England received only 7% of the long-term average rainfall for July. Southern England, just 1%. Factoid: There has been a weather station in Kew Gardens for 155 years. This July was the first month ever to record 0mm of rain. Tomorrow, London will again hit 30C+ www.theguardian.com/environment/...

July set to be driest on record for England and Wales after relentless heatwaves

Climate scientist urges better planning as southern England had just 1% of long-term average rainfall last month

theguardian.com

The Warrior Mounds, South Oxfordshire

Bidston Hill looking very parched today, but clear views over Birkenhead Docks and the Mersey, towards Liverpool City Centre. Home via The Mops, after acknowledging the 10th century Norse Irish Sun Goddess carving. Someone had left her an offering of seashells, which was nice to see.

This wonderfully wonky mosaic from Withington Roman Villa in Gloucestershire, England, depicts a sea deity displaying attributes of both Oceanus and Neptune. He holds a trident, and has crustacean claws at his temples, with two dolphins emerging from his mouth. 🏺 1/ 300-400 CE. #BritishMuseum 📸 me

#TombTuesday a summit cairn for the Bronze Age dead at Moel y Llyn, Ceredigion, high above Cardigan Bay. Not a bad spot for the ancestors to rest.. 📷 My own, April 2022

The entrance passage to the Neolithic round cairn at the Grey Cairns of Camster in Caithness. While reconstructed, the tomb is incredibly atmospheric. 📸 My own. #TombTuesday #Prehistory #Archaeology #Caithness

The passage grave of Mané-Rutual in Locmariaquer (Morbihan) has a 10m long passage leading to a chamber roofed with an 11x4m capstone which broke during an early excavation. Card by Le Rouzic c.1905. #TombTuesday.

Crops grown underneath solar panels produce more, require less water and are more resistant to extreme weather, even during a hot, dry summer. We need agrivoltaics to be rolled out asap, for both the electricity and the better growing conditions. microgridmedia.com/solar-panels...

Solar Panels Are Helping Crops Grow Better, Global Studies Show - Microgrid Media

For farmers worried about losing land to solar energy, new research brings surprising news: many crops actually produce more food when grown beneath solar

microgridmedia.com

One of my favourite archaeological illustrations for #standingstonesunday - the Pictish Clach a' Charridh (Shandwick Stone) #archaeology ⚱️ From: highlandpictishtrail.co.uk/project/art-... Image: ©Crown Copyright HES, Ian G Scott.

Duddo Stone Circle in Northumberland. The circle is incomplete with a sixth stone now missing on the circle’s western side. Excavations in 2008 suggest a construction date during the early Bronze Age. 📸 My own. #StandingStoneSunday #Prehistory #Archaeology #Northumberland

Coedwig hynafol #Borth / A section of the ancient petrified forest in Borth #Ceredigion #Cymru #Wales

Watching Richard E Grant's Very Modern Odyssey on Ch4, and really enjoying these two standing in front of a Caravaggio discussing it, while lit in chiaroscuro and looking exactly like a Caravaggio 😁

One of my all-time favorite depictions of this scene is this fresco panel - also at the #BritishMuseum - which show bird-like Sirens playing their instruments, surrounded by the skeletons of their seafaring victims. Adorbs! 😍 🏺 #ancientbluesky 2/ 📸 me

Well it is #RomanSiteSaturday & passing the Conway valley #NorthWales this afternoon I just had to go & see the parch marks that have appeared at Caerhun Roman Fort (Canovium). 😍...the fort's lines & contours are clearly visible in the fields #archaeology (Aerial 📷 RCAHMW @drtobydriver.bsky.social)

Will be sorry to see our local astronomy radio telescope go at Knockin if Jodrell Bank loses its funding. It’s part of the MERLIN array of telescopes across the UK

Ryknield Street showing up nicely on Darley Abbey Playing Fields today. #Derbyshire #archaeology #romanroad

Reform councils in action. Selling the country's lungs that keep us cooler. I'm sure Kent will be fine even hotter and drier. Paying attention #Clacton?

The Guardian@theguardian.com · 7d ago

Campaigners rail against ‘plundering’ of ancient Kent woodland to make way for quarry expansion

The two people who are breaking through the noise and cutting through to the essence of what is happening right now with deeply damaged Donald Trump are Jon Ossoff and Hunter Biden. Here is Hunter's very perceptive take on the messy scene at the White House Correspondents Dinner:

From 1973, The Last House Standing at Liverpool Anglican Cathedral, from one of my photographic projects at Myrtle Street Art College, I was working then as a black & white printer at the commercial photographers, Elsam, Mann and Cooper in Princes Road @yoliverpool.bsky.social @daveyph.bsky.social

Having seen the Odyssey last week, watching Gladiator again now I have to say that for dramatic narrative, characters, spectacle, action, sets & soundtrack, Gladiator beats it hands down ⚔️🏛️

With today's theft of Vix torc, here's what has been taken... The torc was found as part of a burial & placed around neck of the interred. Despite its size, it weighs only 480g (less that half the weight of the Snettisham Great torc). It is STUNNING. #Archaeology #Gold #Torcs 🏺 1/2

Holiday in the climate emergency. No that’s not AI or edited, just a snapshot I just took with my phone on Lacanau beach in France. What future will this boy grow up in? It is in our hands, but time is running out.

Cool leafy green in Anglesey yesterday 💚 #Anglesey #NorthWales #trees

News travels fast...🔥☀️🛩️ www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

Heatwave reveals lost archaeological sites across Wales

The Royal Commission of Wales said some of these known sites have not been seen clearly in decades.

bbc.co.uk

The fresco decorated the vaulted ceiling of an upper floor room above the tablinum in the House with the Bakery of Aulus Rustius Verus. During the excavation the fragments were reassembled in the finds hut as they came out of the ground and as the dig went on so the puzzle grew.

What an immense joy and satisfaction to see the fragments of the ceiling fresco from Region IX excavations reassembled. The vibrant colours and the intricate details of the highest quality are mesmerising. Currently on display in the Large Palaestra, #Pompeii

Part of the interior of Taversoe Tuick Chambered Cairn on Rousay - one of the Orkney islands. The cairn dates to the Neolithic, and is a wonderful example of a two-storey cairn with chambers on top of each other. 📸 My own. #TombTuesday #Rousay #Prehistory #Archaeology #Orkney

#TombTuesday the old sacred portal to New Grange, Ireland, when I visited with a bike & tent in 1989 The great spiral entrance stone flanks the door, with original closing slab, right, & roof box above 🥰 It's all now rather heavily re-engineered to allow for large groups of visitors 🤔 📷My own

The central panel from the Rudston Venus Mosaic depicting the goddess Venus and a merman. Dating to the 3rd century AD, the mosaic comes from a Roman villa near Rudston in East Yorkshire. The mosaic is now part of the collections at Hull and East Riding Museum. #MosaicMonday

A baked clay Later Bronze Age loomweight Decorated with the thumb and fingernail impressions of the individual who made it 3,500 years ago 🤩 Photographed as excavated at Winterborne Kingston #Dorset in September 2021 #FindsFriday