About this course
From the Aztecs and Mayans to Ancient Egypt, the Roman Empire and the medieval world, you'll study the story of human activity and the origins of civilisation. A BA in archaeology explores how human societies came into being, how and why they changed over time, and the underlying reasons for human diversity today.
Archaeology is the study of the human past through its material remains. Our archaeology bachelor degree teaches you transferable skills through exploring questions about people in the past and in the present. You'll learn in the laboratory, the library or in the field and develop the skills needed to explore contested narratives.
You'll have the opportunity to experience fieldwork, including at least 3 weeks as part of an active research project. This is usually done during the summer period, and may be in the UK or overseas, preparing you for a career as an archaeologist.
BA Archaeology covers a wide range of world archaeology. You can study topics such as:
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excavation and field survey techniques
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underwater archaeology
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artefacts analysis
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medieval archaeology
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museums, heritage and public archaeology
Archaeology combines the humanities and the sciences, working with historical texts and artefacts. You'll develop a range of transferable skills, including:
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evidence-based reasoning
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problem-solving
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project management
This archaeology BA degree gives you the opportunity to study a minor subject alongside your main programme.
We’re also offering up to 10 bursaries of £1000 each to incoming students (subject to criteria). These are from the Terry Mason Bursary and the University of Southampton Archaeology Bursary Fund.
Course location
This course is based at Avenue.
Awarding body
This qualification is awarded by the University of Southampton.
Download the Course Description Document
The Course Description Document details your course overview, your course structure and how your course is taught and assessed.
Changes due to COVID-19
Although the COVID-19 situation is improving, any future restrictions could mean we might have to change the way parts of our teaching and learning take place in 2022 to 2023. This means that some of the information on this course page may be subject to change.
Find out more on our COVID advice page.
Entry requirements
For Academic year 202324
A-levels
ABB to BBB
A-levels additional information
Offers typically exclude General Studies and Critical Thinking.
A-levels with Extended Project Qualification
If you are taking an EPQ in addition to 3 A levels, you will receive the following offer in addition to the standard A level offer: BBB and grade A in the EPQ
A-levels contextual offer
We are committed to ensuring that all applicants with the potential to succeed, regardless of their background, are encouraged to apply to study with us. The additional information gained through contextual data allows us to recognise an applicant's potential to succeed in the context of their background and experience. Applicants who are highlighted in this way will be made an offer which is lower than the typical offer for that programme, as follows: BBB
International Baccalaureate Diploma
Pass, with 32 to 30 points overall with 16 to 15 points at Higher Level
International Baccalaureate contextual offer
We are committed to ensuring that all learners with the potential to succeed, regardless of their background, are encouraged to apply to study with us. The additional information gained through contextual data allows us to recognise a learner’s potential to succeed in the context of their background and experience. Applicants who are highlighted in this way will be made an offer which is lower than the typical offer for that programme.
International Baccalaureate Career Programme (IBCP) statement
Offers will be made on the individual Diploma Course subject(s) and the career-related study qualification. The CP core will not form part of the offer. Where there is a subject pre-requisite(s), applicants will be required to study the subject(s) at Higher Level in the Diploma course subject and/or take a specified unit in the career-related study qualification. Applicants may also be asked to achieve a specific grade in those elements. Please see the University of Southampton International Baccalaureate Career-Related Programme (IBCP) Statement for further information. Applicants are advised to contact their Faculty Admissions Office for more information.
BTEC
Distinction, Distinction, Merit in the BTEC National Extended Diploma Distinction, Distinction in the BTEC National Diploma plus B in an A level Distinction in the BTEC National Extended Certificate plus AB to BB in two A levels
RQF BTEC
We are committed to ensuring that all learners with the potential to succeed, regardless of their background, are encouraged to apply to study with us. The additional information gained through contextual data allows us to recognise a learner’s potential to succeed in the context of their background and experience. Applicants who are highlighted in this way will be made an offer which is lower than the typical offer for that programme.
Additional information
The University aims to recruit students from a wide range of backgrounds who we believe have the potential and motivation to succeed on our challenging programmes. We are committed to fair admissions and strive to ensure we give equal consideration to all applicants who possess the necessary knowledge and skills.
