Stone artefacts reported from the Orce region (Grenada, Spain) indicate a first human presence in western Europe as early as the Plio-Pleistocene boundary, making a ‘long chronology’ for European hominids against the claims for a briefer human presence. Excavations of Barranco León-5 and Fuentenueva-3a in 1995 have produced two groups of lithic artefacts of ‘Oldowan’ type, seen as the most ancient of western Europe by faunal associations and palaeomagnetic study.

Advances in our understanding of the Quaternary history of the earth's magnetic field provide the means to correct the radiocarbon time-scale for long-term (millennia) deviations from the calendrical one beyond the upper limit of the tree-ring-based calibration. The conversion is essential when Middle and Upper Palaeolithic archaeological sites are to be placed within the context of the complex climatic history of the last glacial interval and following deglaciation.

Recent excavations at the Kulpi Mara Rockshelter in the Palmer River catchment of central Australia have produced radiocarbon determinations spanning an archaeological sequence of 30,000 years. These results enable re-assessment of models addressing the how, where and when of arid zone colonisation, and human adjustments to environmental change in the later Pleistocene. Whilst the evidence supports early occupation of the central arid zone during wetter conditions, doubts are raised about the continuity of occupation during the height of glacial aridity.

An ancient and contentious debate in prehistory (Owen 1846; Lyell 1863) asks if the megafauna of newly colonized worlds was exterminated by human hunting, or whether other factors, such as changing climate, were decisive. Debate on this issue remains lively in Australia, because its harsh environments surely posed problems for very large mammals. A starting-point for this fresh look at megafaunal extinction was Flannery's (1994) adoption of the ‘blitzkrieg’ hypothesis, in which humanly caused kill-off was so rapid it left no decisive archaeological traces.

Reconstruction drawings intended to illustrate the realities of prehistoric life can be famously revealing of preconceptions in the minds of the modern illustrator and of the researcher who briefs the illustrator. But are the less interpretative drawings whose purpose is to record the material evidence more neutral in their look? Nineteenth-century technical illustrations of the Neanderthal skull are unintentionally revealing of attitude.

The discovery of a perforated cave-bear femur from the Neanderthal levels at Divje Babe has been interpreted as the oldest musical instrument in Europe. Here we present the current discussion on the ‘flute’ and its implications for other similar bone finds from early prehistory.

Going into a cave or shelter, one walks where one can stand upright or has to crouch less. That affects which zones objects are trampled on, which zones they may be kicked out of, which zones they may be kicked into. And those effects interact with the usual spatial order–with its activity zones and drop zones–that develops through occupation of the enclosed cave or shelter.

The meat and milk of horses are highly valued food products, past and present. Horses were an especially valuable food resource in grassland habitats, which may explain their increased exploitation in the central Eurasian forest steppe during the late Eneolithic. It may also explain the emphasis on horses in final Upper Palaeolithic art.

The recent study of Kis-Mohos Tó lake in Hungary reveals an important sequence of prehistoric landscape changes from the earliest land clearance to the early Middle Ages. The recognition of land degradation, through the application of new analytical methods, forms an important part of the discussion.

Chinese scholarship well illustrates how research attitudes direct the spirit of research, and the tenor of the archaeological story which results. What happens when non-Chinese theory, approaches and field methods are brought to bear in a Chinese regional study?

Pompeii, recovered from under Vesuvius ash, offers a famous ‘frozen moment’ in archaeological time: a city as it stood at a certain day. Beyond and beneath the dating evidence visible in its standing buildings is to be found a more archaeological chronology.

Excavations at Flixborough, Lincolnshire (1989–91) revealed an important Anglo-Saxon settlement. Here the various interpretations are discussed, ranging from monastic to ‘magnate’.

Recent research at the great Irish passage tomb of Knowth has revealed new decorated stones, which were apparently recycled from an earlier tomb. Here, George Eogan describes the finds and discusses the implication of an early phase of tomb building pre-dating the major passage tombs of the Boyne Valley.

The rock-shelter of Jinmium in the Northern Territory of Australia hit the headlines a year-and-a-half ago when TL dates suggested human occupation might date from 116,000 years ago. Such dates were much earlier than any previously obtained for Australia, and thus suggested the continent was colonized at a very early stage in human dispersal around the Pacific. However, some TL dating is notoriously difficult to interpret, and here Nigel Spooner has re-assessed one of the later dates in the Jinmium sequence. His interpretation calls into doubt some of the earlier claims.

Research on six late Mesolithic shell middens on the small Hebridean island of Oronsay address questions of permanent and seasonal occupation. Stable isotope analysis of human bones shows marine resources providing the majority of protein, supporting year-round occupation of Oronsay. One individual, however, demonstrated a mixed diet of marine and terrestrial protein, suggesting seasonal visits and different patterns of site occupation.

Large Mesolithic and Neolithic cemeteries that span the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition are scarce in Europe. As such, understanding the Mesolithic-Neolithic transition is rarely easy when using the direct evidence from carbon-dating of human remains. A new dating programme for the Ukrainian cemeteries of the Dnieper Rapids region throws up considerable discrepancies between typological seriation as a means to assign burials to the Mesolithic or to the Neolithic and the carbon evidence.

The fenland peats of eastern England have produced some 36 prehistoric burials, whose distinctive associations place them into the early Bronze Age–just sufficient for pattern to be evident in their placing and character.

Further remarks on the age of the Foz Côa rock-engravings, Portugal, in the light of studies by absolute-science methods in the March 1997 ANTIQUITY.

Ruth & Vincent Megaw questioned the motivation behind the current critique of the use of the term ‘Celtic’ for the La Tène Iron Age in ANTIQUITY (1996: 175–81). They explained it is a nationalist reaction derived from insecurity about modern English identity. Here we have a reply to their paper, which rejects these interpretations.