Medieval island in Llangorse Lake gets a modern makeover

(I assume this is the one TT looked at ?)

Island Makeover

quote:

Originally posted by Tetricus:
Medieval island in Llangorse Lake gets a modern makeover

(I assume this is the one TT looked at ?)

Island Makeover

Yes it is.

Nice summary of the elizabethan wreck found in the Thamess. Checkout the looting artcle in Thrace also.

Archaeologist

Yet more news of Roman burials in York. This site was excavated over a number of months last summer and autumn (different site and unit, but not far from where the coffin and mummy were found last week)

http://www.thisisyork.co.uk/york/news/YORK_NEWS_LOCAL1.html

<< Mystery over decapitated Roman skeletons found under York street
by Andrew Hitchon
A MACABRE mystery from York's ancient past has been uncovered in a city street.

Experts from York Archaeological Trust have unearthed an "extraordinary" Roman cemetery near The Mount.

They found 56 skeletons, of 49 young men and seven children - perhaps not unusual in itself, since the Roman route which ran approximately along the present Tadcaster Road was lined with cemeteries.

But most of these young men had been decapitated - and one of those was bound with shackles, a find believed to be the only one of its kind in the Roman world. Now the skeletons, and other remains like pottery found with them, have been taken to be cleaned and analysed by the trust.

Archaeologists are beginning the task of trying to understand why the heads were removed. Were they executed or killed in battle? Was the decapitation part of a burial ritual, perhaps aimed at ensuring the dead did not return to haunt the living?

Patrick Ottaway, the trust's head of field work, said he believed the ritual theory was the more likely one, since the state of the bodies suggested the heads were removed after death.

He thought they dated from about 200AD, roughly the period that Emperor Septimius Severus came north to York with an army to fight in Scotland.

Dr Ottaway said one "line of inquiry" was to check whether the bodies could be those of members of that army. They would liaise with archaeologists abroad to see whether any burial rituals from the Rhineland, where many soldiers in Roman armies originated, or North Africa, where the emperor came from, fitted with this find.

Another intriguing find was that of a young child buried in a casket. It was unusual for children of that age to receive elaborate funerals, so this could be a much-loved child, or one from an important family.

But one of the strangest aspects of the find was the shackled body. "That really is odd. We've never had anything like that before, in Roman Britain or the Roman world," said Dr Ottaway.

The shackles consisted of thick iron rings, raising the question of whether this could also be a means of ensuring the dead stayed where they were.

Pupils from the nearby Mount School are in the process of setting up a website about the find, which was on a small plot of land at Driffield Terrace. The site will be used for schoolchildren from all over York.>>

Castle hunt


ARCHAEOLOGISTS will be out in force this week hunting for the remains of Bedford Castle.

Parts of Castle Lane car park will be closed to the public so that ground-penetrating radar surveys can be undertaken at the site of the 11th century castle which was destroyed in the 13th century.

Bedford Borough Council has asked Albion Archaeology to carry out the work in order to protect historic features from future development at the site. The council is hoping that Castle Lane will become Bedford's new 'cultural quarter'.

Jeremy Oetgen, project manager for Albion Archaeology, says: "We know there was a castle here as part of it was excavated in the 1960s and 1970s.

"We need to find out how much of it survives outside the areas dug then, but we don't want to dig up more of the site and risk damaging important remains at this stage of the project so we are bringing in radar survey specialists. Albion Archaeology has never tried radar surveys before, so it's very exciting."

Bedford Borough Council's head of economic development and regeneration, Trevor Roff, says: "Castle Lane is an important part of Bedford's heritage and we want to protect and enhance the historical and architectural features at the site."

Team Finds Best Preserved 26th Dynasty Egypt Mummy

CAIRO (Reuters) - Australian archaeologists have discovered one of the best preserved ancient Egyptian mummies dating from about 2,600 years ago, Zahi Hawass, the head of Egypt's Supreme Council for Antiquities said Monday.



Story

Rare Prehistoric Discoveries Unearthed At Ryton-On-Dunsmore In Warwickshire

Archaeological excavation on behalf of the Highways Agency ahead of a £3m road scheme has revealed historic treasures never before found in Warwickshire, indicating that a high-ranking Iron Age family could have inhabited a settlement at Ryton-on-Dunsmore over 2000 years ago.

Earlier fragments of Neolithic and Bronze Age pottery and flint tools on the same site date from as far back as 3000 B.C. and suggest the site held special significance almost 2500 years before the Iron Age began.

