PRS Christmas Meeting
Saturday 5th December 2026
11am with tea/coffee available from 10.45am
St George’s Centre, 60 Great George Street, Leeds, LS1 3DL

Talk by Dr Peter Halkon:
From elephants to chariots: exploring the changing prehistoric landscape of the Foulness Valley, East Yorkshire.

This talk explores the archaeology and evolving landscape of the southwestern Yorkshire Wolds and easternmost Vale of York from the Palaeolithic to the Iron Age. Dominated by the River Foulness, whose shifting outfall once fed a tidal inlet of the Humber estuary, this region has produced an exceptional prehistoric record. Fieldwork since 1980 has revealed everything from the bones of straighttusked elephants to one of Britain’s most significant Iron Age iron industries, closely associated with the Arras Culture and its chariot burials. Other major discoveries
include the Hasholme logboat, now housed in the Hull and East Riding Museum. Dr Peter Halkon FSA grew up on a farm at Hasholme and has an intimate, lifelong knowledge of this landscape. Formerly Senior Lecturer in Archaeology at the University of Hull, he is an Emeritus Fellow at Hull, Honorary Research Associate in the Department of Archaeology at the University of York, and Chair of the East Riding Archaeological Society.