June 1, 2016 by katberry

Silchester Excavation Project Shortlisted for 2016 British Archaeological Awards

Judges have today released the shortlist for this year’s British Archaeological Awards showcasing the very latest discoveries and innovations in archaeology across the UK, with Reading University’s long-term Silchester excavation shortlisted for Best Archaeological Project 2016.

The results will be announced at the British Archaeological Awards ceremony at the British Museum in London on 11 July, compèred by ‘Meet the Ancestors’ archaeologist and TV presenter Julian Richards.

John Lewis, Chair of the British Archaeological Awards judging panel for the Best Archaeological Project Award commented on the Silchester project,

“The aim of this long-running project is the publication of the total excavation of a large sample (25%) of one insula (block) to characterise the changing nature of the occupation of the Roman town at Silchester. The Judges were impressed with the way the project maximised environmental techniques and the development and use of a sophisticated database to aid analysis and make the findings accessible for future generations. The project has had a long-standing programme of public engagement, with many thousands of visitors each year.“

Deborah Williams, Chair of the British Archaeological Awards added,

“The entries this year reflect the incredible wealth and range of archaeology that is going on across the United Kingdom, the quality and expertise of our world-leading archaeologists, and the ever increasing fascination of the public with the history and archaeology of their local area.

“Increasingly archaeologists are responding to this interest by developing new ways to help people to take part in research and excavations, start up their own projects, and share and understand new discoveries – and this shines through in our shortlisted entries. All the finalists have a common theme – involving and enthusing young people and the public in their archaeological heritage.”

The British Archaeological Awards entries are judged by independent panels made up of leading experts from across the archaeology field in the UK, including both professional and voluntary sectors and aim to celebrate and share the best of British archaeology with the public.

See the shortlisted projects at www.archaeologicalawards.com and follow the Awards on twitter @BAAWARDSUK

May 11, 2016 by katberry

Central Zagros Archaeological Project: Excavations at the Early Neolithic Site of Bestansur

Professor Roger Matthews & Dr Wendy Matthews spent their Easter at the early Neolithic site of Bestansur, Iraqi Kurdistan. The excavations at Bestansur are significant as it is such an early settlement, dating to about 7700/7600 BC. At nearly 9000 years old, this provides us with some fantastic evidence for the very first steps of the transition from hunting to farming in the Neolithic period in this region.

The discoveries this season include the careful excavation of a very special building (Building 5) made of lumps of clay with plastered walls & floor, which had an unusual number of human remains interred beneath it. The team have identified a large number of human remains, mostly disarticulated, and often from very small children.

As seen in the video linked to below, one of the theories is that the building may be a special building for the burial of dead people – some of the remains seem to be coming from quite far distances, which is why the bones are disarticulated. With some of the bodies the team also found small offerings, such as beads of clay or stone, including a bead of carnelian which would have had to be imported from Iran or Afghanistan.

About the Excavation

Map to show location of Bestansur and other relevant Neolithic sites of the region.

A University of Reading and Sulaimaniyah Antiquities Directorate team recently conducted a sixth season of excavations at the Early Neolithic settlement site of Bestansur, Sulaimaniyah Province, Iraqi Kurdistan, between 26 March and 15 April 2016. The team comprised Roger Matthews, Wendy Matthews and Kamal Rasheed Raheem (Co-Directors), Kamal Rauf Aziz and Sami Jamil Hama Rashid (Sulaimaniyah Antiquities Directorate), Amy Richardson (University of Oxford), Sam Walsh (UCLAN), Adam Stone and Tom Moore (University of Reading) and local excavators. We are very grateful to Sulaimaniyah Directorate of Antiquities for all their support, in particular to the Director, Kamal Rasheed Raheem, the Director of the Museum, Hashim Hama, and our government representatives, Kamal Rauf Aziz and Sami Jamil Hama Rashid, who helped us in many ways and contributed greatly to the success of the season. We are grateful to them all for their hard work all season.

The excavations were financially supported by generous grants from the Gerald Averay Wainwright Fund of the University of Oxford and the British Institute for the Study of Iraq. We are very grateful to these bodies for their kind support.

Excavations at Bestansur, an Early Neolithic settlement

Dr Sam Walsh excavating human remains in Building 5.

Excavations at Bestansur focused on expansion of Trench 10 to investigate a neighbourhood of Neolithic architecture on the lower eastern slopes of the mound, in an area of 18 x 14m.

This season’s excavations in Trench 10 aimed firstly to investigate and analyse of the human burials below the floors of Space 50 and the stratigraphic context of these, and secondly to define the extent of the building in which they were placed, Building 5, radiocarbon dated to c. 7700 BC.