As well as Iron Age pottery and remains of roundhouses consistent with previous discoveries at other Warwickshire sites, several unusual finds make it a site of particular historic interest

The most exceptional find of the dig was evidence of a clay structure used in some sort of Iron Age kiln. This 'kiln furniture', which can be dated by an iron brooch that was found with it, is likely to be among the earliest found in the UK. These finds date from around 200 B.C., and the brooch is the first of its kind to be discovered in Warwickshire.

The excavations also revealed an unusual C-shaped ditch with an eastern entrance, which is likely to have been of ceremonial or religious significance - perhaps an unusual form of shrine.

Stuart Palmer, who directed the project on behalf of Warwickshire Museum Archaeology Projects Group, said:

"The fact that several of these Iron Age finds at Ryton-on-Dunsmore are atypical in this area makes it a distinct possibility that this site was the residence of people of an unusual rank, perhaps a local leader or other high status family.

"We can get an idea of the community's economy from a group of large, deep pits which were probably used to store cereal grain. We can also see that the pits ended their useful life as repositories for rubbish after episodes of feasting."

Other finds included a range of quern stones used for grinding cereal seeds into flour. Several different types of these querns were found, including a beehive type, which has never before been seen in Warwickshire.

Rob Sutton of Atkins Heritage, archaeological advisors to the Highways Agency, said:

"The next stage will be the completion of the post-excavation analysis. Environmental samples taken from the excavated features will be examined to recover evidence of local land use and farming techniques.

"Particular attention will be given to the more unusual finds like the 'kiln furniture' in order to attempt to understand how it was used.

"Carbon dating of recovered material, like charred matter adhering to the pottery or charred plant remains, will tell us more about the sequence of events during the prehistoric occupation of this site."

Andrew Butterfield, Assistant Route Manager for the Highways Agency, said:

"We are delighted to have funded such a successful archaeological excavation in the lead up to this £3m safety improvement scheme on the A45 in Warwickshire.

"As soon as the importance of this site became clear, we made additional resources and time available to complete the excavations. Whenever we find archaeological remains on road projects, we work closely with archaeologists to ensure those are preserved for the community.

"Now we await the results of the analysis and look forward to learning more about the way prehistoric communities that occupied this part of the Midlands lived their lives."

27 February 2005

Volunteers needed to discover Marlow’s hidden past
A Call for volunteers to help a major archaeology project has been sounded in Marlow (Buckinghamshire, England). Plans to survey and record some of the area's historic and pre-historic earthworks and monuments has led to a recruitment drive by organisers. The project, known as Recording of Marlow and District's Ancient Monuments (ROMADAM), is being put together by a number of participating organisations, including Archaeology In Marlow (AIM). A grant of £22,605 from the Local Heritage Initiative will help achieve the project's aims, but more hands are needed to uncover mysteries like the Iron Age Hillforts at Danesfield and Medmenham.
John Laker, chairman of AIM, said: "We have good funding to complete all these things and we intend to involve as many individuals, organisations and schools as we can, to ensure the project is a major success for Marlow and Marlow residents." Volunteers are needed in a number of areas, including model making and giving tours to show schools around the monuments. For more information call the AIM group on 01628 475488

Source: Bucks Free Press (25 February 2005)

