Secure in his masculinity?

A truly amazing downpour reminiscent of our first 3 weeks on site…

The clouds build

Lights on as the storm approaches

The heavens open

View from the cooks’ kabin

Raindrops the size of golf balls…

The trackway is laid in order to lift the kabins

Tidying my desk – Dan’s image preserved!

On Tuesday night Mike treated all members of staff still left on site to a last supper at the Red Lion. It was a convivial evening – fairly disruptive for any other diners – but how happy we all look!

Table 1 – here come the girls: left to right…Emily, Nicola, Su, Liz, Rose, Sarah

Table 2: left to right – Lee’s arm, Rob, Tom, Rich, Mike, Riz, Zoe

Table 3: – left to right – Matt G, Lizzi, Natalie

Sarah and Tom – shiny happy people!

On the last day: 3 wise monkeys

Dan: coffee grinding

An empty portakabin…a last coffee….Dan,Tom,Hen, Matt

But…the sun was out and in the end we had 2 days of glorious tying up of loose ends! Of finishing off contexts of archaeology with a small, perfectly formed team. It was actually fun….and not nearly as stressful as I had anticipated. And we DID  finish things! Every area was finally (and finely) recorded….multicontext plans drawn, records digitised (thanks, Jen!), matrices drawn and completed. For the first time in many seasons we were ahead of the game…..no-one trying to finish a mountain of context records while the portakabin was dismantled around them.

And both wells were finished – Rob Cole’s well was superbly and professionally completed by Hannah, Helen and Will. Sadly no goodies at the bottom beyond one pennanular brooch – but it was a very well-executed piece of excavation and they should all 3 be proud of it.

The well in Sarah Henley and Tom’s area was more challenging…..the wooden shaft was revealed in all of its glory, with a protruding collar at its base. The shaft became too narrow for Stephen, Perry or Tom to work in – so Rose was volunteered to descend to the depths and help with the final éxcavation and recording. There were finds from this well – some very nice ones….and its date is not as late as we first assumed. It may in fact be of the same date as well 1750 excavated by us several seasons ago and by the Victorians before us. This well also had a wooden shaft and was dated to the mid to late 2nd century AD. At the bottom of well 1750 was found several sherds of a pottery vessel….and at the base of this year’s well were found several sherds of what looked like a similar pottery vessel! It will be extremely interesting to compare the 2 sets of sherds…if they are the same vessel were these 2 wells dug at the same time,and then a pot broken and ritually shared between the two….? Watch this space – a task for the winter months!

The final task after recording all aspects of the shaft, the well cut and shape, its primary fill – was to lift one of the well planks for dendrochonology dating. The rest of the shaft we will leave in place – preserved for an as yet unguessed future generation. To do this, Tom donned his wetsuit – don’t ask! And with relatively little stress and some small effort, one plank was retrieved. And it was perfect in its execution – wonderful craftsmanship of all those years ago.

The south-east well shaft in all it’s glory (note the ducks)

Stephen in the well

Not a lot of room down there!

Rose in the well (a blur of movement!)

Ready for wet suited action

Tom, Perry and Tom – and a 2nd century AD plank

The well shaft is protected before being capped off and the shoring removed

Elsie finalising the recording of Matt G’s round house

A last look at Natalie’s collapsed clay oven before protecting it and covering it up until next season

Some final looks on site before covering the archaeology

The End of Excavation

Our final day was also a day of visits: Niall Sharples, Jane Timby, Paul Tyers, Mark Robinson, Norman Hammond to name but a few. I also had to hand out our headphones for the final time to lead a tour of the archaeology for the Chichester District Archaeology Society.

