The north of England is so rich in archaeological finds that Alice Roberts is travelling back there once again to reveal more of its fascinating history.\n\nShe starts this journey at that most spectacular of Roman monuments, Hadrian’s Wall. Alice is on site to witness a new dig at the famous Birdoswald Fort, once home to around 800 Roman infantrymen. She joins a team from Newcastle University as they uncover a completely new building, alluded to in the 1930s but never fully excavated until now.\n\nNext, we travel further north to learn more about the so-called barbarians that the Romans were so worried about. The dig is on the shores of the Moray Firth, where archaeologists are uncovering a fort which once belonged to the Picts. A wealth of new evidence suggests that far from being barbaric savages, they were a sophisticated people who were perhaps far more educated than anyone has given them credit for.\n\nAlice also visits the town of Rochdale in Lancashire, just ten miles outside Manchester, where a huge community dig is altering our understanding of the Industrial Revolution. Alice meets local families who are digging beneath the spectacular Gothic town hall to uncover the remains of terraces and tenement blocks that housed the working men and women of Rochdale, shedding new light on the way industrialisation changed our towns and cities.\n\nIn Northern Ireland, another community dig highlights a particularly dark period of recent history, the Great Famine of the mid-19th century. For the first time in Northern Ireland, a team are excavating one of the island of Ireland’s many famine roads. These were roads built by the starving population. Often going nowhere, they were part of a misguided attempt by the British government to boost Irish infrastructure and support the hungry by forcing them to build roads in exchange for money to buy food. Historian Onyeka Nubia travels to London to search for evidence that might explain the British government’s reasoning for what turned out to be a futile relief effort.\n\nBack in Scotland, a new tramline being built from Edinburgh to Leith gives archaeologists the opportunity to study and preserve hundreds of skeletons unearthed at a graveyard dating back to 1300. This dig throws new light on the residents of Leith as they lived through 500 years of Scotland’s history. In the Digging for Britain tent, archaeologist John Lawson brings in one skeleton with a unique set of injuries, and an incredible facial reconstruction brings her vividly to life.\n\nFinally, a once-in-a-lifetime find under a golf course sets archaeological pulses racing as a Bronze Age wooden coffin is remarkably preserved in the waterlogged soil 3,000 years after it was buried.
Source: BBC 4
Series 9: Episode 3
The show travels to the north of the UK to look at the most fascinating archaeology uncovered in the region over the course of 2021. \n\nIn North Yorkshire, a team of community ...
17-04-2025
BBC 4
Series 9: Episode 2
The south of England is the location for a rich and colourful selection of outstanding archaeology excavated in this episode.\n\nThe HS2 High Speed Rail line from London to Birm ...
10-04-2025
BBC 4
Series 9: Episode 1
This episode sees Alice Roberts tour the East of England, seeking out the most outstanding archaeological digs of the year.\n\nStarting in style, she witnesses the uncovering of ...
03-04-2025
BBC 4
Series 12: 6. Lost Mansions And Impaled Prisoners
This episode showcases the best archaeology found in the south of the UK. \n\nFirst, we travel to the Killerton estate in Devon, where the National Trust are hunting for remains ...
04-02-2025
BBC 4
Series 12: 4. Roman Crime And Ancient Dna
Alice heads to the north of Britain to explore the region's most fascinating archaeological digs. \n\nShe first heads to County Durham to join archaeologists digging at the sp ...
28-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 12: 5. Chariots And Slaves
Alice travels through the west of Britain, exploring the region's most exciting archaeological digs. \n\nA previously unknown Roman villa complex is unearthed west of Oxford, ...
28-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 12: 2. Dinosaur Highway And Roman Sauna
Alice journeys around central Britain to uncover the most exciting archaeological discoveries made in the region in 2024.\n\nA quarryman makes the chance discovery of a set of v ...
21-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 12: 3. Island Treasures
In this episode, we make a special journey to some of the most exciting archaeological digs on Britain’s spectacular islands. Alice joins a team of archaeologists in Orkne ...
21-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 12: 1. Saxon Gold And Buried Coins
Alice travels through the east of Britain to the area’s most exciting archaeological digs.\n\nShe joins archaeologists digging an astonishing Anglo-Saxon cemetery in rural ...
14-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 7: 4. Iron Age Revealed
Alice Roberts follows the excavation of Iron Age Britain’s most spectacular grave. A team of archaeologists in East Yorkshire have uncovered the remains of only the third ...
11-12-2024
BBC 4
Series 12: 5. Chariots And Slaves
Alice travels through the west of Britain, exploring the region's most exciting archaeological digs. \n\nA previously unknown Roman villa complex is unearthed west of Oxford, ...
28-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 11: 2. Anglo-saxon Gold And Rebellious Nuns
In central England, an RAF airbase with a Roman past, a forgotten medieval nunnery, a gold pendant from a 7th-century grave and a pub with a very long history of hospitality.
09-05-2024
BBC 4
Series 7: 3. East
Professor Alice Roberts explores this year’s most exciting archaeological finds from the east of Britain. Every new discovery was filmed by the archaeologists themselves, ...
13-11-2024
BBC 4
Series 10: 2. Arthur's Stone And A Georgian Mine
In the west of the UK, a spectacular monument older than Stonehenge, a 200-year-old mine trapped in time and a lost medieval friary.
27-08-2024
BBC 4
Series 12: 1. Saxon Gold And Buried Coins
Alice travels through the east of Britain to the area’s most exciting archaeological digs.\n\nShe joins archaeologists digging an astonishing Anglo-Saxon cemetery in rural ...
14-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 8: 2. North
The remains of a Tudor house in Leicestershire were thought to be the childhood home of England’s forgotten queen, Lady Jane Grey. But when archaeologists excavate, they f ...
27-11-2024
BBC 4
Series 8: 4. Wwii Special
The team are on an archaeological hunt of our more recent past as they follow the search for artefacts from World War II. They join marine archaeologists in the Solent as they r ...
08-07-2024
BBC 4
Series 9: Episode 5
The west of Britain is explored for the best of its archaeological digs and post excavation discoveries.\n\nIn north Somerset, archaeologists are blown away by the discovery of ...
28-03-2024
BBC 4
Series 12: 2. Dinosaur Highway And Roman Sauna
Alice journeys around central Britain to uncover the most exciting archaeological discoveries made in the region in 2024.\n\nA quarryman makes the chance discovery of a set of v ...
21-01-2025
BBC 4
Series 4: 2. East
Professor Alice Roberts explores the year's most exciting archaeological finds in the east of Britain. A team unearths a mass grave, divers search the Thames for clues to a 17th ...
16-09-2020
BBC 4