The purpose of the dig on the Abbey Green was to find archaeological evidence of a huge sacristy reputedly built on the site by King Henry III, founder of the modern abbey in the 13th century.

The sacristy is a building designed for the storage of sacred utensils and vestments. The Time Team was also hoping to find evidence of remains of even earlier church on the same site, dating from Saxon times.

Time Team investigated a potential early Christian chapel on the Isle of Mull, a site originally discovered last year by local amateur fieldwalking enthusiasts Bev Langhorn and Hylda Marsh as part of the highly commended RCAHMS project, Scotland’s Rural Past. The project enlists the help of local volunteers and amateur historians to discover and document lost archaeological sites that litter the Scottish countryside and Bev and Hylda’s work on Mull identified previously unrecorded features that they felt warranted further investigation.

In 2008, members of the RCAHMS undertook a survey of the site in the forest overlooking the harbour of Tobermory. They found that the features contained an artificial terrace upon which was a stone built structure, aligned East-West and a second stone built enclosure identified as a possible burial ground. The archaeology is further complicated by the fact that both structures appear to have been reused at some point for agricultural purposes.

Time Team undertook a three day archaeological evaluation, working alongside the RCAHMS, SRP, the Forestry Commission Scotland and FIRAT Archaeological Services to try and resolve the site as well as determine whether there is an associated settlement to this seemingly isolated structure.

Turns out to be so much more and it all seems to tie in with Columba and evidence of a local saint.

The team spent three days at Piercebridge, near Darlington, in the hope of shedding new light on the workings of the area’s Roman fort. The search unearthed several artifacts.

Three Roman bridges and a shed load of Roman finds at the bottom of the River Tees, a little lead goat and a beautiful hairpin – nothing of value but they tell us so much about the Roman way of life.

Saxon palaces and a very important find.

The ruins is all that is left of Hopton Castle, a 12th Century castle that was the scene of one of the bloodiest massacres of the English Civil War. It is located in a small village of the same name.

The castle achieved notoriety in the Civil war, when, as a Parliamentarian stronghold in 1644, 30 soldiers under the command of Col Samuel Moore, resisted a 500-strong army loyal to King Charles I for three weeks. Eventually outnumbered, a deal was struck between the two sides to allow the Loyalists to take control of the castle in return for sparing their enemies' lives. They took the castle but reneged on the deal, imprisoning Col Moore and slitting the throats of every Parliamentarian soldier before throwing their bodies in the moat.

The team look at not only the castle and the Civil War, but also at the mystery of where the bodies from the massacre are buried.

The team have been unearthing the remains of Cunetio, a Roman town in Mildenhall.

In a cornfield less than two miles from Marlborough the team spent three days carrying out the first proper excavation at the former Roman town of Cunetio for more than 50 years. It has been taking place at Blackfield, an ancient monument site just south of the River Kennet at Mildenhall which would have probably helped determine the site of the town because the river was easy to cross.

Archaeologists have known for years that this was an important Roman site and in 1978 two local men using metal detectors in Blackfield unearthed a clay jar containing almost 60,000 Roman coins. Their find has since been known as the Mildenhall Hoard and most of the coins are in the British Museum.

British Museum numismatist Philippa Walton attended the dig and has helped identify a very rare and early Nero coin found just outside the walls of the town.

Phil Harding who was brought up at Wexcombe and went to Marlborough Grammar School has become a minor celebrity because of his Time Team appearances.

Speaking from a trench where he had led a team exposing the remains of the 16 feet thick walls, once 20 feet high, that surrounded the Roman Town, Phil Harding said: "It is fantastic that we have been given this opportunity to dig here."

A misty Welsh Castle.

Big site and a surprising solution to what was going inside its massive walls.

The team spent three days unravelling the secrets of the world's first purpose-built prisoner of war camp near Peterborough. They uncovered hundreds of finds and unearthed some fascinating facts during the three- day excavations at the 212-year-old Norman Cross Barracks for prisoners of war, which was purpose-built to house thousands of Napoleon's troops captured in battles on land and at sea.

After months of research into the 22-acre site at Norman Cross, using plans, maps and museum collections and archives from Peterborough and throughout the country, the experts marked out specific sites where they were certain they would make a find. The 50-strong team, made up of camera crew, producers, researchers, archaeologists and presenter Tony Robinson, arrived on the site and began the first-ever excavation of the site. The team put down eight trenches about 40cm deep and 4m long and began hunting for the remains of the old camp.

And even the very first spade dug into the soil unearthed a wealth of treasures, including items made from bone, carved by the prisoners, pottery, buttons, glass, parts of the prison itself, knife handles, and dominoes. Peterborough Museum archaeologist Ben Robinson was delighted by the finds, which he hopes will return to the museum in the near future.

He said: "This is a fascinating and unique site. The concept of a prisoner of war camp did not exist before it was built in 1797. It was an inspired experiment in taking huge numbers of enemy troops out of action, but also keeping them in as humane conditions as possible. It was an experiment in its time, and because of its success in housing 7,000 prisoners, Dartmoor and Perth followed suit. All of the prisoners were transported back to Britain by the navy. This site was chosen because it was far enough inland that prisoners wouldn't try to escape, and because of its agriculture and 100ft deep wells. It was also right next to the Great North Road and Fenland waterways, making it ideal for captured soldiers and sailors to reach. Norman Cross is such an important site in modern world history, and yet there are still so many mysteries about it. For example, the depot cemeteries, where more than 1,700 prisoners were buried, have never been located. The site has proved to be much more important and spectacular than we originally thought."

The artefacts found will now be taken away, cleaned and analysed.

