features

We had an overwhelming response from readers to last issue's front cover exclusive – Mick Aston's resignation from Time Team – and print a selection of these with thoughts from Time Team's founder and executive producer, Tim Taylor.

The lost cathedrals of St Paul's

We know St Paul's as one of London's most revered buildings, whose dome survived the blitz to offer a defining counterpart to the rising verticals of modern city architecture. But an earlier tragedy is less well remembered: Wren's triumph was made possible by the destruction of one of Europe's largest medieval buildings in the great fire of 1666, which also took away a huge portico by Inigo Jones. The cathedral's archaeologist John Schofield has been exploring.

Institute of Archaeology celebrates

In April 75 years ago the Institute of Archaeology opened for business in a luxury London villa, under the direction of a playboy and soon-to-be TV star; its next full-time director was a Marxist who had previously worked with an illegal revolutionary socialist group in Australia. Being led by two of the world's greatest archaeologists, however, is not the institute's only distinction, as Gabriel Moshenska explains.

Going native in the land of Boudica

At the time of the Roman invasion the Iceni occupied what is now Norfolk and beyond. Their queen Boudica led a damaging but failed revolt against the invaders in AD61, after which the tribe seems to have vanished from history. Will Bowden thinks we are wrong to write off the Iceni in this way. And he has a very strange building to prove it.

Blitzing a Yorkshire Roman town with geofizz

Aldborough, as the estate agents of North Yorkshire say, is conveniently located near the A1 motorway and highly sought after. But the village was once a busy town and an important feature of Roman Britain (like the road). Rose Ferraby and Martin Millett report how survey is bringing the lost city to life.

Archaeology and heritage in Chitral, Pakistan

We read about the "mystery" of places like Stonehenge or the pyramids, but here is a part of the world where truthfully almost nothing was known of its ancient history, despite its being traditionally popular with adventurous tourists and in the midst of some of the world's great early cultures. Ruth Young and Pakistani colleagues proved there is much to be found – though being surrounded by Al-Qaeda training camps, with a daily threat of kidnapping and fieldworkers protected by armed guards, did not make work easy: Young was warned not to continue research.

A museum for every community

It has never been easier for a wide range of people to investigate the past, and new ideas and technologies bring new opportunities. We hear from two community projects, about something that works – and something that didn't.