Private Eye - Henge and Racket - 4th March 2005

THE Thornborough Henges, three huge prehistoric circle-and-ditch structures near Ripon in North Yorkshire, have been described as "the Stonehenge of the North".
Such is the archaeological importance of these little-known monuments, laid out some 5,000 years ago in an area as rich with barrows, cursuses, and other remains as Salisbury Plain, that English Heritage describes Thornborough as the most important ancient site between Wiltshire and the Orkneys. Each of Thornborough's circles is 240 metres across - large enough to contain 10 Stonehenges. But the visitor who turns off the A1 in search of the henges will find no helpful brown sign to guide him. Better to look out for the giant conveyors on which Tarmac Northern Ltd, a subsidiary of Anglo-American, the world's biggest mining company, extracts 500,000 tons of gravel a year from its Nosterfield quarry, a couple of hundred yards to the north of the monument.
Tarmac has already worked out large quarries immediately to the west of the henges, and Nosterfield is coming to the end of its life. Tarmac has therefore applied to North Yorkshire county council (NYCC) for planning permission to open another quarry at nearby Ladybridge farm. In the longer term it plans to excavate all the land around the henges, in some places coming as close as 50 metres to the monuments. When quarrying is finished the henges would survive as an island in the middle of a series of lakes, as it is cheaper for Tarmac to let the holes it has made fill up with water (and call them "nature reserves") than restore the landscape to farmland.
For many people who care about Britain's heritage, the thought of this important ancient landscape being torn up is appalling. In a parliamentary answer to Vale of York MP Anne McIntosh in December 2003, culture secretary Tessa Jowell said: "My officials are supporting English Heritage's firm opposition to any further gravel extraction in the vicinity of the scheduled site until...the archaeology is better understood. English Heritage is concerned about the wider landscape setting of the henge monuments and is currently funding a project by Newcastle University to undertake extensive archaeological research in this area."
Alas the campaign to save the henge landscape is seemingly being undermined by the very man whose job it is to protect it. North Yorkshire county archaeologist Neil Campling has told people not to sign a petition calling for an end to quarrying within a mile of the henges because "there are currently no planning applications for, and not even any discussions about, quarrying around the middle and southern henges" - which isn't true - and because there is "little archaeology" in the fields around the henges.
How Mr Campling can know this, when little investigation has been done, is a mystery. He is happy for Tarmac's own archaeologist Mike Griffiths (Campling's predecessor at the county council) to investigate a sample of just two percent of the Ladybridge site. Other archaeologists believe a sample of eight to 10 percent would give a better idea of what may be there. Ten years ago a two percent survey of Nosterfield - just 50 metres from Ladybridge - led to the conclusion that there was little of interest in the ground, and the planning application was passed. When the diggers went in, Tarmac's archaeologists were "surprised" to find what they admitted was "the largest group of Neolithic features of this type so far recognised in the North of England". Now Tarmac is poised to make the same "mistake" again. But at least it'll get its gravel.

http://www.themodernantiquarian.com/post/35282

Those of you will longer memories will remember that Mr Camplings comments were posted on this forum in September of last year. At the time I said they were false. Looks like Private Eye have finally cottoned on to him.

What does the Institute of Field Archaeologists think about this? I think we'd all love to know, given their code of practice.

Aussies dicover one of the best preserved mummies found in Egypt. Zahi reinforces his status as the most famous Egyptian by unvieling the mummy

quote:

Originally posted by hopski:
Aussies dicover one of the best preserved mummies found in Egypt. Zahi reinforces his status as the most famous Egyptian by unvieling the mummy

Story

Archaeologist buried alive seeking relics

An Austrian archaeologist has been buried alive and killed after the trench he was working in collapsed in Salzburg, Austria.
Two women working with him were able to dig him out and call for help, but their 30-year-old colleague from a Salzburg museum suffocated, police said on Friday.
The archaeologists were looking for relics on a long-buried Roman farm that is now on the grounds of an industrial site.

ADDIS ABABA (Reuters) - Archaeologists studying human origins in eastern Ethiopia have discovered 12 fossils that appear to be older than the famous fossil "Lucy," the team leader said on Saturday.

"The discovery of 12 early hominid fossÿil specimens estimated to be between 3.8 to 4 million years old will be important in terms of understanding the early phases of human evolution before Lucy," Ethiopian archeologist Yohannes Haile Selassie told a news conference.

"It is hoped that the new discoveries will allow scientists to connect the dots, furthering our knowledge of the time period in human evolution," he added.

Lucy is Ethiopia's world-acclaimed archaeological find. The discovery of the almost complete hominid skeleton, estimated to be at least 3.2 million years old, in 1974 was a landmark in the search for the origins of humanity.

Yohannes said the new find was made approximately 37 miles north of the site where Lucy was discovered in the eastern region of Afar.

The excavated specimens included parts of one individual's skeleton, complete with ribs, vertebrae and pelvis, he said. Animal remains were also uncovered.

Twenty years after Lucy was unearthed, archaeologists dug up the remains of a chimpanzee-sized ape, estimated at 4.4 million years old, in the same Afar region.

County's Time Team star dies at 41

Tributes were today paid to a Shropshire archaeologist who has died in Belgium. Gregory Price, of Bishop's Castle, appeared in the first three series of Channel 4 TV show Time Team.

Full Story

Scottish catacombs rediscovered

The Scotsman

A FARMER has unearthed a network of 700-year-old tunnels beneath his land.

Peter Waddell was shocked when he uncovered the catacombs, which are believed to have been built by monks.

