Dr Matt Pope

Saddle up!

Domesticated horses introduced to Iberia around 1800 BC but wild horses derived from Palaeolithic populations still persist until around 500 BC.

Our new edited volume is finally out! It collects much of the team's work over the last several years in Greece and elsewhere.
Thank you and congratulations to authors, reviewers, editors and the University of Tübingen Press for this exciting - and beautiful! - work!! 🎉✨
#openaccess #humanevolution

Dam!

The 'Hoover'?

Unveiling the multifunctional use of ochre in the Middle Stone Age: Specialized ochre retouchers from Blombos Cave Seven ochre artifacts from Blombos Cave show evidence of lithic retouching and pressure flaking, revealing specialized MSA tools.

Unveiling the multifunctional use of ochre in the Middle Stone Age: Specialized ochre retouchers from Blombos Cave | Science Advances www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Three figures on a sandy beach with sea and rocky headland in the distance

Yesterday, making tracks across Quaisne to The Old Smuggler's Inn. Incidently features La Cotte de St Brelade. 🦣

The Centre Stone, Jersey.
Not in the exact centre of the island but it's found itself a long way inland & 3km from it's supposed source at Mont Mado.
An offering of two dandelions occupied a cup mark on it's surface.
#StandingStoneSunday 🏺
www.instagram.com/reel/DM4fcqP...

People standing with a model of a neanderthal person

An engraved plaquette

Person looking at a model and bone of a dwarf red deer

People looking at the model of a bone heap of mammoth bones

Last day of the 2025 #IceAgeIsland season so we took our students to the @jerseyheritage.bsky.social exhibition of early prehistory. Quite emotional to see the teeth, tools, plaquettes, bone heaps & other material we have worked on these past 15 years all so beautifully displayed.
#IceAgeIsland 🦣🏺

Lughnasadh blessings to all. #Lammas

a stone artefact abut 11cm long by 6cm wide on a black background with a black and white scale

For #FlintFriday, a Levallois flake found towards the centre of the island of Jersey.
It shows us Neanderthal people used the whole of the landscape and its part of why we are investigating the loess landscapes of the plateau.
#IceAgeIsland🏺🦣

It was a lucky shot!

A large field under a blue sky. A surveying level. Flags. Archaeologists in the distance.

Alongside our curatorial work we are continuing a survey of the eastern loessy landscapes of Jersey. Using a low impact approach we are simply recording the artefacts in the field, taking only systematic data, leaving only footprints. Using simple methods we can achieve scale. #IceAgeIsand
🏺🦣

Me in a t shirt showing a mammoth against sunset colors. Text reads "Official Mammoth Herder. IceAgeIsland 2025"

Here's our #IceAgeIsland 2025 t-shirt the right way round. 🏺🦣

I didn't know about Atlantico, will check it out! Thank you!

Help! We have a big end-of-dig espetada marinade to make and so we are looking for a good source of Bay leaves in Jersey this morning?

Loess Moon

Yes, eventually!

As we get close to completing the reorganisation of the La Cotte faunal collections, our 2025 project t-shirts have arrived!
Designed by the brilliant Yore&Lore over on insta, we love them. 🦣🏺
#IceAgeIsland

Under big East Coast skies in the Jersey Loess-lands.
#IceAgeIsland

A red shoe box lid showing a black rose and the text "Duraflex by Clarke's of Leicester"

Does anyone know the history of the Duraflex show brand? Knowing when this box was made would give us a date after which the early La Cotte collection was boxed..

There will be Jam

It's our way of making sure the camp site mugs don't dissapears permanently into people's tents or get taken to site.

Our cave archaeologists & cavers’ group photos outside Castlepook cave, July 2025 research excavation season, taken on different days but including the first day.

#cavearchaeology
#irisharchaeology 🏺
#CastlepookCaveProject2025

Funders:
@ria.ie
@researchireland.ie
Cork County Council

Interested in finding out more about the MSc Palaeoanthropology and Palaeolithic Archaeology & how you can ‘unearth the archaeological and biological aspects of human evolution on this one-year MSc’? Look no further!

🪨 www.ucl.ac.uk/prospective-...

11,000-Year-Old Dinner Party: Why Neolithic People Hauled Wild Boars Across Mountains Prehistoric communities in western Iran brought wild boars from far distances as symbolic gifts for a communal feast. While magnets and shot glasses make for lighthearted holiday keepsakes, food items...

11,000-Year-Old Dinner Party: Why Neolithic People Hauled Wild Boars Across Mountains scitechdaily.com/11000-year-o...

Archaeologists from London help catalogue ancient Jersey finds Visitors can meet archaeologists from University College London at the Jersey event on Saturday.

More coverage form the BBC of our on going work with @jerseyheritage.bsky.social to catalogue and repackage hundreds of ice age animal bones from La Cotte de St Brelade. Featuring Olga Finch and @lettyingrey.bsky.social
🦣🏺
#IceAgeIsland #MammothHerding
www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Archaeology funding to protect Ice Age hunt site Fetcham Springs Fetcham Springs in Surrey is "nationally significant", says the Surrey County Archaeological Unit.

www.bbc.com/news/article...

We all take turns! It's not punitive

Today's info board
#IceAgeIsland

1.2m high granite gate post, set into wall, J P S 1730 possibly inscribed on it.

Not prehistoric, but very much stone and very much standing.
St Brelades Parish. Jersey.
#StandingStoneSunday
🏺