Earlier this summer, the Yper Museum in Ypres opened is new expo “wOnderland: Archaeology that turns the Middle Ages on its head”. This interactive exhibition allowed visitors of all ages to go underground to explore the archaeology of the Medieval city. In doing so, they were able to discover various archaeological subfields such as archaeozoology, dendrochronology, radiocarbon dating, osteology, ancient DNA-analysis, isotope analysis and archaeobotany.

The team of the ‘Make-Up of the Cities’ project (AMGC) contributed to the content and construction of the expo. Individual 936, the skeleton of a horse rider and early inhabitant of the city around the year 1000, was subjected to an interdisciplinary analysis and received a forensic facial reconstruction. In the isotope section, visitors could explore the use of isotopes in archaeological sciences in an interactive manner. Together with the wOnderland exhibition, the book “wOnderland, hoe de archeologie ons verbazend veel vertelt over de mens en het leven in de Middeleeuwen” was published which contains contributions by some BB-lab colleagues. The expo is still ongoing and runs until the 11^th of April 2027 and has free admission for children under the age of 7.

wOnderland website