At 4.30pm Mike gave his final tour of the 2012 season – after 96 weeks of excavation in total! It has been a fantastically successful season – we all agree on that. It has been a hard season – we all agree on that too. But no gain without pain; I am sure Team GB would agree….It is often difficult – at the end of each season people ask me if we made any exciting discoveries. The answer to me is always ‘yes’ but I do find it hard to elaborate. Ours is not an excavation of wondrous things……we do not often (if ever!) gasp at discoveries made. But we have provided the necessary detail to weave a wonderful story, a story which will echo down the centuries long after our excavation trench is filled in, grassed and cowed over. We can tell the story of one part of a major settlement, a major town – in painstaking detail. We will be able to say how this town was planned and organised. We will be able to describe the buildings and say something about their function, their layout,their architecture. We will be able to draw a vivid picture of the people who lived in Insula IX as it developed from its earliest beginnings as a colony of incomers brought in on a wave of migration from the continent. We know what they ate…..we know what they wore……what they ate on and drank out of…we can guess at their beliefs and superstitions…we can build up a picture of their day to day lives. All these things and more. So yes, we have made exciting discoveries – discoveries of detail…and the wherewithal to tell a story of our ancestors based on a tapestry of hard work….through wind, rain, heatwaves and downpours. Each season our story grows ever richer.

The sign says it all…..

And the closing ceremony? Well, our End of Dig party of course! These parties are the stuff of legend now – due in no small part to my core staff who tirelessly organise this – from the important moment of deciding on a theme, to the booking of a band or disco, to the creation of a barbeque, to the setting up of the marquee…..to the provision of ambience and bonhomie. My thanks as ever for this must go to Dan, to Ben, to Nick, to Matt Lees and Matt Gittins, to Hen…to name just a few. Thank you everyone – the End of Dig party is always an evening to remember (or not, as the case may be!).

This year the theme was Hot/Wet in celebration of Silchester’s interesting meteorological conditions in 2012. As ever this theme was very broadly interpreted and executed. We saw……lobsters, penguins……Nick as a jellyfish with electrical fronds which lit up as he floated through the marquee…..we saw rays of sunshine and clouds…..we saw a tap (great costume Amanda M!)…..we saw wet suits, divers, bikinis and grass skirts…we saw inhabitants of hot countries (Mike in full African costume)…pirates, fish…..Captain Ahab and Moby Dick (Jon, as ever, playing the part to its fullest extent) and maybe an eskimo or two. I did not have my camera with me so your imagination will have to do. As for me…..well, I ran out of time and inspiration, but here I am:

Cap’n Clarke

And then the recession hit and the construction industry slumped, taking with it commercial field archaeology. Tough times. But even then I believed that the kinds of skills gained on an archaeological excavation prepared our field graduates for many other jobs. We kept the faith!

And this year it has paid off again…..and as I write 4 of this season’s Silchester Trainees and 2 of our Assistant Supervisors have been offered paid employment with OA and MOLA. I am so proud – they have all worked so hard for these opportunities. And the Silchester Field School has played its’ part. Well done Kat, Rich, Riz, Tom, Jim and Lee – and I believe more are to follow…..

Silchester staff listen to a 'pitch' by Ben Ford, Senior Project Manager at Oxford Archaeology

Ben Ford - once a Reading student and a Silchester Supervisor himself!

Mike and the Silchester photographers - Margaret, Tristan and Kevin - prepare to go aloft

Which bit goes where?

Last year we discovered the benefits of kite photography – and built on this again this season with the help of Mark Household. Some fantastic shots. And then – out of the blue sky came Gunter Pibernik and his archaeological drone…..unmanned aerial vehicle or UAV!

Drone preparation by Gunter

So, on our final photography day we had both a AWP and a UAV……see the results!

Gunter Pibernik's vertical photograph using a drone

Kite photograph by Mark Household

Photograph of Hen's building from the cherry-picker

The cherry-picker as photographed by the drone!

South-east area taken from the cherry-picker

You decide!

Our Iron Age street running north-west to south-east: dating from 1st century BC to1st century AD

Tony's slot through the east-west Roman street - with the Iron Age lane curving round to the south to avoid it - kite photograph courtesy of Mark Household!

