Since January 2017, the UCL Institute of Archaeology has been the institutional base of the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) Heritage Priority Area Leadership team. The team, led by AHRC Heritage Priority Area Leadership Fellow and Professor of Heritage Studies at the UCL Institute of Archaeology Rodney Harrison, are funded to undertake their work initially for a period of three years until the end of 2019. This brief research update provides an overview of the work of the priority area and AHRC’s investment in world leading heritage research, with particular reference to the AHRC’s Heritage Priority Area: Future Directions research strategy, which was updated in consultation with the team in March 2018.

This paper will look at the requirements for a future vision of networked, digital heritage inventories to support heritage protection in England. The present loose network presents several challenges for multiple organizations maintaining similar datasets on disparate IT software: Duplication of content; ownership of content and different approaches to recording practice and standards. This paper will discuss the potential use of the Arches Heritage Inventory and Management System as part of the vision for better operation of this network. Arches was developed by the Getty Conservation Institute, World Monuments Fund and Farallon Geographics as an open source web-based geographic information system (GIS) to help inventorize and manage immovable cultural heritage. The system is based around internationally recognized standards from both the heritage and IT sectors. These include: ISO 21127: 2006, commonly referred to as the CIDOC-CRM (Conceptual Reference Model); the CIDOC Core Data Standard for Archaeological and Architectural Sites; Core Data Index to Historic Buildings and Monuments of the Architectural Heritage as well as Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards. The proposed use of Arches as a data collection and exchange platform would provide effective and useful recording systems for small heritage projects lacking in-house IT support and the finances and skills to support their development. In addition it would promote standards to support cross-searching, data exchange and digital archiving and through its use of open source a community of IT developers, standards developers and content specialists can be developed to sustain the network.

The Wiltshire and Swindon Historic Environment Record (HER) is a resource available to all which houses significant data about the archaeology of the county. HER data within a defined study area has been analysed using statistical techniques and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to evaluate settlement distribution and change in the Late Iron Age and Roman periods. A key element has been to develop a methodology for analysing data in the HER. It is argued that the comparison of different datasets, such as artefacts and coins, can be used to explore the circulation of Iron Age coins in the Roman period. In-depth analysis of aspects of the data have in turn led to an enhancement of the HER and shown what an indispensable resource it is for wider research.

A summary of geoconservation work in the county of Suffolk, England, in 2004/2005. It includes details of the Suffolk Geodiversity Audit and the Suffolk Mammoth Trail projects.

Geophysical survey in 2006, part of the Silbury Hill Conservation Project, revealed extensive settlement in two fields south of Silbury Hill. The Later Silbury project consisted of an archaeological evaluation in 2010 and reassessment of surviving material from earlier excavations in the immediate area. The project aimed to characterise the Romano-British settlement, and to elucidate this poorly understood phase of activity around the monument and within the Stonehenge and Avebury World Heritage Site, contributing to future management and presentation. Roman Silbury was probably a roadside settlement or small town along the London to Bath road (the modern A4). Immediately south of the road, any surviving features were masked in the magnetic survey by pipelines. In the arable field sloping down to the Kennet, the surveys indicated an extensive settlement, including a minor road or trackway running south from the road with three large subdivided rectangular enclosures to its west. Five evaluation trenches were opened here, concentrating on one of the enclosures and avoiding the large stone buildings identified by ground penetrating radar. Three trenches were opened in the water meadow to investigate geophysical anomalies and alluvial deposits near the river. This report assesses the results of the 2010 evaluation.