We established that there are an exceptional number of human remains interred within Space 50. The excavations this season increased the number of individuals identified to more than 55 people, with more remains detected but left preserved in the ground for the next season. This number of individuals is higher than that found in many houses from other Neolithic sites of the Middle East, such as Tell Halula in Syria, for example, where 5-15 individuals were buried within single buildings. The high number within Building 5 at Bestansur is larger than expected for a single household and suggests that there were extensive and long-lived inter-relations between communities.

Four principal groups of human remains were investigated in the south and east of Space 50. All of these represent selective burial of particular skeletal parts,

Cluster of human skulls and other bones buried under room floor

predominantly of skulls, long bones and ribs. Two of these groups were of mixed age ranges. One group included red-pigmented material around clusters of bones and another group included traces of white mineral material on many bones and a skull as well as red pigment. A third group comprised predominantly juveniles and infants. The fourth assemblage was represented scattered remains of human bone and beads in the fill below the floors. One unusual bead of carnelian, imported from Iran or Afghanistan, was also found (Fig. 7).

As the walls of Space 50 slope inwards, c. 10 cm of deposits have been left against the base and lower sections of the walls. These microstratigraphic sequences were carefully cleaned with an artist’s palette knife, photographed and drawn at 1:5 and 1:10 to investigate the history of the construction and use of Building 5 and the complex burial sequence throughout the foundation, occupation and infill of the Building.

Carnelian bead from burial deposits under room floor

The north of Building 5, the western narrow rooms and the northwest corner of Space 50 and adjacent buildings were defined by extending trench 10 to the northwest.

We will continue excavation of this extraordinary deposit and building in spring 2017 and beyond.

Recording of human remains was conducted in the field and the laboratory by osteoarchaeologist Dr Sam Walsh (Fig. 4). We are very grateful to the Sulaimaniyah Antiquities Directorate for permission to export human bones and teeth for analysis to study diet, health and mobility. We will be carrying out a full programme of analysis of this very special assemblage of human remains from the Early Neolithic period.

You can watch an interview with Roger on Rudaw TV here.

October 30, 2015 by katberry

Silchester – Summer Excavations Updates

This summer, the Silchester team(s) were back in the field again for both the Insula III project and the Environs Iron Age project. Amanda Clarke and Dr Cathie Barnett give their updates below…

Never say Never Again: further excavations at Silchester Roman Town

By Amanda Clarke

Professor Michael Fulford, CBE and Archaeologist of the Year, is as near as our profession will get to having Royal Navy Commander James Bond on its books. And, in true 007 style, and with reference to the 1983 Bond film of that name, we have learnt that The Commander will Never say Never Again.

Mike and I had left a hole in the ground (and in our hearts…..) at Insula IX in August 2014, and had walked away, olive trees in hand (our farewell presents from the participants), never thinking we would be back.

Groundhog Day

Now here I was, returning to Silchester in August of 2015, to set up and run a 4-week project to excavate a 15m by 20m trench in the north-east corner of Insula 111 in the heart of the Roman Town.

The Insula III team

What could possibly lure us back? Insula III has been pivotal to our research excavations at Silchester for several years now. In 2013 and 2014 we opened an area 30m by 30m in the south-east of Insula III with the aim of re-excavating the Victorian trenches (dug in 1891) to reveal the structure the Victorians had thought – excitingly – to be a bath house. This methodology – of walking and digging in Victorian footsteps – proved to be an extremely successful one and allowed us, with the minimum of new excavation, to understand further the Victorian campaigns and methods of excavation, as well as determining at least 3 phases of Roman and post-Roman occupation of this part of the insula.

Palaces and Promises

We returned in 2015 to the north-east corner of Insula III as we hoped, by implementing our established methodology of Victorian shadowing, to uncover further evidence for the early Roman palatial structure (misidentified by the Victorians as a ‘bath house’) we had exposed in 2013 and 2014. This would lead our research in a new and exciting direction, promising an early Roman template of town planning, possibly under the auspices of the Emperor Nero.

Victorian mayhem

The first week of excavation in 2015 revealed several things fairly rapidly to our team of volunteers, Silchester ‘old-hands’ and aspiring 1^st, 2^nd and 3^rd year students. For a start, the Victorians had been fairly brutal in their excavation techniques and had employed a methodology which resembled the path of a modern-day bulldozer. However, silver linings and all that, as the excavators of 1893 had avoided and outlined the extent of the spoil heap of the Basilica-Forum excavators of the 1860’s, who had placed an enormous and intimidating mound of soil from their forum excavations all along the western edge of the North-South Roman street, extending into the north-east area of Insula III. This meant that preserved intact beneath the outline of this spoil heap were undisturbed late Roman and potentially post Roman deposits – something of a holy grail for Silchester archaeologists who have been long intent on illuminating the final years of the Roman town.

