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Mike Pitts

@pittsmike.bsky.social

790 followers 270 following 4K posts

Award-winning writer/broadcaster Editor British Archaeology magazine 2003–23 Editor Society of Antiquaries of London e-newsletter 2015–20 President Sussex Archaeological Society https://mikepitts.wordpress.com/

mikepitts.wordpress.com

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · Aug 17

"The true and fascinating story of Easter Island and its amazing statues" KEN FOLLETT
"Anyone looking for an intelligent, balanced and accessible account of Rapa Nui should read his book"
PROF CHRIS GOSDEN
Out September 11 – Pre-order now
amazon.co.uk/Island-Edge-...

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 13h

My latest blog: Stonehenge, the #Washingtons and New York.
How many Americans know that their first president’s family once owned #Stonehenge? It’s quite a story.
mikepitts.wordpress.com/2025/10/08/s...

Stonehenge, the Washingtons and New York

Garsdon church: photo MB-E1, Find A Grave How many Americans know that their first president’s family once owned Stonehenge? It’s quite a story. George Washington numbered among his ancestors Sir L…

mikepitts.wordpress.com

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 2d

So cleverly funny

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 2d

I first read Jilly Cooper as a child when she had a column in the Sunday Times. Once she came to our home town Chichester, & joked about a music shop I knew called Southern Organs. Huge respect. You didn’t talk like that in my family

Jilly Cooper dies aged 88
www.theguardian.com/books/2025/o...

Jilly Cooper, author of Rivals and Riders, dies aged 88

The author of 18 ‘bonkbuster’ novels including Riders, Rivals and Bella has died following a fall

www.theguardian.com

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 3d

Island At The Edge Of The World by Mike Pitts: The mystery of Easter Island is finally SOLVED
“Revelatory… fascinating… wholly convincing”
It's true, it's in the Mail on Sunday ("fruiter"?)
The striking photo puzzled me until I realised it's back to front!
www.dailymail.co.uk/home/books/a...

The mystery of Easter Island is finally SOLVED

Finally scientists have discovered that there is a fruiter reason for the placement of Easter Island famous statues than any of us might have considered.

www.dailymail.co.uk

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 7d

Very sad to hear of the passing of Andy Jones, outstanding regional fieldworker, principal archaeologist with the Cornwall Archaeological Unit for 30+ years. He wrote often for me in British Archaeology, not least on the exceptional Whitehorse Hill bronze age burial
kernowgoth.org/in-memoriam/...

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 8d

I found one of those feet!

Kevin Wilbraham @kpw1453.bsky.social · 9d

A replica of a slab from an early Bronze Age cist burial which was discovered at Pool Tree Farm, West Harptree in Somerset. The foot carvings are very unusual in a British context. Now part of the collections at Wells & Mendip Museum in Wells. 📸 My own. #TombTuesday

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 8d

Meanwhile in Oxford the Schwarzman Centre opens, an Arts & Humanities focus that if half its claims come true will transform the university’s cultural experience. A timely highlighting of the UK’s powerful creative industries by Irene Tracey. Spring in my step today!
www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4kR...

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 8d

BM 2026! Alice Christophe-curated Hawai’i show “shaped with Native Hawaiian knowledge-bearers”, features Hawai’i-UK links - Kamehameha I’s gifts to George III (feathered cloak lent by our King), Kamehameha II & Kamāmalu in London in 1824 (& ?giving this 2.7m kiʻi to George IV) etc. Wonderful things!

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 9d

Here’s my immediate reaction to the million year old skull that rewrites the history of humanity. Hyperbole aside, it’s a great piece of work and the implications, if you go with the paper’s drift, really are significant. Spectator online
www.spectator.co.uk/article/has-...

Has the history of human evolution been rewritten?

A new report from the field of human origins had sub-editors reaching for their hyperboles. A million-year-old skull, we have learnt, has rewritten humanity’s story. The finality of this is misleading...

www.spectator.co.uk

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 13d

We should all call out Israeli corruption of archaeological practice: destroying Palestinian collections, tunnelling for remains & faking histories. Pointing out the errors is not political, it’s just about very bad archaeology
www.theguardian.com/world/2025/s...

‘Tunnel vision’: how Israel is using archaeology to win US support for goals

Scientists say Netanyahu government and its US backers are trying to construct a history shorn of all complexity

www.theguardian.com

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 13d

STATUES! It’s said there are 1,000 on Rapa Nui. The real total is nearer 600, others are carvings in the rock. But 600! And the scale! Impressed by Hoa Hakananai’a in the British Museum? Here it is to the same scale as one dug out by Heyerdahl. How? WHY? Find out in Island at the Edge of the World!

