A new microbrewery has opened which gives a nod to the ancient people who lived on its site.

The Big Dig Brewhouse launched at North West Farm, Winterborne Kingston, near Blandford as part of the annual Big Dig Open Day.

Fittingly, the brewery is in a location where evidence has been found of an ancient brewery on site.

The open day, held by Bournemouth University's archeology department, displays the finds of their ancient dig site.

The event, which attracted more than 600 visitors, was the launch of the brewery's first beer called Duropolis Rising, named in collaboration with Dr Miles Russell from Bournemouth University.

Duropolis Rising is a hazy pale ale with bright tropical fruit and juicy citrus flavours.

Neal Unitt-Jones, who set up the brewery project as a partnership with friends and fellow craft beer lovers, said: "We brewed a cracking beer to launch our little brewery project, and we're delighted to have completely sold out of the first batch on our launch weekend."

As long time home brewers, Neal and his project partners have been dreaming about opening a micro brewery for years.

The first beer was brewed using a recipe from brewery partner Steve Rogers, and adapted for the larger brewing kit.

Neal added: "The Big Dig team believe they have found evidence of an ancient brewery on the site, so there may have been some form of beer brewed here as long as 2,000 years ago.

"We like to think we've moved on a little bit since then, but nevertheless we're happy to be making nod to the ancient people who lived here so long ago."

The brewery is a small project by a local group of craft beer enthusiasts, with the aim of brewing fresh beer for the surrounding villages and visitors across the county at their planned taproom and open days.

Big Dig Brewhouse is situated inside the premises of Dorset coffee roasters Bean Press Coffee Co, which has been on the farm since 2016.

Director Ben Roberts said: "Coffee and beer are two of my favourite things, so it's been really fun to help set up a micro brewery on the site.

"I'm really looking forward to hosting the tap room open days and other special events on this beautiful farm in the Dorset countryside."

The Durotriges Big Dig Project is run by the Department of Archaeology, Anthropology and Forensic Science at Bournemouth University, where students, staff and volunteers explore the history of an Iron Age settlement that was inhabited by an ancient society.

To date they have found hundreds of artefacts, from ancient coins and pottery, to bones and elaborate bone tools.