The Big Dig

Today, the excavation commenced with particular vigour as the urgency of discovering the true nature of the site settled in, with only two weeks remaining. The aim of this week is to investigate the internal space of the circular features within the trenches, in order to confirm that they are indeed roundhouses. Artefacts recovered from… Read more » about Day 16 – part 1!

As today marked the end of the third week of excavation of the site, the site directors, Miles Russell and Paul Cheetham, revised the aims of the investigation in relation to the existing archaeology. Searching for the crucial transitional period between the Iron Age Britain into Roman Britain; from prehistory into history, had proven fruitful through… Read more » about Day 15: end of week 3!

This week the site welcomed a group of local people and students from other academic institutions, who have travelled to volunteer in the excavations. A number of the volunteers have participated in the preceding seasons of excavation, as such, they have experienced the development of the investigation in Winterborne Kingston since it began. The Field… Read more » about Day 14: Public Engagement

Today marks the half way point of the current excavation season at the farm. Many of the pits, gully sections of roundhouses and post holes have been fully excavated and recorded.  Recording of each feature through section drawing, plan drawing and photography informs the the archaeological record of the site.   The superposition of contexts, summarised… Read more » about Day 13: Half way!

Context of the research Throughout the past two weeks of excavation, progressively more finds had been discovered in the form of faunal remains at different stages of articulation. Throughout the top stratigraphic layers of the smaller features, the finds only existed in the form of very fragmentary pieces of bone, nearly unidentifiable in their state. However,… Read more » about Day 12 – reflection on the animal bone deposits