The network, which does not appear in any records, features a large arched tunnel which runs for about a mile beneath Park Farm, near Linlithgow, West Lothian.

Archaeologists believe the culvert, just a few miles from Linlithgow Palace, dates back to the early 14th century when a secretive brotherhood of monks farmed the land.

Some local people even believe the tunnels may have provided escape routes and hiding places for the Carmelite monks.

The main tunnel is constructed from hand-cut sandstone blocks formed into an arch using medieval building techniques.

Nearly 10ft underground, it is about four-and-a-half feet high by a yard wide and is still in immaculate condition.

Mr Waddell uncovered the network while carrying out building work to convert one of his barns into a canal-side bistro.

Mr Waddell, 41, a third generation farmer, said that when he was ten, his father told him a story about secret passageways beneath the land, but nothing was mentioned again.

The farmer, who lives with his wife Tracey, 32, and daughters Tara, two, and seven-week-old Olivia, said: "I couldn’t believe what we had unearthed.

"We pulled away the stones and there was this gaping hole beneath. We looked in and there was this perfectly preserved arched stone tunnel running as far as we could see. It was quite a shock."

Dr Tony Pollard, an archaeologist at Glasgow University, called for the site to be surveyed. He compared the tunnels to ones he had worked on at Paisley Abbey dating to the 14th and 15th centuries and built by monks for drainage.

Dr Pollard, who co-presented the BBC series Two Men in a Trench, said: "This is potentially a very important discovery.

"The one at Paisley had slightly better stonework and ran off a millpond. It was used to flush out the latrines of a number of buildings which are no longer standing.

"But this one is rougher which would make it older. The construction seems quite elaborate for what is probably a glorified drain, but monks were quite wealthy."

Bruce Jamieson, a local historian, said the tunnels may have been built by the Carmelite monks who lived in a friary near the site at the end of the 13th century.

He said: "Whoever built it must have been well off. The Carmelite friary stood at a place now called Friars Brae and they would have been working the land at this time.

"The only people who could afford such a grand structure would be monks or royalty."

They showed a short piece about this on the BBC regional news this evening. The drain looked pretty impressive - and very similar to part of the Paisley Abbey drain which has the same flat construction - as opposed to the finely arched section.

This is a link to a report I wrote on the Paisley Abbey drain for Co's website.

http://www.ourpasthistory.com/monastic/paisley/index.htm

Final verdict on King Tots death. Doctors say he did not meet a final death. Arch tomb raider Zahi says let's leave him in peace now.

The Guardian

Henges campaigners hit out

CAMPAIGNERS have hit back at claims by quarry company Tarmac over the threat of job losses if it is not allowed to expand its operations close to the Thornborough Henges.

In a statement last week Tarmac warned the local economy would suffer if quarrying had to cease and said tourism would not compensate for the loss of some £2.3m resulting from its present operations at Nosterfield Quarry.
Responding to the claims this week, the Friends of Thornborough campaign group insisted that quarrying did not provide long-term jobs.
Chairman, John Lowry said: "Aggregates quarries actually create very few jobs in relation to the amount of land they sterilise, and the employees know those jobs are relatively short-lived because all mining ventures have a limited life.
"To ensure a constant supply of minerals, well-managed mining companies buy up mineral reserves in advance, phasing development so that a new quarry is opened as an existing one becomes exhausted. So jobs are not 'lost' - they are simply transferred to the new quarry and the sub-contractors follow them.
Mr Lowry, who is a qualified exploration geologist and chartered engineer, added: "In trying to reduce this issue to a simple contest between the relative economic benefits of quarrying versus tourism, Tarmac is cynically ignoring the over-riding need to save Yorkshire's greatest archaeological treasure for future generations.
"Due to the concern our campaign has raised in both Parliament and the EEC, Tarmac now has to prove that it is necessary to destroy a landscape of international importance in order to supply a local market with sand and gravel that could readily be obtained from a less sensitive site like those already quarried by its competitors."
Tarmac is applying for planning permission to quarry further land close to the henges, at the Ladybridge Farm site.
But Mr Lowry said: "Tarmac's employees should be demanding that the company gives up its plans to expand near the henges and turns its attentions to opening a replacement quarry in a location already designated by the county council. Surely good management practice dictates that a contingency plan should already be in place, in case the application to extend the present quarry is refused?"

There's also a lot of letters in both our local weekly's echoing the same comments.