The 2,000-year-old nut was found at the bottom of an ancient well in North Yorkshire. Archaeologists made the find while excavating as part of a project to upgrade the A1.

       The discovery is one of thousands of objects located around Catterick, which used to be the town of Cataractonium in Roman times.

       Experts believe the nut had been picked between AD 24-128.

       Excavations in the region began in 2013, when Highways England commissioned a ￡400m upgrade.

       While the discovery was made in 2017, experts have only just announced it publicly.

       Archaeologists had to crack the shell open to be able to identify the nut.

       A Highways Agency spokesman confirmed the finding.

       She said: "Pistachios were first brought to Italy by Vitellius, father of the Emperor, who served in the Levant in the late AD30s.

       "It was not possible to tell if the nut had been imported from southern Iberia, the north African coast, Greece or the Near East.

       "However, its date of collection and deposition in the Trajanic period marks it as the earliest known evidence of pistachio consumption in Britain."

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