Archaeologist Neil Holbrook, chief executive at Cotswold Archaeology, called the discovery of an 1,800-year-old enamelled cockerel figurine in the grave of a child a "most spectacular" find. The figurine is believed to have religious significance. (photo)

A recent report in Urðarbrunnur, the journal of the science association at Laugar in the rural district Þingeyjarsveit, Iceland, suggests that remains found in a large hole in the turf wall in Þegjandadalur, Iceland show the practice of ritual sacrifice in the time before the country converted to Christianity.

Archaeologists continue to make new discoveries that shed light on the construction and use of Stonehenge. The latest discoveries are "evidence of two huge pits positioned on celestial alignment" marking the rising and setting of the sun.

Scholar Andrew McGowan offers a paper on the Dating of Christmas on the Academia.edu website. Originally published as How December 25th Became Christmas, a 2002 edition of Bible Review, the paper is available in PDF format.

In a recent message posted on the Merry Rose eList of the Kingdom of Atlantia, Thomas Brant of Salem shares a memory from last year's War of the Wings.

In 2008, the remains of 40 bodies, thought to be at least 5,000 years old, were removed from Stonehenge for scientific study. Recently, in court, a Druid named King Arthur Pendragon pleaded to ''Let those we lay to rest, stay in rest."

In 1870, Humphrey Senhouse discovered Roman altars at Maryport near Hadrian's Wall, beginning a long debate over the nature of religion in the Roman military. Now excavations at the Camp Farm site may shed new light on the subject.

When archaeologists first unearthed Viking graves and ship burials, they dismissed the importance of Stone Age artfacts in much later burials. Now researchers are taking another look, one that seems to suggest the importance of "antiques" in Viking life.

On December 1, 2010, the bones of an 1,100-year-old pagan were interred at the Viking World museum in Reykjanesbaer, Iceland. The remains, first discovered in 1868, are part of an exhibit on ancient pagan burials.

The British Charity Commission has accepted that druids' worship of natural spirits is a religious activity, making it the first pagan practice to be given official recognition as a religion.

On August 24, 410, Imperial Rome was sacked by an invading force of Visigoths from northern Europe, an event that has been compared with September 11, 2001 in the United States.

Victor Singh, of the Veliki Novgorod archaeological project in Russia, has announced the discovery of a pagan mask, cut from the top of a leather boot, in the 13th Troitsky Pit. (photo)

iPhone users and British folklore enthusiasts may want to download the iPhone app for the Mabinogion, a cycle of Welsh legends collected in the 14th century Red Book of Hergest.

Archaeologists working near the ancient site of Vindunum  (now Le Mans, France) have found an "exceptional discovery," a vast complex of temples dating to the first through third centuries C.E.

Archaeologists have long wondered about the inclusion of "thunderstones"—fist-size stone tools resembling the Norse god Thor's hammerhead -- in Viking graves. New research may show that the stones were considered good-luck talismans. (photo)

A team of archaeologists from the University of Oulu in Finland is studying seitas, sacred places of the indigenous Sámi people, some dating to the 12th century.

Archaeologists in Scotland are excited about the discovery of Roman altar stones found in a cricket pavilion in Musselburgh, East Lothian, finding them "the most significant find of their kind in the past 100 years."

Nearly everyone celebrates Valentine's Day, but many are not familiar with the origins, some rather dark, of the holiday for lovers. Ngonidzashe Dzimiri of the Sunday Standard offers a history.

Equos Designs' proprietor makes Iron Age Celtic jewelry designs in fine silver. They have horses and stags and wolves, suns and moons.

A recent study of pig and cattle bones found near Stonehenge has led researchers to believe that it was the site of huge winter solstice feasts. Experts believe animals were herded to the site and then slaughtered to feed celebrants.

Dikran Aivazian of the Kingdom of An Tir reports on the creation of a Celtic bardic association in the western United States and Canada.

In a Yuletide card, courtesy of Revival Clothing, we learn the origins of "Yule" from its pagan Germanic beginnings through its joining with the Christmas festival during the reign of Haakon the Good. The article includes a bibliography.

It isn't exactly news, but it's appropriate to the day! YouTube has a video posting of a rare promotional video for Jethro Tull's "Ring Out Solstice Bells", from 1976. It's decidedly medieval in theme, and quite amusing.

With the ghosts of Halloween 2009 still lingering in the corners, writer Dara McBride Irish Central looks at The 10 scariest monsters and demons from Celtic myth.

Experts on Old Norse mythology met recently at the University of Aberdeen's Centre for Scandinavian Studies to take a look a fresh look at the religion.

A rectangular stone and marble temple, built using the opus testaceum technique, has been discovered near Marina di Alberese in central Italy. The existence of the 4th century temple may suggest a larger settlement in the area.

Archaeologists in Denmark are puzzled over the discovery of a large building "littered with bits and pieces of exquisite golden jewellery, glass and bronze broaches, high quality artifacts, such as drinking glasses and ceramics, which all seem to have been deliberately smashed in some ritual."

It has been over 40 years since any significant excavation have been done at Stonehenge, but during the spring of 2009, that changed when Timothy Darvill, professor of archaeology at Bournemouth University, and Geoffrey Wainwright, president of the Society of Antiquaries of London, headed a new dig in the monument's inner circle.

The popular perception of the Druid as either a sage with a long beard or a blood-thirsty expert in human sacrifice is the topic of a new book by Bristol University professor Ronald Hutton: Blood and Mistletoe: a History of the Druids in Britain.

A discovery of multiple buried dog skeletons in a medieval town outside Budapest suggests that the custom of animal sacrifice was much more widespread in early Christian Hungary than previously thought.