As archaeologists we sometimes come across evidence for ancient forests, long since disappeared, which populated the British Isles after the last Ice Age drew to a close. In this blog, archaeological woodwork specialist Damian Goodburn explores the different types of evidence we find, and what we can learn about how forests have been used and managed over the centuries.

The wet ground in many parts of Greater London and the Southeast of England contains rare hidden evidence of ancient forests of the last four thousand years or so. We dig up prehistoric and early historic trees in the form of worked timbers, fallen trees and even stumps of trees that grew thousands of years ago. Some are also found on the eroding foreshores and coasts surveyed by CITiZAN and the Thames Discovery Programme around the country.