Sadly however there was no evidence for the continuation of the large palatial building located in the south-east of the insula – instead a packed stratigraphy visible in the sides of the Victorian trenches promised a different story.

Our second week on site proved an enormous challenge on many fronts; we had to re-employ our JCB to remove the huge depth of Victorian backfill we were confronted with, as we recognised that this Victorian-sorted soil would only enhance our muscles, and not our minds. As well as this, it rained – very hard. For days on end.

A Case of Mistaken Identity

By the start of the third week, the Victorian interventions had been emptied, mapped and plotted, and we now had time to look at what they had left behind. The Victorian plan was a red herring – nothing recorded on it was as we found it – but we did gain further insight into the Victorian psyche. For example, a feature recorded on their plan as ‘HYP’ (hypocaust) and left in situ, turned out to be an early Roman hearth, pedestalled and separated from its context – but still intact, beautiful, and able to be sampled and studied.

The early Roman Hearth

Targeted excavation

The Victorian excavators had not reached the natural ground surface but had instead stopped at an extensive spread of gravel of early Roman date. So, our methodology was to extend downwards from some areas of the Victorian intervention to see if we could stratigraphically uncover the earliest occupation on this part of the insula. This we did, revealing a number of Iron Age features at the base of the sequence.

It’s all in the section

The strategy for the fourth week on site was simple: to record and sample the sides of the Victorian trenches – which contained the story of Insula III from earliest to latest – and to begin stratigraphic excavation of the late Roman tabernae, or small shops which fronted onto the north-south and east-west streets, and lay beneath the dark soils. The remains of these buildings had eluded the Victorians but we were able to recognise them as flint and gravel founded buildings with clay floors, and backyards consisting of gravelled areas delineated by post pads.

Final Thoughts

After 4 weeks on site we ended with a very successful Open Day and were able to present our many visitors with a coherent story about the development of the north-east corner of Insula III. Our work has revealed a complexity of occupation on this central insula, and has provided a tantalising glimpse of the richness of the archaeological record here. Now follows a winter of post excavation to establish the chronology of the area, and the chance to assess the many finds left behind by the Victorians – which included more than 66 coins. See you next year!

Pond Farm

By Dr Catherine Barnett

A team of 15 hardy professional, student and volunteer archaeologists, led by project officer Nick Pankhurst, ignored the August-September monsoon season to tackle the site of Pond Farm. The site was suspected to be an Iron Age univallate hillfort and had been chosen as the first in a series of sites to investigate under the new Silchester Environs project led by Prof Michael Fulford.

Four 20x20m trenches were opened up across the site, positioned according to the results of geophysical and coring surveys undertaken earlier this year. Key aims were to date the site and to gauge whether it had a chronological relationship with the nearby Iron Age oppidum that underlies Silchester Roman Town. We also wanted to find out what the site was used for and for how long. Artefacts proved sparse but appeared in just the right places, including a piece of Late Iron Age pedestal beaker recovered from a palisade trench at the end of the defensive encircling bank. The lack of internal structures yet evidence of several phases of earthwork and ditch recutting leads us to suspect that this was not a permanently settled site but one periodically visited over a long time, perhaps as part of a stock management system, with the huge defensive earthworks there to protect valuable livestock.

Much of our understanding will however come from the post-excavation analysis and radiocarbon dating of samples collected during the dig. These are currently being processed, and we’ll let you know what we find in a future post.

For further information on the Environs project please see the Silchester website or email Dr Catherine Barnett at c.m.barnett@reading.ac.uk.

You can also follow Silchester on Facebook and Twitter for the latest updates!

October 26, 2015 by katberry

Uncovering the secrets of ‘the Blob’: a spectacular finale to the Lyminge excavations

By Dr Gabor Thomas

View over 2014 excavations with the Blob in the foreground trench and the Coach and Horses pub in the background overlooked by Lyminge church

In September of this year the curtain closed on one of the department’s flagship fieldwork projects: a seven-year programme of excavation targeting an Anglo-Saxon settlement preserved under the village of Lyminge in south-east Kent. Fieldwork projects of this scale and complexity nearly always run out of time and Lyminge is no exception. 2014 was supposed to be the final season of a three-year campaign funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council designed to investigate a large open space in the middle of the village called Tayne Field. In the event, the new discoveries made that year were so unprecedented that it was impossible to examine the evidence satisfactorily in the six weeks available. With the realisation that more work was needed, plans for a return season soon began to be hatched; by the following spring funds for a pared-down excavation had been secured from several sources, including a generous donation from a member of the Sutton Hoo Society who visited us in 2014. Game on!

