Category Archives: Training excavation at Lord of the Manor 2013

Four days in and things get complicated

Placing scales for the photograph
Placing scales for the photograph

One segment excavated through the ring ditch was completed today, the cut photographed and the section drawn.

This segment proved difficult to interpret, with the platforms either side of the cut and the V shaped gully at the base, the profile is unusual for a round-barrow ditch in Thanet. The fills were fairly undifferentiated making the stratigraphy harder to work out and the working theory is that a flat based ditch was recut by a later V shaped ditch on a similar alignment.

Ring ditch - Segment 1 north facing section
Ring ditch – Segment 1 north facing section

More complicated is that a second segment  meant to show us more of the ditch, has a very different character. At the moment it appears that two very deep cut features, pits or deep ditches, are present not far from the relatively shallow profile to the south.

The excavation continues in this area and we hope to work this one out tomorrow…

Ring ditch Segment 2- deep features maiking things complicated
Ring ditch Segment 2- deep features making things complicated

Work is also continuing on the later pits that cut the ring-ditch on its southern side, with a very complicated picture emerging of small intercut pits, perhaps associated with a larger cut feature. These are perhaps medieval or possibly Roman in date, but dating evidence has been sparse to date. We hope to get a clearer idea of this (and some pictures) tomorrow.

For anyone who appreciates Umberto Eco, here’s an example of a journey into hyper-reality, a ‘real fake’.

Athenian_owl_small
Replica Athenian owl coin

A collector’s replica of an ancient Athenian coin (read about the real thing here) found on the spoil heap at our site with a metal detector (the field was used for car boot fairs).

Simultaneously the most historic and iconic image and yet absolutely artificial and completely out of place. Now where else have we heard of an artificial owl. Just look into my eyes…

Image of the replicant owl from Bladerunner
Replicant owl

A third busy day on the dig

A great deal of activity today and a few visits, planned and unexpected. We made a great deal of progress with excavating sections through the undisturbed northern area of the ring ditch. Our first section reached the bottom of the ditch, showing it had a symmetrical, but unusual profile (photo update tomorrow).

LOM-5_UKCTD_day3_sections
Excavation continues on day three…

However, the northern section proved less easy to interpret and it may be we have evidence that the ditch had possibly been re-cut around the circuit of the ditch, or had been cut by a later linear ditch.The features and their relationships are not clear yet and more work needs to be done in the next few days. The recut may explain why the significant finds from the upper fill of what should be a Bronze Age feature were a medieval jug handle and a peg tile pierced with a hole for hanging the tile on a roof.

Medieval jug handle and peg tile sherd
Medieval jug handle and peg tile sherd

We also carried on with a series of small sections to explore the later features cut into the southern side of the barrow. These may be a series of pits or perhaps a larger feature. There’s more to be done in this area and we really appreciated the help of two of our regular volunteers who joined our University of Kent student excavators for the day.

Later in the afternoon we were visited by the team from the Powell-Cotton Museum, where many of the finds from the earlier excavations on the site are stored. A good opportunity to match the finds in the Museum with their context in the landscape; and a chance to discuss how we can work with our local Museum in the future.

 

 

 

Day two on the dig

We began excavating sections through a stretch of the ring ditch which has not been sampled before. The edge of the trench at the northern end of the feature had to be defined so we could locate the outer edge and position one section across the ditch.

Excavating sections through the ring ditch
Excavating sections through the ring ditch

Preliminary geophysical survey with a  magnetometer showed that a composite plan of the area produced after the  excavations in 1981/82 had a serious error, placing the ring ditch around 17m too far south of its actual location. It is becoming clear that the feature’s real  location in the landscape is more significant to the physical landscape. occupying the plateau at the crest of the downland ridge overlooking Pegwell Bay. This space, with horizons falling away on all but the north west side where the plateau continues,  is unique  in the natural landscape in this location. The position shares similarities with the location of many round-barrows and other ring ditch features in Thanet, the locations owing more to a careful choice of local topographic conditions rather than a reference to a wider cosmology.

Sectioning the later pit featureIn a later period, as yet undetermined, the southern edge of the round barrow was cut by a series of pits and possibly a  large cut feature. We bagan to try to define the dimensions and shape of the feature by excavating another small section into it, As we make progress with this the nature of the later features will be more clearly defined and perhaps dated in the next few days of work at the site.

First day’s work at Lord of the Manor

The team assembled on site today to begin work on the training excavation at Lord of the Manor. Our first morning was spent reviewing the site of the training excavation and its place among other features and past excavations in the surrounding landscape. Discussion focused on the aim of the project followed a closer look at the excavation area.

The excavation is designed  to test the interpretation of an investigation carried out in 1981 and 1982 by re-examining  a sample of the archaeological features on the ground. Initial review suggests that we may have a lot to learn from this process. The earlier sample of the site appears to have been quite small and there is a great deal of scope to refine the plan.

The team clean he surface  of the archaeological features
Cleaning the surface of the features

Later in the day we concentrated on cleaning and defining the features in the excavation area, photographing the area and identifying the location of earlier interventions. We also spent time discussing the potential location of sample sections to dig in the following days. On the surface of the undisturbed fill of the wide ring ditch we recovered a sherd of  flint tempered Middle Bronze Age pottery.

Bronze Age flint tempered pottery sherd
Bronze Age flint tempered pottery sherd

A promising start with more important discoveries to come…

Training Excavation at lord of the Manor 2013

One hundred and sixty six years and three months ago, three men; William Henry Rolfe, Charles Roach-Smith (biography) and Thomas Wright (biography) began an archaeological investigation at a site near Ramsgate. In the previous year Anglo-Saxon burials and Roman finds had been made when a deep railway cutting was excavated through the open chalk downland at a place called Ozengall Down, or Osendun.

Over many years, starting in 1976, the site has been explored by members of Thanet’s archaeological community. Over time a landscape was revealed that was settled in the early prehistoric period and continued to be a place of cultural significance into the early medieval period. Even after a little more than a century and a half of archaeological investigation, there is still more to learned about this landscape.

The training excavation

In August this year a training excavation led by the Trust for Thanet Archaeology, with students from the University of Kent, will once again be exploring this hillside overlooking Pegwell Bay. The project’s aim is to look again at we think we know about the settlement on the site. The results of older excavations need to be checked with modern methods and the knowledge we have already gained reviewed and revised while it is still possible to access the site.

Excavation area overview
Excavation area overview

Initial targets are to revisit part of the area of an earlier excavation of part of an Anglo-Saxon cemetery and re-plan graves that were emptied  in 1982, with the aim of verifying the location of the original survey of the site (see our Virtual Museum page on Anglo-Saxon Thanet). We will also sample a small area of a Bronze Age round barrow to reconsider the previous interpretation of how the circular ditch, which once surrounded a central mound, was filled (see our Virtual Museum page on round barrows). The team will also investigate how pits that were dug through the barrow in a later period  show whether it had survived in the  landscape and possibly discover something about  the  way people who dug the pits understood the older monument.

Looking forward

Our two week dig excavation hopes to answer some of these questions and others that will arise as we carry out the latest investigation of this historic part of Thanet’s landscape.

Follow the progress of the dig

Updates to these journal entries will include key finds, new ideas and new questions that we can ask of the archaeological records and the features that we excavate.