Archaeology in Area B

I finished my first of two weeks back on Justin's crew. The area of archaeology has grown quite a bit since I was last on his crew some five weeks ago. The area opened and under excavation has doubled in those five weeks. The picture I have first up is an overview of the majority of archaeology open in Area B. Everything on the far side of the baulk running left to right across the picture has been excavated and will be backfilled in the upcoming weeks. The section most everyone is working in is nearest the bottom edge of the picture where a number of ditches seem to be converging. The big question at the moment is whether the ditches are all man made or is at least one a natural gully that was used by the populace to help drain away water and waste? I'll be interested to read about the conclusion in the eventual report.
This week glass and ceramic gaming counters were prevalent in one section of the new area opened which quickly got the nickname "Las Vegas of Vindolanda". Three more shoe soles and a piece of tent with cord was found in the largest of the ditches under excavation this week. Two of the shoe soles still had some hobnails attached. One of those was small, sized for a child maybe 8-9 years old. I haven't found much as I have been helping to finish out areas so they could be recorded and closed out for excavation. I was able to get my hands dirty using the total station to record the good bits onto an auto CAD plan. Archaeology isn't all just digging fun!
Next week Katie will be here and we will be sharing a section excavating one of the ditches 9far left and lower left of piucture). I found a bit of a samian bowl in the ditch fill which had a piece of the stamp which was was exciting as I have not found a pottery stamp yet. Pottery stamps can be just as important as coins for dating evidence for the levels of archaeology we dig through. Hopefully more good stuff will show up next week.

Another Drive About

I took another drive today. This time I went to Bewcastle and Lanercost Priory. Bewcastle is a ruin set on a motte within the ditches of a Roman fort. The Roman fort was first built in the 120's AD and abandoned when the Antonine Wall was built in Scotland in the 140's AD. The fort was recommisioned in the 160's AD when the Roman frontier was pulled back to the Hadrian's Wall area. Bewcastle is north of the Wall near the present day English/Scottish border. It is a strange design for a Roman fort as it is not a classic playing card style similar to Vindolanda. Instead, the fort makes use of natural plateau which is hexagonal in shape. The platform can be seen as can the ditches but there is no Roman remains on display. The fort platform is now used by a farm, a church, and the ruin of Bewcastle. At the church most of an Anglo-Saxon carved stone cross stands. The first picture is of the cross and is the relief where three persons are represented and Anglo-Saxon writing (more like runes) is evident. The cross dates from the late 600's AD. The other two pictures are the remains of Bewcastle. I had to share with sheep who had taken up within the gatehouse so I could not get a good shot of some of the best remains.



I ended my short day at Lanercost Priory. The Priory dates from the early 1100's AD and was a part of the Augustinian order. The Priory is south of Hadrian's Wall by about a 1/2 mile and I noticed that the boundary wall for the church yard makes heavy use of what looks like Wall stone. It is not hard to imagine the builders of the Priory and its attendant buildings and yard boundary walls robbed Hadrian's Wall for stone that was already cut. The nave of the Priory is still an active church but the rest of the Priory is displayed through English Heritage. There is much remaining but I had not gone to the ATM before my drive and didn't feel like using a credit card to pay the entry fee. I'll be back I think and get some pictures of the extensive remains. The last picture is of the Priory from the west looking east and the cars are parked in front of the church (nave of the older Priory church). The buildings to the right are a part of the priory grounds but were built after the 1530-40's AD when the churches of England were taken by the King and either demolished or in this case converted into a grand residence.

To New Pastures

The "Pit Crew": Darren, Bob, Ian, Kate, me, and Sue

I have ended my weeks of digging in Area A under the tutelage of boss Andy and his assistant Beth. I started today helping over in Area B where I was for my first three weeks. The Area B crews has done quite a bit of work and have some great archaeology to show for their efforts. I helped out today with little stuff as Justin's time was taken up by a Chinese film crew doing a travel show about England and then later in the day overseeing the JCB take off the topsoil to make it a bit easier to get at the archaeology. The future crews digging in Area B won't know how lucky they are to not have to spend the first couple of days taking out useless turf and topsoil to get at the archaeology!

The pictures I have posted are of the northwestern stone wall of the first stone fort. The best idea is that the first stone fort was built in the decades of the 150's AD. Not much in the way of small finds turned up around the wall but who needs small finds when you find a four foot wide wall! And there is talk of consolidating the wall and leaving it open for visitors to see. Now that is legacy! No little trinket in the museum that you tell people you found. Instead everyone will see the wall and read the posted bit about it. That feels great!

Thanks to everyone who worked on the wall and a special thanks to everyone upcoming who will find the turn in the wall and get into the ditch that we just touched the surface of on Thursday.

Walking the Wall

Yesterday I took a walk along a section of Hadrian's Wall I had not completed. The walk started at the Roman Army Museum and ended at Vindolanda about 9 miles away. I had walked about half of this particular walk a couple of weeks ago but had not done the whole thing. The views are great and the weather was perfect. It even got a little warm although not enough to go to shorts! The first picture is at one of the better constructed and surviving mile castles, or fortlets, attached to the Wall. I see this particular mile castle every morning as I drive to Vindolanda. The second picture is of Barcombe Hill which is just east of Vindolanda. Barcombe is the long, brown colored hill in the middle of the picture. The final picture is at the highest point of Hadrian's Wall. The walk was a good hike and took about three and a half hours to do. There is one bit left I want to walk and that will wait until Katie arrives.