The cause of our extended season was first identified in a geophysical survey completed by Dave Thornley in 2012.

Aerial view of the Blob and adjacent ring-ditch after initial cleaning in 2014.

The ‘Blob’, as it soon became known amongst the excavation team, appeared as a large (18m by 12m) ovoid anomaly straddling the ring-ditch of a Bronze Age barrow. Both features lay at the northern margins of a dense array of Anglo-Saxon settlement remains which had formed the principal target of excavations in 2012-13. When uncovered for the first time in 2014, the feature stood out like a sore thumb: an expanse of charcoal-rich sediment crammed with animal bone and artefacts immediately recognisable as Anglo-Saxon. Gold dust – we were staring at a huge, and as we would later find out, very deep, Anglo-Saxon midden! Because all of the material removed from the Blob was dry sieved, progress was slow going and it soon became apparent that we could only investigate a small sample in the time available. We therefore limited our window to a pair of 1m-wide perpendicular transects positioned across the maximum girth of the Blob. Each of these slices produced a vivid layer-cake of dumped deposits punctuated by burnt horizons and, in one particular locale, an in situ hearth. By the beginning of the final week both transects had been excavated to a depth of 1.80m, but with no sign of a bottom. Then, in the final few days, we broke through the earliest of the Anglo-Saxon dumps to reveal a horizontal layer of flint nodules. Time was up and we were left to ponder the hard-won evidence: what was the origin of the large crater used as a dumping ground by the Anglo-Saxons? And what was the function and age of the enigmatic flint layer?

These questions were foremost as a skeleton team reassembled to take on the Blob with renewed vigour in 2015. Our strategy involved re-opening 2014’s transects to investigate the lower levels of the Blob (where possible) with further hand excavation, leaving the deepest portions for coring. In addition, we planned to excavate a new 2m-wide transect across the unexplored northern sector of the Blob with the aim of exposing the full extent of the layer of flint nodules. So what did we find? The upper horizons of the midden sampled by the new transect proved to be as productive in Anglo-Saxon cultural material as in 2014, yielding a further 200 sherds of vessel glass, an array of brooches and other diagnostic metalwork and prodigious volumes of pottery and animal bone. The new transect also revealed the full extent of the flint layer demonstrating that it formed a sloping ramp extending from the northern rim of the Blob down into its murky depths where it was first exposed in 2014 at depth of nearly 2m. Further excavation and coring in the previous season’s transects produced equally rewarding results. We now know that the original cut of the Blob has a strongly asymmetrical profile and that its lower stratigraphy comprises clay-rich sediments deposited during later prehistory under natural processes.

Kevin Williams from QUEST assisted by Simon Maslin get stuck into some coring.

So what does all this evidence add up to? I would be lying if I said we had a definitive answer so soon after the excavation, but a compelling story is starting to emerge. It goes something like this. The Blob started life as a natural feature – a solution hollow, or to give it its correct label, a doline, produced by the erosion of soluble bedrock. This particular example may have opened up early in prehistory and, as a significant landscape feature, could have acted as a focus for the construction for the adjacent Bronze Age barrow (such associations have been documented in other prehistoric chalklands, including the Dorset ridgeway). When an Anglo-Saxon settlement was established in Lyminge in the 5^th century A.D., the doline was reappropriated, commencing with the construction of the flint ramp to provide access into the deepest portion of the feature. This may have been to facilitate the extraction of clay for the making of pottery and daub for buildings and furnaces, but alternative, potentially ritualistic, uses cannot be discounted. Subsequently, as the Anglo-Saxon population expanded and economic activity intensified, midden material collected from various domestic and industrial contexts was systematically dumped into the cavity. This process of infilling extended into the second half of the 6^th century, but was punctuated by episodes of stabilisation when the hollow was used for industrial processes such as iron smelting reflected archaeologically in hearths and associated dumps of slag and furnace lining.

Although compelling, there are parts of this story which will remain speculative until the evidence has been carefully evaluated by professional geologists. However, if the hypothesised sequence turns out to be correct in its essentials, then this will be the first example of an archaeologically-attested doline in the UK with evidence for Anglo-Saxon exploitation. Irrespective of the final attribution, the investigation of this remarkable feature has transformed our understanding of Lyminge’s formative development as an Anglo-Saxon settlement. Should you be fortunate enough to encounter a Blob on your own excavation, be sure to go back for a second season!

