnall (London Museum) – Connections with the river: new finds from the Thames.
11:00-12:00: Session 2
11:00-11:20 - Adelle Bricking (Amgueddfa Cymru) – The importance of landscape context for portable antiquities: A pair of La Tène brooches and a banjo enclosure at Boverton, Vale of Glamorgan.
11:20-11:40 - George Prew-Stell (National Museums Scotland) – Beyond the Wall: New Connections between Rome and Scotland through Chance Finds.
11:40-12:00 discussion
12pm-12:40pm Lunch break
12:40-14:00: Session 3
12:40-13:00 - Mike Moody (University of Leicester) - Is that awl? – Rethinking the role of Early Bronze Age copper-alloy awls in craft practices.
13:00-13:20 - Jennifer Beamer (Independent Researcher) - “Spindling for Weaving” — A First Look at Results.
13:20-13:40 - Rose Karpinski (University of Reading/Ashmolean Museum) - An interdisciplinary study of Iron Age copper-alloy material culture.
13:40-14:00 – discussion
14:00-14:20: Coffee break
14:20-15:40: Session 4
14:20-14:40: Matt Hitchcock and Dawid Sych (University of Leicester) – Destruction as transformation: Reassessing the destruction of metalwork in the Bronze Age.
14:40-15:00: Jane Barker (University of Manchester) – People and Ponies: New Perspectives on Human-Equine-Landscape Connections in Iron Age Britain.
15:00-15:20: Tess Machling (Independent Researcher) - ‘From Netherurd to Newark and beyond: tracking torc makers across Britain.’
15:20-15:40: Discussion
15:40-16:00: Coffee break
Keynote Talk: (16:00-17:00)
Sophia Adams (British Museum) - Fabulous bits and masses of metal: the Melsonby hoard
Abstract Booklet
The Later Prehistoric Finds Group welcomes you to the annual online symposium 2025, held via Microsoft Teams. The theme this year is communities and connections. From interpersonal relationships and kinship ties to larger scale populations, we will explore how later prehistoric communities came together and connected with one another through objects, architecture and the built environment. The symposium will begin with a series of short lightning talks, followed by three sessions of standard 20-minute conference papers with time for discussion after each. We will conclude with an exciting keynote lecture from Dr. Sophia Adams of the British Museum.
Lightning talks
A new feature for the LPFG symposium 2025! These short, 3-minute presentations using just one or two slides will provide quick updates about projects and work in progress, or present singular objects or ideas, and are particularly meant to open up discussion and welcome comments and suggestions.
1. Andrew Lamb (University of Edinburgh) and Matt Hitchcock (University of Leicester) - An Iron Age silver brooch from Whitchurch, Hampshire.
2. Hannah Curry (University of Leicester) - Weird times in tin mines: exploring unusual histories in Cornish streamworks.
3. Andrew Ward (Kent Archaeological Society) – A mystery object.
4. Jacob Metson (University of Leicester) – A rock in a hoard place.
5. Kate Sumnall (London Museum) – Connections with the river: new finds from the Thames.
Standard paper abstracts
1. Adelle Bricking (Amgueddfa Cymru)
The importance of landscape context for portable antiquities: A pair of La Tène brooches and a banjo enclosure at Boverton, Vale of Glamorgan
In 2022–23, two unique Iron Age brooches were discovered by a metal detectorist near Boverton, Vale of Glamorgan, and recorded by the Portable Antiquities Scheme in Wales (PAS Cymru). Through the generosity of the finder and landowner, the brooches were donated to Amgueddfa Cymru - Museum Wales (accession no. 2024.4H/1–2). La Tène I brooches, dating to the Middle Iron Age (c.450–250 BC), are rare in Wales, with only thirteen examples now known, making this discovery of particular significance.
While PAS Cymru has recorded over 60,000 artefacts reported by the public—most from metal detecting—interpreting these finds within their landscape context remains a major challenge. Many objects are effectively reduced to ‘dots on maps’, with limited understanding of whether they represent settlement debris, agricultural manuring, deliberate deposition, or proximity to routes and resources. Without additional fieldwork, it is often impossible to determine the nature of these findspots or their relationship to known archaeological sites.
