Subjects

The places and periods worth arguing about

Every claim labelled with how far it can be pushed, and both sides of every open question put at full strength.

Lidar hillshade of Old Sarum, Wiltshire: concentric ramparts around an inner motte, with cathedral foundations visible inside the enclosure

Overview

Ancient civilisations

What we know, how we know it, and where the map is still blank.

Lidar hillshade of Silbury Hill, Wiltshire: a large conical prehistoric mound with the surrounding ditch and field system

Anatolia

Göbekli Tepe

What is actually established, what is still argued, and what would settle it.

Macro photograph of banded sedimentary rock, ochre and grey layers running horizontally

Text

The Dead Sea Scrolls

The one machine result in this whole series that published its own error rate.

Macro photograph of a dry ochre mineral surface, cracked and finely textured

South Asia

The Indus script

Undeciphered for 150 years, and seriously argued not to be writing at all.

Lidar hillshade of Badbury Rings, Dorset: concentric Iron Age ramparts with Roman roads crossing the surrounding landscape

Climate

The Younger Dryas

The cold snap that interrupted the end of the ice age, and the argument about the cause.

Plates: Environment Agency LIDAR Composite DTM 1m · Open Government Licence v3 · rendered by us at four azimuths · these are real terrain, not illustration