Course: Exploring Stone Age Archaeology: The Mysteries of Star Carr

At Star Carr we have discovered Britain’s oldest known houses. Here Nicky explains how they might have been made, using a variety of plant remains. Further resources If you would …

This is an additional video, hosted on YouTube. We knew from the work in the 1980s that there was some sort of a wooden platform on the edge of the …

Another exciting discovery was a complete digging stick which again we believe is the oldest known example in the world. As well as the one that Mike Bamforth shows you …

One of the most exciting discoveries we made was what appears to be a complete wooden bow, which is the oldest known complete bow in the world. As Mike Bamforth …

As we have learnt, birch was dominant in the landscape. Birch bark can usually be removed from birch trees in large strips (though you have to be careful not to …

During the time when Star Carr was occupied the environment would have been different to today. In order to try and reconstruct this environment and the plants within it, over …

Here several strands of evidence from Star Carr are pieced together to suggest how sparks might have been made and then tinder and wood would have been used to build …

Harry Robson, our fungi expert, has always had a passion for fungi and he collected them and studied them over the years as a hobby. Although fungi are not plants …

Welcome to week 2. During this week we will be learning all about stone – from flint tools to mysterious engraved pendants made from shale.

In addition, three pieces of amber were found during Clark’s excavations, one of which was perforated twice but was also broken (the photograph above). Such finds are incredibly rare – …

During our excavations we found three shale beads. Two of these were found in situ (i.e. within the peat) and are very similar in size and shape to those found …

During Clark’s excavations a total of 33 shale beads were found. The stone beads were found mainly in two clusters with some others scattered around. All of the beads were …

There are intriguing similarities with other parts of Europe in terms of the beads and decorations on the pendant.

Finally, we carried out some experiments and made a pendant out of shale, using a piece of flint to engrave it. What we found was that when grooves are made …

We also looked for usewear traces on the pendant. There were no wear traces around the hole which might have indicated that it had been suspended and neither were there …