In this instance, the Boverton brooches were found 400–600m from Summerhouse Camp (SAM GM032), a small multivallate promontory fort, yet no settlement was previously known nearby. A collaborative investigation between Cardiff University’s School of History, Archaeology and Religion and Amgueddfa Cymru undertook geophysical survey around the findspots, leading to the discovery of a banjo enclosure—providing crucial contextual evidence for interpreting the brooches.
This case study demonstrates the importance of integrating PAS data with targeted fieldwork to move beyond artefact distributions and reconstruct patterns of later prehistoric activity. Although resource constraints in the heritage sector pose challenges, stronger partnerships between museums, universities, and other heritage bodies could enable more systematic contextualisation of metal detecting finds, enriching our understanding of the Iron Age landscape of south Wales.
2. George Prew-Stell (National Museums Scotland)
Beyond the Wall: New Connections between Rome and Scotland through Chance Finds
Chance finds from metal detecting are filling out and shading in our understandings of communities and connections throughout Scotland’s history and prehistory. This is perhaps most evident in the case of Roman finds. While these have always formed part of Scotland’s heritage, much of the focus on Roman activity in and around Scotland focuses on the two barriers set between Scotland and the Empire, Hadrian’s Wall and the Antonine Wall. While the reasons for this are obvious, previously this focus has also been due to the paucity of evidence which has traditionally appeared of Roman activity in the rest of Scotland, but this is changing massively with the recent explosion in interest in metal detecting, more and more chance finds are coming up from Shetland in the north down to the traditional home of Scottish Roman activity in the Scottish Borders.
This talk presents the evidence which can often be overlooked of chance finds which have come through the Treasure Trove system in the last twenty years, and suggests new narratives to enrich our understanding of Roman connections with Scottish communities throughout their invasion and settlement of Great Britain, its effect on the peoples of what is now Scotland, and the interaction of local communities with the cultures and material cultures of the invaders on their doorstep.
3. Mike Moody (University of Leicester)
Is that awl? – Rethinking the role of Early Bronze Age copper-alloy awls in craft practices
Copper-alloy awls are an understudied class of artefacts from Early Bronze Age (EBA) Britain. Previous research has suggested that these artefacts might have been used in leather working but also used in ways not solely analogous to modern awls, such as body modification and pottery decoration. The research presented here shares some preliminary results from an ongoing PhD research project on the relationship between copper-alloy awls and various craft practices. A desk-based study of nearly 100 EBA copper-alloy awls has identified new evidence for previously unidentified multi-material relationships during the EBA. These results suggest specific craft practices to investigate via programmes of experimental archaeology; of which some results are also presented here.
4. Jennifer Beamer (Independent Researcher)
“Spindling for Weaving” — A First Look at Results
Experimental archaeology benefits from investigating research questions as (or part of) a programme, delivering insightful realities that can be applied to archaeological assemblages and landscapes. At its heart, experimental archaeology enlivens past activities by drawing them into the present so they can be observed, analysed, and help us resolve persistent questions. As part of an on-going programme of experiments utilising the textile tool assemblage from Danebury hillfort, the Spindling for Weaving project aims to fill in a knowledge gap about the range of yarns that could be produced from these Iron Age spindle whorls. Foregrounding the people involved in how the past was created is fundamental to the discipline of archaeology. This experiment examines the role of craftsperson more intensely by focusing on how intentionality influences the operational sequence of textile production at the point of yarn production, how significant this influence might be, how it might be observed in the non-perishable material culture, and what the limitations of the results are.
For assemblages with no textile remains, the results of this experiment are crucial for answering those questions and are instrumental in supporting reasonable conclusions with evidence rather than hypotheticals. This paper presents initial data from the project and discusses the results and potential impact on British Iron Age textile studies, and how this applies to non-textile specialists when interpreting finds and presenting site narratives.
5. Rose Karpinski (University of Reading/Ashmolean Museum)
An interdisciplinary study of Iron Age copper-alloy material culture
Previous research into Iron Age non-ferrous metallurgy has principally focused on high status sites, and consequently it has not provided a representative insight to everyday life in the Iron Age. My research aims to address this balance by undertaking a widespread study of Iron Age copper-alloy finds from the upper to middle Thames Valley and Iron Age copper alloy coins to understand the characteristics of Iron Age copper-alloy metallurgy.
