UK's OLDEST town revealed: Amesbury dates back more than TEN millenia

Archaeologists are confident they finally know the identity of the country's oldest town[PA]

Archaeologists at the University of Buckingham believe Amesbury, 40 miles from Stonehenge, is the oldest settlement in Britain not the previously thought Thatcham.

Researchers believe the town holds the distinction of being the birthplace of history in Britain.

They say the new findings dismiss previous theories that the Wiltshire town was conceived by European immigrants - instead, relics uncovered during a painstaking search point to British settlers being behind the settlement, which dates back to more than 10 millennia.

David Jacques, research fellow in archaeology at the University of Buckingham, who led the dig, said: "The site blows the lid off the Neolithic Revolution (deemed the first agricultural revolution in Middle Eastern history) in a number of ways. It provides evidence for people staying put, clearing land, building and presumably worshipping monuments.

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