Digging For Britain

Dr Alice Roberts follows an entire year of British archaeology, joining up the results of digs and investigations the length of the country. The results are astonishing - and sometimes disturbing. Tonight, the Romans, where finds include the mystery of 97 babies murdered by the Thames, a fabulous Roman coin hoard found in Somerset and a man buried on a layer of dead animals.

Dr Alice Roberts' journey takes her from Orkney to Devon, by land, sea and air. In Norfolk, flint tools unearthed push the earliest human occupation back by 200,000 years, to around a million years ago. In Orkney an early farm yields glimpses of our ancestors' earliest religious beliefs and customs. In Devon, we find one of the oldest known shipwrecks.  And a bronze age burial holds a mystery.

They divided our land and heralded the arrival of the Dark Ages. But were they just barbarians? Dr Alice Roberts continues her journey as she visits the royal seat of power at Bamburgh, Northumbria. There's a remarkable community project in Sittingbourne where people are curating the grave goods of their own ancestors. There are treasures that make her wonder just how dark the Dark Ages were.

In the finale, Dr Alice Roberts explores the Tudor Age, when Britain was reshaped by religion, power and culture. She visits digs at Shakespeare's first theatre in Shoreditch, studies finds from his Stratford home, and meets archaeologists exposing the impact of Henry VIII's Dissolution. From a lost Thames palace to a Tudor shipwreck, new discoveries reveal a transformative era.