QCF BTEC
Distinction, Distinction, Merit in the BTEC Extended Diploma or Distinction, Distinction in the BTEC Diploma plus B in an A level or Distinction in the BTEC Subsidiary Diploma plus AB to BB in two A levels
We are committed to ensuring that all learners with the potential to succeed, regardless of their background, are encouraged to apply to study with us. The additional information gained through contextual data allows us to recognise a learner’s potential to succeed in the context of their background and experience. Applicants who are highlighted in this way will be made an offer which is lower than the typical offer for that programme.
Access to HE Diploma
60 credits with a minimum of 45 credits at Level 3, of which 30 must be at Distinction and 15 credits at Merit OR 60 credits with a minimum of 45 credits at Level 3, of which 24 must be at Distinction and 21 credits at Merit
Access to HE additional information
Irish Leaving Certificate
Irish Leaving Certificate (first awarded 2017)
H1 H2 H2 H2 H3 H3 to H2 H2 H3 H3 H3 H3
Irish Leaving Certificate (first awarded 2016)
A2 A2 B1 B1 B2 B2 to B1 B1 B1 B1 B2 B2
Scottish Qualification
Offers will be based on exams being taken at the end of S6. Subjects taken and qualifications achieved in S5 will be reviewed. Careful consideration will be given to an individual’s academic achievement, taking in to account the context and circumstances of their pre-university education.
Please see the University of Southampton’s Curriculum for Excellence Scotland Statement (PDF) for further information. Applicants are advised to contact their Faculty Admissions Office for more information.
Cambridge Pre-U
D3 M2 M2 to M2 M2 M2 in three principal subjects
Cambridge Pre-U additional information
Welsh Baccalaureate
ABB to BBB from 3 A levels or AB to BB from two A levels and B from the Advanced Welsh Baccalaureate Skills Challenge Certificate
Welsh Baccalaureate additional information
Offers typically exclude General Studies and Critical Thinking.
Welsh Baccalaureate contextual offer
We are committed to ensuring that all learners with the potential to succeed, regardless of their background, are encouraged to apply to study with us. The additional information gained through contextual data allows us to recognise a learner’s potential to succeed in the context of their background and experience. Applicants who are highlighted in this way will be made an offer which is lower than the typical offer for that programme.
European Baccalaureate
77% overall OR 75% overall
Other requirements
GCSE requirements
Applicants must hold GCSE English language (or GCSE English) (minimum grade 4/C) and mathematics (minimum grade 4/C)
You might meet our criteria in other ways if you do not have the qualifications we need. Find out more about:
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our Access to Southampton scheme for students living permanently in the UK (including residential summer school, application support and scholarship)
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skills you might have gained through work or other life experiences (otherwise known as recognition of prior learning)
Find out more about our Admissions Policy.
Foundation programmes for international students
A foundation programme will give you the language skills and subject knowledge you need if you're not qualified for direct entry to your chosen undergraduate course.
You'll progress to your chosen course after successfully completing the foundation programme.
Find out more about undergraduate foundation programmes for international students.
Got a question?
Please contact our enquiries team if you're not sure that you have the right experience or qualifications to get onto this course.
Email: enquiries@southampton.ac.uk
Tel: +44(0)23 8059 5000
Course structure
Our Curriculum Innovation Programme offers you the chance to take optional modules outside your chosen subject area. Our BA Archeology syllabus allows you to personalise your education, developing new skills and knowledge for your future. Topics range from how to live and work on the web to developing business skills. You can also take a language module, which may count towards your degree. These modules cover 10 languages and range from absolute beginner to near-native speaker level.
Year 1 overview
Compulsory modules will give you a grounding in archaeology, fieldwork and analysis. These cover:
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the development of archaeological and anthropological thought
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archaeological methods you'll need for fieldwork and analysis
You'll also be able to choose from optional modules including:
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human origins
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the landscapes and seascapes of Britain's past
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the ethnography of food and culture
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studying world history through 40 historical objects
Year 2 overview
You will develop your understanding of how archaeology relates to the modern world. You'll also prepare for fieldwork with at least 3 weeks of practical experience in a field school or research project in the UK or overseas.
