Wells & Mendip Museum

19/10/2026

Twenty five years ago the book ‘Wells – Then and Now’ was published. The Then and Now series aimed to match historical photographs with modern ones taken from the same places, to show the changes. Photographer and local historian Caroline Bagias compiled the Wells book, reproducing historical photographs from the museum collections and taking new photographs.
Caroline since gave her research archive for the book to the museum. This presented us with an ideal opportunity to revisit the sights, scenes, and characters she photographed at the time of the Millenium. Perhaps you will recognise some of the people she photographed? You may even be able to help us name some of them.

15/10/2026

History in your hands 🔍 Discover local archaeology in our next society talk with Andrew Buchanan!

🗓 Friday 6th Nov, 7 PM (Doors 6:30 PM)
📍 Wells & Mendip Museum
🎟 £4 entry / Free to Members & Museum Friends

14/10/2026

In 1949 Honorary Curator Herbert Balch moved a pierced standing stone to the front garden of Wells Museum from a site on the golf course at Tor Hill, east of Wells. His colleague Dean Armitage Robinson persuaded him that it had been moved to the hillside from the Cathedral Green by the clerics of the cathedral, and relegated to become a gatepost. Little has been found to support this view and Balch’s initial thought that it was prehistoric is more likely to be true. Furthermore it is suggested that the stone was carefully erected on Tor Hill so that its pierced hole provided a view of the nearest highest point on Mendip – Pen Hill, where there is a Neolithic long barrow.

14/10/2026

We made it onto BBC Points West! 📺🦏

Take a look at the feature highlighting our incredible local Ice Age discovery—the Woolly Rhino skull from the Mendip Hills.

Click the link below and our section is at 2:30min mark.

Pop in to Wells & Mendip Museum this week to see this amazing piece of local history for yourself! ✨✨

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14/10/2026

"It's absolutely incredible" 🦏
The 50,000-year-old skull, found in a Mendip cave, is going on show at a museum in Wells ➡️ https://bbc.in/3VJRoDf

12/10/2026

A spectacular new find is on display at the museum, the skull of an Ice Age woolly rhinoceros. It was found by a team of cavers exploring in Fairy Cave Quarry, near Stoke St Michael. The animal was a male, and its well-worn teeth indicate that it was old when it died. It is probably 40-50 thousand years old, from the middle of the last Ice Age when the vegetation was tundra grassland. How did it die? Most likely it fell down a fissure open on the surface.

10/10/2026

Craft Market
TODAY 11am - 3pm

07/10/2026

Come rain or shine, there’s always something special to spot in the museum garden 🌸 What’s your favourite detail on the mural?

05/10/2026

Come and support local artisans and find something beautiful and unique.