Diagnostic Anglo-Saxon jewellery recovered in 2015. The gilding and decorative detail on these artefacts will show up beautifully when professionally conserved.

With thanks to my Co-Director, Alex Knox, Lyminge Project PhD and Data Manager, Simon Maslin, Finds Supervisors, Helen Harrington, Emily Harwood, Alex Miller and Jessica Barnsley, QUEST technician, Kevin Williams, not forgetting a clutch of dedicated students from Reading and UCL and our regular local volunteers. The 2015 excavation could not have happened without the generous support of Sue Banyard, the ‘Up on Downs’ Landscape Partnership Scheme and our principal funders, the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

For more information please visit the project website: www.lymingearchaeology.org

Gabor Thomas, Director of the Lyminge Project

October 26, 2015 by katberry

Summer 2015 in the Vale of Pewsey

By Dr Jim Leary

This summer the University of Reading Field School excavated within the landscape between the famous prehistoric monuments of Avebury and Stonehenge in the Vale of Pewsey in Wiltshire. Our excavations focused on two prehistoric henge monuments (Marden and Wilsford) and, with Historic England, a Roman settlement. We also surveyed part of medieval Marden village.

Marden henge is a truly huge monument, enclosing an area of 15.7 hectares, making it the largest Neolithic henge in Britain. Our excavations focused to the south end of the monument and we uncovered an extraordinarily well-preserved Neolithic building surface. The complete surface was rectangular with a central sunken area, which was dominated by a large hearth. On the floor were flint flakes still lying untouched in the same position they had been left in, and this is one of the best preserved Neolithic buildings in England. Close to the building were spreads of Neolithic rubbish, which incorporated elegant bone needles, as well as flint flakes and decorated ‘Grooved Ware’ pottery. In one area was an assemblage of bones from numerous pigs, clearly representing the remains of a feast. Analysis of the building is ongoing and we do not yet know what it was used for, although we have suggested that it may have been a sweat lodge type building.

We also excavated the Wilsford henge on the other side of the river. This is a much smaller monument and completely flattened by ploughing over the centuries. We excavated through the end of the ditch, next to the entrance of the henge, and discovered that the ditch was amazingly deep – over three metres! Near the bottom was a very well preserved early Bronze Age burial of a teenager wearing an amber spacer necklace.

The striking feature about these monuments is their relationship with the River Avon, which runs between them. Both monuments face the river, as if access or good views of this part of the river were important, and Marden henge in particular sits within a large sweeping meander of the river. The relationship between these monuments and water was evidently a close one and likely to be key to understanding them. To this end and in order to better understand the hydrology of the river in the past, we undertook a geoarchaeological project along the river valley. This work has produced some very exciting results, including thick layers of peat, and will no doubt add significantly to our knowledge.

Under the guidance of staff from Historic England we also undertook a detailed topographic survey of an earthwork site located within Marden village. The grass-covered site comprises a series of enclosures of varying size, within which a number of building platforms and a network of tracks or hollow-ways have been identified. The enclosures clearly represent multiple phases of activity, with some of the enclosure banks overlying or reusing earlier features. At the eastern end of the site, two small terraced building platforms were recorded associated with a number of small compounds; these earthworks probably represent the remains of a small deserted medieval farmstead. This site is clearly complex and multifaceted, and interpretation work is ongoing.

The area around Marden henge has seen very little archaeological work, particularly compared to the famous sites of Avebury and Stonehenge to the north and south. However, we now know that there are many other monuments preserved in the Vale of Pewsey, particularly along the upper reaches of the River Avon. These monuments will all be investigated over the coming seasons. There is clearly much more work to be done in the Vale of Pewsey and as we work through the post-excavation over the winter, we look forward to going back next summer.

Visit the Field School website, or follow us on Facebook and Twitter.

October 26, 2015 by katberry

Dr Jim Leary explores the prehistoric human experience of rising sea-levels

Footage of flooded houses and landscapes provide us with some of the most striking and immediate images of sea-level rise, bringing home the drastic consequences of modern climate change. Sea-level rise threatens humanity, but we have been through it before – many times. Sea-level rise happened in the past, particularly in the centuries after the last Ice Age.