In addition to these compulsory modules, you can choose modules from approaches and periods, including:
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the Vikings
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archaeological dating
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scientific diving
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archaeological dating
Year 3 overview
In your final year, you'll develop your own specialist interest with a dissertation on a research topic of your choice. This is an opportunity to demonstrate your planning, research, data collation, analysis, and communication skills.
You'll also take a further 6 modules from a wide range of options. You'll be able to specialise in different periods, regions or methods in archaeology. For example, you could study:
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Neolithic Britain
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Iron Age societies
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Ancient Egypt
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museums and heritage
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Roman urbanism
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geographic information systems (GIS)
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molecular archaeology
Want more detail? See all the modules in the course.
Modules
Changes due to COVID-19
Although the COVID-19 situation is improving, any future restrictions could mean we might have to change the way parts of our teaching and learning take place in 2022 to 2023. This means that some of the information on this course page may be subject to change.
Find out more on our COVID advice page.
For entry in Academic Year 2022-23
Year 1 modules
You must study the following modules in year 1:
Archaeological Methods for Fieldwork and Analysis
How do archaeologists find sites, gather data and proceed to make sense of archaeological traces? This module provides a detailed introduction to fieldwork methods and analysis, covering site prospection techniques (e.g., aerial photography and geophysica...
Emergence of Civilisation: domesticating ourselves and others
Archaeology reveals how during prehistory certain transformations have profoundly altered human societies. These include the adoption of domesticated plants and animals, sedentism, the adoption of new technologies (such as pottery) and the emergence of co...
Human Origins
The investigation of human origins has been described as the intellectual romance of the social sciences. This module examines the changing ideas about our earliest ancestors and the evolution of hominin culture and biology and explores the links between ...
The development of Archaeological and Anthropological Thought
As is well-known, archaeology has very strong connections with other disciplines. This module explores how the study of archaeology has developed over the centuries, both as a discipline in its own right and as a sister discipline within Anthropology. It ...
Wonderful things: World history in 40 objects
As he broke the seal and opened the door to Tutankamun’s tomb, archaeologist Howard Carter declared, breathlessly, that he could see ‘Wonderful things’. Ancient things have this special appeal. They enchant and captivate. They excite curiosity and unleash...
You must also choose from the following modules in year 1:
Debates and Issues in Archaeological Science
The application of scientific techniques is increasingly embedded in archaeological studies and is an area where the UK currently leads the world. Techniques such as dating methods, the use of isotopes to reconstruct past diet or human migrations and the ...
Introduction to Ethnography: Food and Culture
Biological science tells us what items in our world are potentially edible, but culture decides what constitutes food. Culture informs us as to whether a specific item is appropriate, appetising, valued, desirable, prohibited, restricted, staple or medici...
Landscapes and Seascapes of Britain’s Past
The landscapes and seascapes of Britain play host to one of the world’s most varied and intriguing archaeological records. With an occupational history spanning one million years, it tells a complex inter-twined story of social, physical and environmenta...
Year 2 modules
You must study the following modules in year 2:
Contemporary Issues and Debates in Archaeology
Contemporary archaeology operates within a broad remit: its traditional focus on understanding a deep past is now supplemented by studies of more recent material cultures, and issues of heritage, representation and the politics of the past. All of these d...
Professional and Academic Practice in Archaeology
Fieldwork is an integral part of the archaeological process and we want all our students to experience directly the generation of primary data by means of field and related practical activities. At the core of this module, therefore, is participation in a...
You must also choose from the following modules in year 2:
Bones, bodies and burials: osteology and comparative anatomy
This module examines the variation within the mammalian skeleton from an evolutionary and functional perspective. Additionally, it gives an overview of the main methodological and theoretical issues in the retrieval, treatment and interpretation of bone f...
Cosmology, Ritual and Belief
This module is concerned with how people in different cultures make sense of their world. The spiritual beliefs and ritual practices of a range of different cultures across the world are considered together with some of the ways in which anthropologists ...