End of a Week

This past week of digging which starts on Sunday and ends on Thursday saw a lot of dirt moved by the "human JCB's". The first picture is what the trench looked like on Sunday morning. The second picture is what the trench looked like on Thursday afternoon (the small green basket full of dirt behind Bryan is where the trench edge was to start Sunday). We have been able to show up about ten feet of the earliest stone fort wall and are ready to show another six feet by the end of this coming Sunday. Yesterday the sandstone and cobble foundation layer was discovered which means we have found the base of the wall. The turf rampart lies right on top of this and I am beginning to have questions about the development of the wall and rampart. It seems the rampart overlays a bit of the eastern side of the wall. The rampart is made of turfs cut rectangular by the workers and laid in a pattern one on top of the other. The rampart is the black soil in the right of the trench in each picture. There doesn't seem to be a mason's trench cut into the rampart for workers to be able to face the inner side (eastern/right side of picture) of the wall. The rampart is mashed right into what remains of the wall as if it was a later date. The western side of the wall is where the outer facing stones and wall core is falling away and it is loose rubble when excavating into it. I hope to run a small side trench off the opened area, in effect cutting through the rampart, and see what its full shape is. Time and manpower will tell as to how much is done next week. There may be eight people working in the area which means a very big section of the wall could be opened up for viewing by Thursday next week.

I'm off to Corbridge today. Corbridge is the eastern most point of the Stanegate and was the site of a Roman fort and town which acted as a service and supply depot for the Roman army. It is another Bank Holiday weekend in the UK which means lots of walkers and tourists and rain. The theory in the UK is that a bank holiday weekend will always bring rain. And of course rain is expected on Sunday and Monday. But today is great-sunny and blue.

A Wall has been found and Celebs onsite

The new crew for the week: Bryan sitting on the turf rampart that would be inside the fort and Pam and Kate sitting on the Antonine stone wall. The later fort wall is in the background.

The Antonine period stone fort wall has been found extending north from the north west corner of the later stone fort. The 4th cohort of Gauls came along in 215 AD and built their fort almost smack on top of the Antonine period fort that was constructed 60-70 years before. What the Gauls seem to have done, though, is offset their fort further south. Last year, Andy's crew found the south west turn of the Antonine period stone fort wall within the Gaul fort so the thought was that the north west turn would be outside the later fort. Well, the wall has been found and now we are hunting for the turn. Sorry Richard, Lydia, and Vicki. We were just about a foot from hitting the top of the wall when we ended last week. The wall has been cut into the turf rampart and is at least five course tall on the turf side and four courses high on its outer face with a step back course just below. There is still a bunch of earth moving to do. The wall remnant is roughly five feet down. This week's crew has dubbed ourselves "Human JCB's" JCB is a mechanical digger similar to a back hoe in the States. I have even asked if there are any picks with motors to give us a hand! The weather has been dry the past few days which means the top couple of feet of earth is turning to concrete which is no fun to have to dig. But the prize waits below-the angle turret and the turn of the fort wall!

Sunday there were a couple of celebrities leading a tour caravan that stopped at Vindolanda. The two gentlemen in the picture are Julian Richards on the left who is the presenter of "Meet the Ancestors" and the man on the right is Mark Corney who has guested on Time Team and is an Iron Age/Roman Era Expert. I had a chance to talk a bit of archaeology with them about what we were doing with finding the Antonine stone fort wall. When they were there we had just uncovered the first definitive course of the wall but hadn't found the front face yet. If they came now it would look vastly different and more impressive! Made my day for sure. Find a stone fort wall and talk with some TV celebs. Can't say I do that everyday!

My Car Trip

Yesterday I drove to the west coast, which is a little over an hour away, to the town of Maryport. Maryport is where a Roman fort was built around the time of Hadrian (120-130 AD) to guard against incursions of enemies from Scotland and Ireland. It is a part of the Cumbrian shore defense. The fort platform and a part of the vicus outside the north gate is now pasture land and is up on the cliff edge north of the main town. The Senhouse Roman Museum is in a mid-1800's shore defense building and takes about 45 minutes to walk through. Almost all of the museum is devoted to Roman altars found in the vicus fields north of the main fort. Some tombstones are also in the museum. It was fascinating to see the couple of dozen altars, especially with inscriptions, that gave information about the military group stationed there and the officer dedicating the altar. I couldn't take pictures inside the museum but I did get a couple of shots of the port and of the outside of the museum. The fort platform is just to the east of the museum and you can take stairs up a viewing tower to see the field. Nothing is on display like at Vindolanda and not much modern archaeology had been done. The Senhouse family has owned the land for centuries and has collected finds from the "Roman Camp" field and the vicus fields. That is what is on display in the museum.


This is a picture of one of the anchorages. I was there at low tide. The tides there are some 15-18 feet. Wow! Puts the tides of a couple of feet at home to shame.


This is a picture of Senhouse Museum showing the western side that faces the sea. The building was used to train Sea Cadets until 1960. The Sea Cadets would be similar to ROTC for the Navy in the States.

Lastly, I have to put up the picture of the beautiful intaglio that was found in Area B today. Normally Justin doesn't dig today, but he and his girlfriend Karen got in a day of digging. Karen found the intact intaglio carved with the head of Mars in profile. It is the best intaglio that I have seen yet.