A case study from large scale XRF analysis on Iron Age coins from across the country will be presented to explore the concept of regionality during the late Iron Age and the different patterns of alloy use in the creation of these coins. This will be presented alongside the results of analysis on copper-alloy finds from a range of sites across the upper to middle Thames Valley.
This paper will showcase elements of my methodology which combines traditional small find study with integrated chemical analysis, in order to better understand the flow of metal within the upper-middle Thames Valley during the Iron Age. Through an interdisciplinary approach to Iron Age material culture, I aim to illuminate the choices being made by craftspeople in everyday life.
6. Matt Hitchcock and Dawid Sych (University of Leicester)
Destruction as transformation: Reassessing the destruction of metalwork in the Bronze Age.
The destruction of metalwork in the Bronze Age was highly variable and could involve the crushing, notching, bending, twisting, burning and breaking of a wide range of object types from personal adornments and ingots to tools and weapons. Different situations, object types and materials called for interventions to be carried out in a range of often quite prescribed and specific ways.
Through three case studies of copper alloy hoard objects and via the lens of wear analysis, we will reframe deliberate destruction as a productive, performative and transformative practice, requiring skill and embodied knowledge to enact. We will explore how microscopic analysis of the surface of objects can add nuance and build toward new interpretations of the different forms and circumstances of deliberate destruction in the Bronze Age.
This paper presents material from the Leverhulme Trust funded project A New History of Bronze: Crafting, Leadership and Violence, based at the University of Leicester and directed by Dr. R. Crellin. The project re-thinks who metal makers and users were, and how metals were exchanged, utilised, and valued across the Bronze Age in Britain and Ireland.
7. Jane Barker (University of Manchester)
People and Ponies – New Perspectives on Human-Equine-Landscape Connections in Iron Age Britain
The ubiquitous presence of horse gear and equine remains at various Iron Age sites suggests that ponies were a common sight during this period. Yet, very little is known about these animals. Previous assumptions around equine husbandry, including diet and capture, are based on modern perceptions of horse care, without any supporting archaeological evidence.
The pony is the focal point of this new doctoral research, taking a unique life course perspective on human-equine relations within an Iron Age setting. Alternative equine husbandry mechanisms and potential landscape use for keeping ponies are considered in the absence of evidence for large-scale grain production and formal stabling.
This research also explores the strong connections between pony remains and the human dead in specific landscape locations, suggesting that the relationship
between ponies and humans went much further than traditional notions of equines as a functional form of transport, as economic domesticates or symbols of prestige. The pony may have held agentic qualities, framing notions of life, death and beyond within an Iron Age cosmology.
8. Tess Machling (Independent researcher)
From Netherurd to Newark and beyond: tracking torc makers across Britain.
Research on the decoration of Iron Age gold torcs has shown the hand of the same maker at work on three torcs from widely geographically spaced areas in Nottinghamshire, Peeblesshire and Norfolk. But what can this distribution tell us? Are we looking at travelling torcs? Or craftspeople? Or materials? This paper will examine these possibilities and will suggest that the find spots of gold torcs can offer insights into the mobility of craftspeople and their products in the Iron Age of Britain. In addition, I will critically examine the traditional model of torcs being made in East Anglia before travelling north and also look at whether it is possible to start peopling the gold-working community of Iron Age Britain.
Keynote Talk
Sophia Adams (British Museum)
Fabulous bits and masses of metal: the Melsonby hoard
‘One of the greatest hoards in Iron Age Britain'* hit the news in Spring 2025. Buried 2000 years ago this massive assemblage of horse harness, vehicle parts, weapons and cauldrons captured the imagination of the world. The headlines brought North Yorkshire to the attention of a global audience and saw Iron Age artefacts reach the unexpected heights of the Wikipedia front page (and a Radio 6 Music playlist). Behind the sound bites and press cuttings is a story of discovery, collaboration, cataloguing and research in progress. This presentation tells the story with a focus on the finds to answer the ‘big’ questions: How big is it? Why have we called it a hoard? What about the finds from 1843?
With thanks to Durham University, Historic England, The British Museum, µVis laboratory at Southampton University and Yorkshire Museum we will marvel at the benefits of CT scans, give praise to the skills of conservators and consider the questions this project is raising.