Digging Data: quantitative data analysis in Archaeology
Archaeology is an immensely data-rich activity that records the characteristics of sites, landscapes and artefacts, sometimes in great detail. Making sense of that data often relies on quantitative or statistical methods to identify patterns, associations...
Human Dispersal and Evolution
This module explores human evolution in the context of expanding and contracting populations. We shall review the evolutionary landscape and the big questions that face archaeologists. We shall cover the hominin fossil record, learning about the major spe...
Introduction to Scientific Diving
This fifteen credit module will introduce you to the theoretical, logistic, technical and legislative issues that have to be addressed if the theory and practice of archaeology are to be successfully applied in the investigation of sites underwater - thes...
Maritime Archaeology
This course aims to give students a sound introduction to the way archaeology is carried out underwater.
The Life and Afterlife of the Vikings
Blood, violence, terror, raids, pirates, rape and pillage are just some of the words associated with the Vikings in both the medieval and modern imagination. Their fearsome reputation is underlined by nicknames such as ‘Blood Axe' and ‘Skull-splitter', bu...
Year 3 modules
You must study the following module in year 3:
Archaeology Dissertation
The dissertation is a key component of your degree, and the culmination of your programme of study. It provides an opportunity to demonstrate the skills of planning, research, data collation, analysis, and communication that you have learned during your p...
You must also choose from the following modules in year 3:
Archaeology of Seafaring
Seafaring lies at the heart of human activity across the world and has taken place from the earliest times to the present day. Reflecting this, in recent years the study of seafaring has become an increasingly important area in our understanding of the hu...
Ecology of human evolution: biological, social and cultural approaches to hominin adaptations.
This module explores human evolution in terms of physiological, social and cultural adaptations. It explores human ecology in the broad sense, combining not just cultural and social variability, but also physiological adaptations in past and present-day h...
GIS for Archaeology
This module aims to acquaint you with Geographic Information Systems including their use for mapping and analysing archaeological sites and landscapes, and to explain the broader context of their application to a range of archaeological research and manag...
Iron Age Societies
Iron Age Europe witnessed the divergence of a ‘classical' Mediterranean world, whose culture included such features as states, towns, coinage and literacy, from a ‘barbarian' world to the north, where these features developed only much later, if at all. T...
Later Anglo-Saxon England
This module examines the major social, economic and cultural developments that took place in England during the period between c. 800 and c. 1100 AD. It makes use of evidence from diverse disciplines, including the study of documentary, archaeological, ar...
Living with the Romans: Urbanism in the Roman Empire
The towns in which the Romans lived are some of the most familiar features of the Roman world. Although they seem to look and feel like modern towns, they actually worked in quite different ways, a reflection of the fact that ancient Roman society was dis...
Molecular Archaeology
The extraction and characterization of ancient molecules and the measurement of stable and radioactive isotopes has revolutionized archaeology over the past two decades and remains at the cutting edge of archaeological science. From the identification of ...
More than Pyramids & Pharaohs? Ancient Egypt in Context
The module provides an introduction to the history and archaeology of ancient Egypt. The module provides a broad sweep of Egyptian history from the Predynastic through to later periods. It introduces aspects of death, burial and commemoration, compares an...
Presenting the past: Museums and Heritage
In this module we will examine how knowledge about the past is presented in museum exhibition and display. We will look at current practices in exhibition design and discuss the contemporary literature on communicating heritage to a range of audiences. Yo...
Seeing beneath the soil: geophysical survey for archaeology
The development of geophysical survey methods has provided archaeologists with a wholly new approach to buried archaeological remains allowing - in some circumstances - plans of entire archaeological sites to be obtained prior to any excavation. The use o...
Stonehenge to Skara Brae: the Neolithic of Britain
The Neolithic period heralds some of the most momentous changes in human history; it is the period when prehistoric people began to live in permanent settlements and adopted agriculture. In Britain, this period is dominated by rich evidence for large monu...
The Archaeology and Anthropology of Adornment
The impulse to adorn the body is as old as human history. This module explores the extraordinary variety of ways in which people have adorned their bodies in a range of archaeological and anthropological contexts, from body painting and tattooing, to the ...