In 1931, a lump of peat was dredged from the depths of the southern North Sea by the fishing trawler ‘Colinda’. Contained within it was a barbed bone point – an elegant artefact that was once one half of the head of a fishing spear, known as a leister. It is an archetypal implement of Stone Age hunter gatherers that lived in Britain after the last Ice Age.

With striking resonance for us today, these hunter gatherers lived through a singularly profound process. For this period saw rapid environmental change. During this time, sea-levels rose quickly, inundating vast tracts of the landscape, leading to the displacement of communities as land was lost altogether. One such area now lies beneath the North Sea – a prehistoric land larger than the United Kingdom, and which joined Britain with mainland Europe. It was an area that was lived in – people hunted in it, told stories, raised children, and we know from the leister, fished there. And yet this landscape became submerged and entirely lost; hidden now under a sea.

In a newly published book, Dr Jim Leary explores this process of sea-level rise. Not the recording of it, but the human experience – what it felt like, what affect it had on people’s everyday life. What were the consequences of sea-level rise and the loss of land, and what were people’s responses to it? What happened when their houses, hunting grounds and ancestral lands were lost under an advancing tide? And importantly for us, what can we learn from these past experiences as we face modern climate change. The book seeks to understand how these people viewed and responded to their changing environment, suggesting that people were not struggling against nature, but simply getting on with life – with all its trials and hardships, satisfactions and pleasures, and with a multitude of choices available. At the same time, this loss of land – the loss of places and familiar locales where myths were created and identities formed – would have profoundly affected people’s sense of being. This book moves beyond the static approach normally applied to environmental change in the past to capture its nuances. Through this, a richer and more complex story of past sea-level rise develops; a story that may just be useful to us today.

The Remembered Land. Surviving Sea-level Rise after the Last Ice Age.

By: Jim Leary

Bloomsbury Academic

10 bw illus

RRP: £14.99

ISBN: 9781474245906

Published: 22-10-2015

See more at: http://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/the-remembered-land-9781474245906/

Read the first chapter here: http://bloomsburycp3.codemantra.com/widgets/9781474245937/Rememberedland.html

October 22, 2015 by katberry

500 years of urban life at Silchester: the Iron Age and Roman town

On Wednesday 14^th October, Mike Fulford gave a public lecture on the results of the Insula IX ‘Town Life’ Project: 500 years. The fieldwork aspect of the 18 year excavation project came to an end in 2014, but a large team are busy undertaking the post-excavation analysis. Mike’s last public lecture at Reading was 5 years ago, so there was plenty to talk about – the lecture theatre was fully booked, and the audience was packed with old friends from fieldwork, local residents, staff and students.

After an introduction from archaeologist and Deputy Vice-Chancellor Prof Stephen Mithen, Mike started off by setting the scene. Calleva Atrebatum is one of only three major Roman towns in Britain on a greenfield site, meaning the archaeology is preserved much better than places like London and York. The Society of Antiquaries excavated the site from 1890-1909, but they missed an awful lot of the archaeology and stratigraphy. Insula IX was chosen back in 1997 as there were plenty of gaps on the map (meaning undisturbed archaeology), plus buildings on the ‘Late Iron Age’ alignment.

Mike casually offered some impressive stats – Insula IX has produced 62486 finds and 16240 contexts! Based on all of this information, the current chronological outline of Insula IX was presented. The Late Iron Age phase of occupation is currently dated from c. 20 BC to AD43, consisting of a ‘Great Hall’, a series of trackways, pits and wells. After the Roman conquest in AD43, activity within the Insula became much more intensive, but still clinging on the northwest-southeast alignment. At the end of the first century AD, there was a major reorganisation of buildings within the Insula, and again in the late Roman period.

Mike with the Silchester artist in residence, Jenny Halstead

Faced with the wealth of material and environmental evidence for life in Insula IX, Mike highlighted a few key themes. Firstly, the wealth of Silchester was shown through objects such as Harpocrates, the Silchester eagle and imported glassware. Secondly, dogs! From the Late Iron Age lap dog buried in the foundation trench of the Great Hall, to the dogs buried in a later Roman pit along with a raven and the famous mating dogs knife handle, and the evidence for dog skinning in the mid Roman period, dogs were a theme of the excavations. Thirdly, the living conditions within Insula IX were a key point, with trickling filter fly, whipworm and maggots all found through the environmental analysis of wells and cesspits. Along the way, Mike highlighted the work of researchers in the Department of Archaeology, including Rowena Banerjea’s study of floors and buildings through soil micromorphology, John Allen’s work on building stone, and Lisa Lodwick’s research on early food imports. Plus of course the amazing archaeological work of Amanda Clarke and her team of excavators!