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 14d

Quite! Which is what the book’s all about

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 14d

The 1786 French expedition to Easter Island brought a gardener who described productive soils, fields & cultivated trees. Why was this ignored by modern theories of starvation, war & collapse? Finding the answers allowed me to think anew about the Polynesian adventurers who discovered Rapa Nui

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 15d

My book has controversial claims. Rapa Nui archaeology needs rethinking. Legendary histories still have a grip: they should be ditched as sources. This will not endear me to everyone! Doing fieldwork, Dale Simpson was asked: “Why conduct more research? Your answers are already in the oral tradition”

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 18d

I'm further honoured by the @thespectator1828.bsky.social review being selected for the week's Spectator Out Loud, where you can hear reviewer Maggie Fergusson read out her piece about Island at the Edge of the World
www.spectator.co.uk/podcast/john...

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 19d

Thank you Spectator! (Except for the last fatally incorrect paragraph). Island at the Edge of the World is in shops now
www.amazon.co.uk/Island-Edge-...

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 19d

RIP Francesco Mallegni, 85. He claimed to find faces of famous people in anonymous skulls (“Dante Alighieri” 's “looks like a man who lived in the world") & promoted the Turin shroud as an original Christian relic
www.telegraph.co.uk/obituaries/2...

Francesco Mallegni, paleoanthropologist who recreated the faces of famous dead Italians

He claimed that a skeleton buried under Florence cathedral was Giotto, and that Dante was much less ugly than we had thought

www.telegraph.co.uk

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 20d

Martin’s 1998 Sutton Hoo book is terrific, and this ship project is wonderful, this should be a good read

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 20d

Meanwhile back at Stonehenge!

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 20d

I do quote Boris (& like him was inspired by Heyerdahl at school). But unsurprisingly, I do not, as the review implies, go with his idea of Islanders bowing down to superior Europeans: they did NOT pull down all their statues at the sight of Christians! Lovely review, but get the book for the truth!

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 20d

Island at the Edge reviewed in the Spectator:
“he is good at bringing alive human stories – particularly about the indigenous islanders & how, after 20 generations of keeping their own company, they were shockingly assaulted by the outside world… a gripping story”
www.spectator.co.uk/article/the-...

The mystery of Rapa Nui’s moai may be solved

Boris Johnson claims that in his first year at Oxford he attended just one lecture. Delivered in the crepuscular gloom of the Pitt Rivers Museum, it was about Rapa Nui, the tiny Pacific island 2,200 m...

www.spectator.co.uk

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Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 20d

@antiquaries.bsky.social Salon: Arthur Freeman FSA, writer, antiquarian bookseller, died at home in London on 30 May 2025

"Secondhand hearses and ambulances have the best suspension for transporting books and were much in demand for this purpose in the States"
www.sheila-markham.com/interviews/a...

Arthur Freeman | Sheila Markham

Arthur Freeman in conversation with Sheila Markham, Best Before 1850

www.sheila-markham.com

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 21d

I'm talking about Easter Island's extraordinary story tonight at the Gloucester History Festival. This extract from my book expresses an underlying theme that feels more widely relevant (with one of my photos). Hope to see you there!
www.gloucesterhistoryfestival.co.uk/events/forgo...

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 23d

Oh my, this speaks for all of us in all our worlds

Tom Gauld @tomgauld.bsky.social · 23d

My latest cartoon for @newscientist.com

p.s. this week I am on a USA/Canada tour with my new book. Details and preorder links at tomgauld.com

Panel 1. image of a huge nuclear plant.
“Reactor Overheating”

2. A worker in a hazmat suit works at a computer. The screen reads:
“Press cancel to avoid critical overload”

3 - 9. The worker continues to type at the computer. The screen changes in each panel and reads:
“Enter password to confirm”
“Incorrect password”
“Incorrect password”
“Do you want to reset your password?”
“Reset link has been sent to your email”
“Please choose a new password”
“New password can't be the same as old password”
The colour gets hotter in each panel. Starting blue in 1 and ending in red in 9.

Panel 10. Wide view. The entire earth is blown up.

Mike Pitts @pittsmike.bsky.social · 23d

Let me know what you see! I think it's all quite different from when I was there in 1994