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Friday 27 June 03
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Groundwell Ridge, Swindon
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The Background
Groundwell Ridge in Swindon is the main site for the Big Dig weekend. Today we're investigating one of the back gardens on the edge of the main site.
Chris and Babs Walker and their family have been keen followers of Time Team for the last ten years or so. 'Ever since it started I've been into it.' says Chris. Inspired by the programme, Chris is now an active amateur archaeologist who's worked on numerous digs in his local area. After moving to Groundwell Ridge Chris discovered Roman pottery while landscaping his garden. The Big Dig is giving him the opportunity to investigate further.
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Searching for the past
As Carenza Lewis said in last night's programme: 'Just imagine what we would know now if every hole that was ever dug in a garden was done in an archaeological way.' The fact that each and every test pit is excavated following standard archaeological conventions means that every find is recorded and logged in the site archive for future reference.
'It's great to dig like this.' says Chris, 'We've already found some modern bits of pottery and even a couple of little bits of Roman. The thing is, even if we don't find anything special it doesn't really matter. Digging this test pit will just let us know what's here. It's great but very hard going as we're cutting through solid clay deposits at the moment.'
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It's all archaeology
There's a huge amount of archaeology around the Swindon area, but when most people think of Wiltshire they think of Prehistory. 'I've been doing some work recently on an old RAF base at near Swindon.' says Chris, 'We've been recording the buildings and hangars before they are lost through decay. It's all archaeology. If you record a hanger and it's the only one of that type in Wiltshire it's just as archaeologically valuable as Stonehenge: there's only one of those in Wiltshire too.' he says with a smile, 'But truthfully it all counts, it's all a part of our past.'
Cheese and Onion
At 50cm depth a fantastic piece of dating evidence appeared: a Walkers crisps packet. Easily identified as cheese and onion flavour, the key detail was the sell by date which read '28 April 1998'. This was probably discarded by one of the builders of Chris's house and backfilled into the garden when it was landscaped. Chris's house was actually built in 1997 so it all ties in quite nicely.
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Auger Survey
Chris's mate and archaeology tutor, Bob Clarke from the University of Bath in Swindon (www.info.Swindoncll@bath.ac.uk), has come along to help out with the digging. He's brought an auger with him and the plan it to take some samples from the test pit to check out how far down the clay goes. An auger is a hollow drill that takes a core sample of soil from the ground.
'What we've got here is mostly clay.' says Bob, 'But it does look like there's changes in colour in the clay as we go.'
Mick Aston is a bit concerned about the amount of clay: 'Here we're going to get loads of clay and hill wash material because we're at the bottom of a slope. A lot of the material we have here could be a bit messed up and churned around.'
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Stewart Park, Middlesbrough
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In partnership with Tees Archaeology, the Big Dig is celebrating the 275th birthday of Captain James Cook. Cook was born in the small Yorkshire village of East Marton, in what are now the suburbs of Middlesbrough. The village was demolished in the 1780's to make way for landscaped gardens and was then forgotten until a recent archaeological survey discovered foundations and indications of the medieval settlement. One of those sets foundations is likely to be the archaeological remains of the childhood home of Captain Cook.
Although Cook was born into a poor family, he rose to great heights. He joined the Royal Navy and worked his way up through the ranks, eventually rising to command his own vessel, unusual for an enlisted man. It was his cartographic skills that made Cook's name. The surveys were so accurate that they remained in use until the beginning of the 20th century. His surveys and scientific observations, coupled with his own scientific ability and his being in the right place at the right time led to his being chosen to captain the Endeavour in 1768 on a mission to explore the great unknown of the Pacific Ocean and scientifically record everything that was encountered. It was the first of the three great voyages of discovery he led in the South Pacific.
The test pit was dug as close as possible to the location of the house where Cook was born and the finds were very exciting! Carenza and the team found a wall and doorway belonging to a house which was below the level of the park ie it was at the right level to be part of the village of East Marton before it was demolished! This means that there's a possibility it was the very house Cooj was born in. |
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