Mike rounded proceedings off with the end of Insula IX, the mysterious ogham stone, and the role Silchester may have had in the fifth century AD. There was time for questions at the end – with lots of interest in the Insula IX dogs, the decline of Silchester, plus the important question “would you choose Insula IX again?”

The lecture was accompanied by a display of artwork from the Silchester artist in residence Jenny Halstead. Jenny’s paintings and sketches will be on display at the Old Fire Station Gallery, Henley-on-Thames from Saturday 24^th October – Tuesday 3^rd November.

Looking forward, work is steaming ahead on preparing the next Insula IX monograph on the Late Iron Age archaeology. Meanwhile, the exciting new Iron Age environs project is using a range of techniques, from LIDAR to geophysics, to investigate Iron Age activity in the wider area – something which will provide a vital prologue to the Insula IX story.

You can watch the video of the lecture here.

Find us on facebook www.facebook.com/Silchester

http://www.reading.ac.uk/silchester/

October 13, 2015 by sarahlucas

Out now! Roberta Gilchrist’s new book on Glastonbury Abbey

Congratulations to Professor Roberta Gilchrist on the publication of her new book, Glastonbury Abbey Archaeological Excavations 1904 – 1979!

This volume, co-authored with Dr Cheryl Green (an alumni of our department 1992-95), reports on the results of the Glastonbury Abbey Archaeological Archive Project, a collaboration between the University of Reading and the Trustees of Glastonbury Abbey. The project has reassessed and reinterpreted all known archaeological records from the 1908–79 excavations and made the complete dataset available to the public through a digital archive hosted by the Archaeology Data Service.

The scope of the project has included the full analysis of the archaeological collections of Glastonbury Abbey by thirty-one leading specialists, including chemical and compositional analysis of glass and metal and petrological analysis of pottery and tile, and a comprehensive geophysical survey conducted by GSB Prospection Ltd. For the first time, it has been possible to achieve a framework of independent dating based on reassessment of the finds and radiocarbon dating of surviving organic material from the 1950s excavations.

The principal aim of the Glastonbury Abbey Archaeological Project was to set aside previous assumptions based on the historical and legendary traditions and to provide a rigorous reassessment of the archive of antiquarian excavations. This research has revealed that some of the best known archaeological ‘facts’ about Glastonbury are themselves myths perpetuated by the abbey’s excavators.

Reassessment of the archive of excavations has identified a number of new questions for future research. The presence of LRA1 pottery confirms occupation at Glastonbury in the fifth or sixth century, but there is no evidence yet to suggest whether this was a religious community or a high status secular settlement engaged in long-distance trade. The relationship of the monastery to earlier settlement patterns deserves further consideration; for example, it is possible that the monastic vallum incorporates a defensive bank and ditch pre-dating the monastery. A striking feature of the finds assemblage is the lack of evidence for metal objects dating to the Middle and Late Saxon periods. The paucity of evidence dating from the seventh to the ninth centuries prompts the question of whether the early monastic core has actually been located. It is feasible that the main domestic buildings of the Middle Saxon monastery were situated to the north of the church, in an area yet to be examined. Fresh excavations will be required to fully understand the character, form and dating of the Ango-Saxon monastery at Glastonbury.

October 1, 2015 by katberry

Glastonbury Abbey: myths, legends and reinterpretation

Glastonbury Abbey is world-renowned, an ancient location tied to British myth and legend. The site of various archaeological investigations for 75 years, the Abbey’s prominent reputation and long history have served to maintain the public’s fascination for years. A new book from Professor Roberta Gilchrist and Dr Cheryl Green gathers all the archaeological evidence over the past century and reinterprets it to discover the truth behind the mythology, including the suggestions of a deliberate strategy of antiquated architectural choices, challenging the discovery of King Arthur’s grave, and finding evidence of occupation of the site long before the earliest Christian settlements.

Glastonbury Abbey was renowned in the middle ages as the reputed burial place of the legendary King Arthur and is the site of the earliest Church in Britain thought to have been founded by Joseph of Arimathea. The aim of these legends was to establish Glastonbury as the pre-eminent monastery in England and attract thousands of pilgrims and wealth to the abbey. This strategy proved successful; Glastonbury became a major pilgrimage centre and was the second richest monastery in England at the Dissolution.

