Found architecture: places becoming monuments in northern Britain‘ (jointly with the Prehistoric Society)

Add to your list(s) Download to your calendar using vCal

• Professor Richard Bradley, University of Reading
• Monday 11 May 2026, 18:00-19:00
• Law Faculty, 10 West Road, Cambridge CB3 9DZ.

If you have a question about this talk, please contact ss16.

Twentieth century fieldwork in Britain had many emphases but one of the most influential was the identification and classification of different types of prehistoric monuments. It was not always easy to distinguish between ruined structures left by ancient people and geological formations that often resembled them. The problem was most severe in highland regions. This distinction was based on the contrast in Western thought between nature and culture.

New work in Scotland and Northern England has weakened this contrast. Bona fide monuments could develop from topographical features that gained a special significance in peoples’ lives, and glacial mounds and rock outcrops might have been mistaken for the remains of older structures – sometimes those connections were celebrated in architectural form. There was ‘found architecture’ in the past just as modern artists have used ‘found objects’.

The lecture will illustrate these points drawing on a series of recent excavations.

This talk is part of the Cambridge Antiquarian Society series.

This talk is included in these lists:

• Cambridge Antiquarian Society
• Law Faculty, 10 West Road, Cambridge CB3 9DZ

Note that ex-directory lists are not shown.