This note reports the initial results of a joint multidisciplinary project between the University of Sheffield and the Musée d'Art et d'Archéologie in Antananarivo, which has concentrated on the investigation of the social and economic significance of the tombs that are an outstanding landscape feature in an area of southern Madagascar.

Another view is given on issues arising from the return of the Kow Swamp human remains, discussed by John Mulvaney in the March 1991 ANTIQUITY.

A distinctive type of stone tool, from midden sites on the eastern Queensland coast of Australia, is identified from ethnographic accounts of the preparation of fern roots as food.

Successive UK Governments have persisted in maintaining the archaic nonsense of Treasure Trove. This paper demonstrates the unsuitability of a medieval Royal Prerogative for protecting our archaeological heritage, and goes on to outline a more effective system. This rejects the principle of animus revertendi and concentrates on the protection of portable antiquities in its own right. It advocates a system of statutory reporting and certification, coupled with a policy of acquisition in the public interest.

Four separate finds of human skeletal remains from the Norfolk Fens have been 14C-dated to the Early Bronze Age. It is suggested that they are a facet of the far more extensive deposition of bodies and artefacts in wet places.

The Council for British Archaeology pioneered bibliographical information services and its British Archaeological Abstracts was the model for similar services in other European countries. A consortium of archaeological organizations has now been formed to produce a fully computerized bibliographical service which will be available in a variety of output formats.

Two organizers of the TAG meeting at Lampeter, December 1991, take issue with Bintliff's view of their intellectual position, starting with the label ‘post-modern’.

Work in 1992 has significantly added to understanding of this important Maya site in the Middle Formative or Preclassic period (1000–450 BC). The known settled area now extends to 1.62 sq. km. One of the 14 burials was associated with rich grave-goods, suggesting that it was of a leading member of the Cuello community in the 5th century BC.

It is a common assumption that archaeological deposits with well-defined bands of ‘undisturbed’ sediments possess absolute stratigraphic integrity and hence that discrete cultural events are sealed within them. This cautionary tale, based on the excavation of a sandstone shelter site in Queensland, shows that this precise stratigraphic and chronological resolution can no longer be taken for granted. Conjoin sets (stone flakes struck from the same core) demonstrate substantial vertical artefact migration between layers, with consequent implications for interpretation.

Readers may know, from editorial comments and notes in ANTIQUITY, and from newspaper letters and articles early in 1991, the deep concern felt over the destruction of archaeological sites in West Africa, particularly in Mali, to satisfy the demands of art dealers for terracotta figurines (see ANTIQUITY 65: 904-5). Oxford University has re-considered its attitude.

This essay in the historiography of Bronze Age studies traces their growth from the early 19th-century adoption of the Three Age system to the 1960s and their subsequent decline as a distinct field of endeavour with the retreat from period-based approaches.

Observance of the Columbus Quincentenary has greatest relevance when focused on historical processes at a global scale. Nevertheless, American events and circumstances of the contact period have not received from archaeologists the attention given to the more pre-Hispanic Aztec and Inca.

The 16th-century efforts of Spain, and other western European powers, to extend empire overseas into the Americas led to a frontier-state expansion and confrontation among vastly different cultures. Colliding with each other and with powerful indigenous societies, the Spanish established the most extensive empire in the New World (FIGURE 1). The outcome shaped the destiny of America, Spain and the world.

Earlier fieldwork by the University of Manchester (see ANTIQUITY 64:51–8) identified the important early medieval port of Quentovic. This note reports on the final two seasons of work, which clarified the phasing and extent of this major wic settlement, and on the radiocarbon dates from key features.

The first contacts between the prehistoric cultures of the Canary Islands and western civilization occurred in the European expansion of the late Middle Ages. Their ultimate colonization was intimately related to this expansion, driven by new economic forms, including ‘commercial capitalism’ or ‘pre-capitalism’, which affected economic and intellectual structures throughout Europe, the economic characterized from then on by innovation, risk and increasing turnover; and the intellectual by the concept of ‘profit’ in place of ‘service’.

The practical transition can be seen in the technology that supported expansion: transport (new types of ships, cartography, systems of navigation, etc.); financial systems (nonmonetary payment, insurance, commercial credit, etc.); and mercantile institutions (commercial societies, consulates, postal services, etc.).

A conference on Interpretive Archaeologies was held at Peterhouse College, Cambridge in September 1991. It sought to explore alternatives; to share rather than impose a programme for interpreting the past. Here is one reaction.

The Archaeological Site Index to Radiocarbon Dates for Great Britain and Ireland, pioneered by the Council for British Archaeology in 1971, is now being prepared as a fully computerized database. This note describes the genesis and format of this invaluable new tool.