The Abbey has undergone no less than 36 seasons of excavation from 1904 to 1979 under 8 different directors. The most significant excavations were carried out by Dr Courtenay Arthur Ralegh Radford in the 1950’s and 1960’s; he was interested in finding evidence for Arimathea’s early church and also claimed to have found the shared grave of Arthur and Guinevere. Glastonbury’s central importance to archaeological scholarship stems from the interim report published by Radford in 1981. Due to his findings, Glastonbury has become a ‘type’ site against which the evidence of all early monasteries is appraised. However, none of the results of these important excavations have been published in their entirety. That is, however, until now!

A new 500- page, colour monograph, Glastonbury Abbey: archaeological investigations 1904-79, co-authored by Prof. Roberta Gilchrist and Dr. Cheryl Green and published by the Society of Antiquaries, lays out the results of the re-examination of the antiquarian excavation archive and the archaeological collections. The monograph harnesses modern scientific methods, such as radiocarbon dating, chemical analysis of glass and digital analysis of plans, to bring the archaeology of this important medieval monastic site into the public domain. The complete dataset is also available to the public through a digital archive hosted by the Archaeology Data Service.

Blue lias carving fragments

The main aim of the monograph was to set aside previous assumptions based on the myths and legends and to provide a rigorous reassessment of the excavation archive. Research revealed that some of the best known archaeological ‘facts’ about Glastonbury are themselves myths perpetuated by the abbey’s excavators.

The key findings were:

Evidence was discovered for prehistoric and Roman occupation pre-dating the earliest Christian settlement at Glastonbury.
New evidence for occupation on the site of the Abbey in the 5^th to 6^th centuries, pre-dating the earliest documented Saxon monastery at Glastonbury.
Excavations in the 1920s revealed three phases of a Saxon stone church with detached burial crypt to the east.
An excavated complex of five glass furnaces represents amongst the earliest and most substantial evidence for glass-working in Saxon England. It was radiocarbon dated to the late seventh or early eighth centuries, refuting Radford’s earlier conclusions that it dated to the tenth century.
Several details of Radford’s interpretation of the early monastery are challenged, including the existence of a pre-Christian ‘British’ cemetery and the discovery of Arthur’s grave.
Re-examination of the records has confirmed evidence for the Norman and later medieval monastic ranges and revealed the sequence for the replacement of the Saxon and Norman buildings.
Evidence for the Dissolution includes iconoclasm targeted on sculpted images, salvage activities and possible evidence associated with a short-lived community of Protestant refugees, who occupied the site of the former abbey in 1552
The monastic character of the medieval finds assemblage is evidenced especially in objects linked with music and literacy, such as bone tuning pegs, book binding tools and styli, and the large number of items for personal devotion that were owned by monks or secular guests and pilgrims.
The chemical analysis of clay used to make 7000 ceramic tiles showed that the majority were made at kilns close to Glastonbury.
The assemblage of over 2000 fragments of medieval stained glass includes durable blue glass. It is likely to date from the twelfth century and confirms that Glastonbury’s early glazing schemes were of the highest quality.
Study of the worked-stone assemblage reveals the lavish cloister constructed by Abbot Henry of Blois, c 1150: the fifty-one fragments of blue lias carving are amongst the finest examples of Romanesque sculpture produced in England.
There are many conservative or retrospective elements evident in the architecture of Glastonbury Abbey; this tendency seems to have been deliberate and strategic, aimed at demonstrating the antiquity of Glastonbury and its pre-eminent place in monastic history.

The Project Continues…

The results of the archive project will reach new audiences through a follow-on project funded by the AHRC (1 Oct 2015- 30 Sept 2016). Roberta Gilchrist and Dr. Rhi Smith will work with the Trustees of Glastonbury Abbey to implement a reinterpretation strategy aimed at visitors to the Abbey, the local community of Glastonbury and the wider public. Partnership between the University of Reading and the Trustees of Glastonbury Abbey will enable the charity to improve the quality of site interpretation and education offered to visitors. Interpretation of the ruins and museum collections will be informed by new academic research and presented in more creative and accessible formats including digital reconstructions and an interactive map developed with the Centre for Christianity and Culture, University of York. It will also explore the local legends of King Arthur and Joseph of Arimathea, as well as improve understanding of spatial layout, chronological development and archaeological evidence.

July 20, 2015 by katberry

New book by Dr Daniel Howells out on Late Antique Gold Glass

“A Catalogue of the Late Antique Gold Glass in the British Museum”, by Daniel Thomas Howells is now published (http://bit.ly/1KfTVJb) and will be soon available in the library.

Dr. Howells completed his MA here at Reading in 2006 and then went on to undertake a Phd with the University of Sussex in collaboration with the British Museum.

This publication is the most in depth of its kind since 1901 and is a must-read for all those with an interest in gold glass!

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