The story of the discovery of a Roman period aqueduct built to transport water from underground sources – such as Solomon’s Pool, the Pool of Hezekiah, and so on, into the city of Jerusalem, is told in some detail as archaeologists had to clamber through ancient sewage systems rich in organic material to discover where the system went and who built it. The story began with a German archaeologist in the 19th century attributing a surviving piece of wall to King Herod – but this theory is now dead in the water. See www.haaretz.com/misc/article-print-page/revelations-of-an-ever-changing-past/
At www.ottawacitizen.com of July 29th there is a bit about the excavations at Tell Tayinat in the desert near the border between Syria and Iraq which is being excavated by a Canadian team. It has been determined that a fire razed the town in the 7th or 8th century BC and at the same time there is a record of the Assyrians taking over the town in 732. An Assyrian governor’s residence is known to exist a short way from the diggings.
BBC News August 2nd … see www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-miod-wales-10837347/ reports on the discovery of the post holes from a large wooden building near Welshpool in Powys, which it is being suggested might be a Saxon Hall (or even a palace).