The Big Royal Dig – Looking Back. December 2006.

Across the August Bank Holiday weekend of summer 2006 hundreds of eager diggers, historians, archaeologists, experts, presenters and production crew swelled the ranks of the core Time Team and descended on the UK's three Royal Palaces – the official residences of the Queen – Buckingham Palace, Windsor castle and Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh in order to carry out major excavations and uncover some fascinating and significant royal finds.

The scale of the operation was simply massive and required careful planning and smooth co-operation and co-ordination between Time Team and palace staff. With the obvious security concerns arising from highly sensitive sites and the disruption that would be caused to the running of locations that in addition to being royal residences are also some of the most popular tourist destinations in the world, every possible detail had to be scrutinized.

The palaces not only had to open their doors to hordes of film crew and their equipment but they were also required to sit back and watch as yards of pristine lawn disappeared (albeit temporarily) at the hands of mechanical diggers and plenty of spade and trowel action.

Four days of Time Team Live were broadcast on Channel 4 and More 4 with the aim of unravelling the history of these iconic buildings and their inhabitants as well as embarking on some in-depth archaeology.

So were they successful? The answer is a resounding 'yes!' Not only did the team achieve all their targets and unearthed some fascinating royal finds in the process but they also hit the archaeological jackpot at Windsor with the discovery of the 'Round Table' building dating back to the 14th century – a truly world class find!

But the hard work hasn't stopped yet – the finds and discoveries made at the digs are still being examined and dated. Reports are being collated for publishing in the future, books are being written and arguments and discussions continue as to the exact details of the royal discoveries.

In this section you will be able to read about the most significant finds from the Big Royal Dig and hear from Time Team presenter Tony Robinson, producer Philip Clarke, Time Team creator Tim Taylor, David Wilkinson of Oxford Archaeology who oversaw the Buckingham Palace dig, Richard Brown of Oxford Archaeology who was in charge of the Upper Ward at Windsor Castle and Gordon Ewart of Kirkdale Archaeology, responsible for the dig at Holyroodhouse.