Hurrah! The digging season is upon us again & Derek in Shillington got us a good gig!
A late 18th century house backing onto fields, Kevin & I got there about 10am & met Ivor, Nigel & Derek, we got site of the test pit set up and away we went, Alison joining us later. The householders were really nice & kept us supplied with tea, coffee, biscuits & cake! much to Derek's mock consternation, 'Don't keep bringing out tea & coffee these buggers stop working!'
I dug the first context (10cm) and then went onto sieving. That's where most of the finds appear, it's difficult to see alot of them while you're digging.
The lawn had been raised by about 30cm so we knew anything there was a mix moved there when an extension was built. Mainly sherds of Victorian pottery & the ever present clay pipe. Mostly just the stems with one partial bowl if I recall.
We got through that 30cm then onto the good stuff and were very pleased to find alot of sherds of Medieval greyware and afew decorated sherds, some with green glaze very indicative of early/mid Med pottery. The greyware wasn't too bashed about their so must have been undisturbed since it was thrown away six to seven hundred years ago. It was a very good day and the sun shone for us.
Post dig analysis at The Musgrave Arms and very pleasantly surprised to find Tring Brewery's 'Side pocket for a Toad' as their guest ale. It's travelled along way from Tring and was a delicious pint.
Day two saw us muster about 10am again & crack on. We'd got down to 0.6m on the first day & Kevin & I got stuck into the next context, sadly the finds rapidly dried up, unlike the test pit that was getting wetter and wetter. The clay we were down to was an absolute bugger to dig and impossible to sieve, it had to be broken up by hand. So lean were the finds and so hard was the work that Derek told us just to take out a quarter of the next context taking it down to 0.8m. This too was barren of finds so we called it a day. Taking a metre square test pit down to 0.8m means you've shifted alot of dirt, it 's such a shame to fill it back in. We'd got a lovely pit, all the sides dead straight, it really was a thing of beauty. I think we should leave the pits open so the householders can use them as ponds or something! To help tamp down the soil as we throw it in Derek has employed the use of 'Old Thumper ' & 'Old Thumper 2' pictured below.
Post dig analysis once more the Musgrave Arms and that was it. A terrific weekends digging.
A late 18th century house backing onto fields, Kevin & I got there about 10am & met Ivor, Nigel & Derek, we got site of the test pit set up and away we went, Alison joining us later. The householders were really nice & kept us supplied with tea, coffee, biscuits & cake! much to Derek's mock consternation, 'Don't keep bringing out tea & coffee these buggers stop working!'
I dug the first context (10cm) and then went onto sieving. That's where most of the finds appear, it's difficult to see alot of them while you're digging.
The lawn had been raised by about 30cm so we knew anything there was a mix moved there when an extension was built. Mainly sherds of Victorian pottery & the ever present clay pipe. Mostly just the stems with one partial bowl if I recall.
We got through that 30cm then onto the good stuff and were very pleased to find alot of sherds of Medieval greyware and afew decorated sherds, some with green glaze very indicative of early/mid Med pottery. The greyware wasn't too bashed about their so must have been undisturbed since it was thrown away six to seven hundred years ago. It was a very good day and the sun shone for us.
Post dig analysis at The Musgrave Arms and very pleasantly surprised to find Tring Brewery's 'Side pocket for a Toad' as their guest ale. It's travelled along way from Tring and was a delicious pint.
Day two saw us muster about 10am again & crack on. We'd got down to 0.6m on the first day & Kevin & I got stuck into the next context, sadly the finds rapidly dried up, unlike the test pit that was getting wetter and wetter. The clay we were down to was an absolute bugger to dig and impossible to sieve, it had to be broken up by hand. So lean were the finds and so hard was the work that Derek told us just to take out a quarter of the next context taking it down to 0.8m. This too was barren of finds so we called it a day. Taking a metre square test pit down to 0.8m means you've shifted alot of dirt, it 's such a shame to fill it back in. We'd got a lovely pit, all the sides dead straight, it really was a thing of beauty. I think we should leave the pits open so the householders can use them as ponds or something! To help tamp down the soil as we throw it in Derek has employed the use of 'Old Thumper ' & 'Old Thumper 2' pictured below.
Post dig analysis once more the Musgrave Arms and that was it. A terrific weekends digging.
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| First context down and we're off! |
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| Finds from context one. |
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| Green glazed decorated early/mid Medieval pottery sherd. |
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| Decorated greyware pottery. |
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| Finds from contexts 1 to 5. |
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| Selfies take concentration! |
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| Test pit with the bottom quarter dug to 0.8m. |
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| L to R. Me, Derek, Alison, Nigel ,Kevin, Ivor. |
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| Ivor and Kevin use 'Old thumper' & 'Old thumper 2' to tamp down the soil as we back fill. |