Three lost cemeteries associated with the camp were located during the excavation,

Peterborough Museum houses the world's finest collection of artefacts made by Napoleonic prisoners, including jewellery boxes and pictures decorated with straw marquetry, and mechanical models of bone.

Trying to locate a massive villa found by antiquarians the team end up digging the whole village - with the help of the villagers.

Time Team have uncovered the remains of a dazzling Roman villa in the Cambridgeshire countryside. The army of diggers were searching for a 30-room palace recorded by antiquarians in the 19th century; and a cemetery, close to the Roman track known as Ashwell Street.

But although the experts believe they have located the villa and its mosaics, excavated a bathhouse and uncovered the cemetery; they have come to very different conclusions from those of their predecessors.

Fascinated villagers being shown around the site last night were told the villa, thought to date from the late Roman period, was smaller than thought and in a different location from that plotted on Victorian maps. Crews spent much of their time digging in gardens in the Anvil Avenue area. Intricate tessellated floors discovered under back gardens and colourful painted plaster work revealed it was a very wealthy settlement. A big haul of Roman coins was also uncovered.

In the Roman cemetery; now under a field, osteoarchaeologists worked to make sence of Victorian excavations. and unearthed disarticulated human bones and pottery which dated from the late Iron Age and early Roman period. It is believed to be related to the villa.

Tony Robinson said that he thinks this will be one of the shows Which will demonstrate why the archaeological process is so important.

Around 200 years ago, somebody said there was something under the ground and everybody believed them. But in fact there is something completely different here.

The Time Team was first invited to Litlington 10 years ago by the May family, who own Manor Farm, and fmally came along after a tip-off from experts.

Tony Robinson said villagers had been thrilled to find mosaics under their gardens. He said: "It's been brilliant for them. I don't think we've had anyone who has said 'not on my land."

Features Guy De La Bédoyére and Ben Robinson.

In July of 2009 the team investigated a possible Iron Age hillfort on Dinmore Hill north of Hereford. The mammoth operation involved not just the Time Team regulars, but also another seven HA archaeologists, ten HA coordinated volunteers, and around fifty Time Team support staff ranging from camera crews to caterers. Despite some awful weather, the results were
extremely interesting, and have potentially put a major and important new site on the Herefordshire prehistoric map.

The team went to Burford Priory in April 2009. The team had been invited to investigate the history of the site by the owner of the house, who allowed unprecedented access to the building and surrounding grounds. As co-author of the EPE Burford book, Antonia Catchpole was invited to appear as a local history expert, filming a variety of scenes about the history of the site and town.

The main aim of the excavations was to find evidence for the medieval hospital believed to have stood on the site of the Priory, and to set the features found into their local social
and topographic context, relating them to the origins, development and expansion of the medieval Saxon town.

Day 1 saw a trench opened in front of the house to investigate geophysical evidence for a possible east-west wall. Excavation revealed a large, buttressed wall with associated pottery of mid-late 12th century date, supporting the contention that the hospital was founded between 1147 and 1183 by the earl of Gloucester. An extension to the trench produced an abutting wall thought to represent the foundations of a late 13th century arcade known to have stood on this alignment before the restoration of the Priory in the early 20th century. No evidence for a similar arcade was found on the opposite (south) side of the medieval building, despite Phil Harding’s best efforts.

Meanwhile, trenches were also dug in the vegetable garden behind the house, one of which produced Saxon pottery associated with a possible structure, prompting the suggestion that the earliest settlement in Burford may have stood on the high ground to the west of the present town. Other trenches revealed evidence for post-medieval activity, presumably connected with the occupation of the Priory by the Lenthall family from the 17th to 19th centuries. Finally, a small exploratory trench dug beneath the altar of the 17th century Lenthall chapel (a Time Team first), demonstrated that the chapel had been built over a pre-
existing wall, possibly marking the precinct of the medieval hospital. The Time Team work is the first large scale archaeological investigation in the Burford area and has provided invaluable, and unexpected, evidence for pre-urban settlement as well as tangible proof
of the 12th century hospital.

Pilgrims’ hospital on the sea front.

An excavation of a former military hospital graveyard has revealed the harrowing deaths of some sailors from Nelson's navy. The dig is being carried out in the grounds of the Royal Hospital Haslar in Gosport, where the unmarked graves date back to 1755.

The work, which is being filmed for a Channel 4 Time Team documentary, is to reveal what life was like in the navy hundreds of years ago.

A total of 29 skeletons will have been carefully removed and analysed by the time the excavation comes to a close. Some of the incredible cases that have been revealed so far include a skeleton from a man in his mid-20s, which has seven broken bones, a broken jaw and one side of his skull smashed. Analysis from the team of 60 who have been working on the project shows he would have survived in hospital for about three months being fed through a straw before passing away from an infection. It is believed he would have fallen from the rigging or crows nest of a ship and smashed face first into the deck. They also found the skeleton of one man, also in his mid-20s, who had his leg amputated below the knee.

Dr Andrew Shortland, who runs the Centre for Archaeological and Forensic Analysis at Cranfield University, which is jointly behind the project with the MoD, said: 'The excavation is taking place so that we can gain more knowledge of how naval hospitals were at the time, in particular Haslar.'We also want to know how people died, and we are really discovering what life was like in the navy at the end of the 18th century. 'It's hit home that there just wasn't any safety net for these people. 'Seeing how these people died, having it stare you in the face, is really quite sobering.'

The dig has also shown that there are an estimated 8,000 bodies buried, many from Nelson's navy and battles such at Trafalgar and Waterloo.

The analysis has been carried out through observation and measurement. Over the weeks chemical tests will be carried out to see what the diet in the navy was like.

All skeletons will be given full military burials when the research is complete.