Learning and assessment
The learning activities for this course include the following:
- lectures
- classes and tutorials
- coursework
- individual and group projects
- independent learning (studying on your own)
Course time
How you'll spend your course time:
Year 1
Study time
Your scheduled learning, teaching and independent study for year 1:
How we'll assess you
- coursework, laboratory reports and essays
- dissertations
- essays
- individual and group projects
- oral presentations
- written exams
Your assessment breakdown
Year 1:
Year 2
Study time
Your scheduled learning, teaching and independent study for year 2:
How we'll assess you
- coursework, laboratory reports and essays
- dissertations
- essays
- individual and group projects
- oral presentations
- written exams
Your assessment breakdown
Year 2:
Year 3
Study time
Your scheduled learning, teaching and independent study for year 3:
How we'll assess you
- coursework, laboratory reports and essays
- dissertations
- essays
- individual and group projects
- oral presentations
- written exams
Your assessment breakdown
Year 3:
Academic support
You’ll be supported by a personal academic tutor and have access to a senior tutor.
Course leader
Simon Davies is the course leader.
Careers
An archaeology degree is excellent preparation for future employment. This course offers a balance of sciences and arts, and provides a range of practical and theory-based components.
Our archaeology graduates move into industries including:
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professional archaeology
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museums and the heritage sector
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geophysics, cartography and aerial photography
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animation and virtual reality graphic design
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commerce and marketing
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the NHS
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financial services
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local government
You'll also be welcome in a wide range of other sectors with this highly-respected degree that demonstrates your intellectual and problem-solving abilities, and includes transferable skills in:
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teamwork
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project management
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evidence-based research
This degree is also a great foundation for further study at PhD level.
You'll get support from your personal academic tutor and an employability coordinator, who can advise you on your career path throughout your course.
Contact us to speak to a careers advisor.
Careers services at Southampton
We are a top 20 UK university for employability (QS Graduate Employability Rankings 2022). Our Careers and Employability Service will support you throughout your time as a student and for up to 5 years after graduation. This support includes:
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work experience schemes
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CV and interview skills and workshops
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networking events
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careers fairs attended by top employers
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a wealth of volunteering opportunities
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study abroad and summer school opportunities
We have a vibrant entrepreneurship culture and our dedicated start-up supporter, Futureworlds, is open to every student.
Fees, costs and funding
Tuition fees
Fees for a year's study:
- UK students pay £9,250.
- EU and international students pay £19,300.
What your fees pay for
Your tuition fees pay for the full cost of tuition and all examinations.
Find out how to:
Accommodation and living costs, such as travel and food, are not included in your tuition fees. Explore:
Bursaries, scholarships and other funding
If you're a UK or EU student and your household income is under £25,000 a year, you may be able to get a University of Southampton bursary to help with your living costs. Find out about bursaries and other funding we offer at Southampton.
If you're a care leaver or estranged from your parents, you may be able to get a specific bursary.
Get in touch for advice about student money matters.
Scholarships and grants
You may be able to get a scholarship or grant to help fund your studies.
We award scholarships and grants for travel, academic excellence, or to students from under-represented backgrounds.
Support during your course
The Student Services Centre offers support and advice on money to students. You may be able to access our Student Support fund and other sources of financial support during your course.
Funding for EU and international students
Find out about funding you could get as an international student.
How to apply
When you apply use:
- UCAS course code: V400
- UCAS institution code: S27
What happens after you apply?
We will assess your application on the strength of your:
- predicted grades
- academic achievements
- personal statement
- academic reference
You may be invited to an interview.
We'll aim to process your application within two to six weeks, but this will depend on when it is submitted. Applications submitted in January, particularly near to the UCAS equal consideration deadline, might take substantially longer to be processed due to the high volume received at that time.
Equality and diversity
We treat and select everyone in line with our Equality and Diversity Statement.
Got a question?
Please contact our enquiries team if you're not sure that you have the right experience or qualifications to get onto this course.
Email: enquiries@southampton.ac.uk
Tel: +44(0)23 8059 5000
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