In the early 1st century AD this Iron Age street system was enlarged upon and formalised; layers of gravel were added, along with roadside ditches and fence lines marking out properties. And the right-angled offshoot heading to the north-east may have been re-routed at this time to avoid the Roman east-west street which was constructed sometime in the latter years of the 1st century AD. There is also another right-angled turn of the street system added at this time, running south-east into the Iron Age ‘insula’ from the north-east running street spur. This lane offshoot is clearly defined by roadside ditches.

Photographs of gravel; challenging indeed! But if you look carefully you can see the spur of the Iron Age lane heading south-east into the heart of the Iron Age block, flanked by ditches

We know that much post excavation work (and further excavation next season)  must be done to confirm the dating of these various streets – but whatever the result, we do know that in the Iron Age there was a cunning plan! Streets were laid out between buildings….there was organisation…..and we are beginning to identify building foci, along with foci of rubbish pits and wells. It will all make glorious sense one day – and I am looking forward to uncovering the big picture! The town of Calleva Atrebatum was planned and developed – and how exciting is that?

And take a look at our fantastic Iron Age building as uncovered by Hen! We believe it is contemporary with the Iron Age street system, so it dates from about 20BC. It is an extremely substantial building – at least 30m in length (next season will confirm its exact length) and approximately 8m wide. It is diagonally aligned north-east to south-west, and it overlies our 40BC ditch. At its south-western corner was found ‘Scraps’, the ‘toy’ dog breed discovered last season and dubbed by the Guardian newspaper ‘the handbag dog’ due to its tiny size. We don’t fully understand this building as yet – more work for next season -but it was clearly an important, rectangular building. Post excavation work will reveal more of its secrets – so stay tuned!

Our Iron Age building looking north-west; marked out by linear construction trenches. There is clearly an earlier (or later??) post-hole constructed building running across its width...more work for next season!

Look at this wonderful kite photograph taken by Mark Household! You can clearly see the north-south Roman street sweeping north through our Insula IX trench and out through the North Gate

I love this picture of cows at the South Gate!

Sarah Shimmy

Sun worshippers!

And…..a big thank you to Diana for my beautiful roses…..a burst of colour in my office.

Rosiness

The east side of the trench is alive with early Roman archaeology (c. 50 – 70AD). We have: a post built building in Emily’s area…..east-west aligned post-holes with no overall pattern emerging as yet. Is this our Roman military granary? Will we ever know??!

Emily's post built building

We have….a round house in Matt Gittins’ area…..a complicated sequence here….earliest appears to be a clay floored rectangular building with a small cobbled hearth. This is succeeded by a very clearly demarcated round house with an orange clay floor. In turn this is replaced by ?2 rectangular clay floored buildings with central scorched hearths – and – finally another round house! So much happening in a very short space of time – possibly a span of 20 years in the early Roman period.

The earliest Roman round house in Matt G's area

The north-east area with Matt's round house to the south

We have….Natalie’s wonderfully complicated clay floored building sat square to the earliest Roman road…surely on top of a precise military predecessor? The more we excavate of this building, the more there is to reveal. A stratigrapher’s delight…

Natalie's building: centre stage

We have….an east-west aligned clay floored building in Sarah Henley’s area excavated to reveal the dark silts beneath….and just later than a diagonally aligned building against the far south section with a wonderful hearth of pebbles, charcoals and fire-reddened clay (and a lot of ants).

Sarah Henley's south-east area

The wells along the eastern half develop apace. The far south-eastern well is late Roman in date: a missed feature obscured in 1999 by our excavation of a Victorian pit dug into its top fills. the team here is Tom, Perry and Steve – closely melded by well-shorer supreme John Brown. Most exciting is the fact that at 2m below the contemporary ground level we found a wooden lining…..currently being revealed….very exciting….

Perry in the well

Duck Aid

We also have….a well beneath the clay floored building excavated in Rob’s area…..early Roman or Iron Age? And it is being expertly excavated at great gravel speed by Will, Helen and Hannah…so far the fills are sterile, but there are possibly metres to go!

Helen and her well

Will at depth

Hannah in action