The Dig

The excavation was on farm land close to the village of Whittington. The area around Cheltenham was heavily settled in Roman times because the land is particularly good for agriculture. Most of people who lived there were probably Romano-British. i.e. Native British people who had adopted the Roman way of life.

The remains were originally found in the late 70's when the farmers daughter came across some sherds of pottery in some molehills in a field. This led to a group of amateur archaeologists who found traces of a building. Unfortunately the remains seemed to extend under a neighbouring field and the farmer at the time was not prepared to allow his crops to be dug up to continue the excavation.
Throughout the day the 3 members of the team were extremely friendly and helpful. They were always willing to listen to ideas and answer questions.
Trench 1 - Reopening the original excavation. Not as easy as it sounds because they hadn't got exact directions to the location.

Three Roman villas have been located close together in the area which is quite unusual. It's possible that they were separate dwellings for a family group who worked together on the same farm or perhaps, as the land owner grew in wealth and status, they abandoned their original home and moved on to a new, grander building.

 

Trench 2 - you can easily see the outlines of where the bases of the walls were.

It's not surprising that bits of pottery surfaced so easily. The remains are actually only a few inches beneath the soil. Apparently the farmer always wondered why the field was so difficult to plough - now he knows! Usually ploughing a field destroys any remains that are close to the surface so it's amazing that this survived at all.

Phil with the "geophys" results.

Modern archaeologists don't have to dig holes in the ground! Geophysics allows them to get a picture of what's there before they start. There are basically 3 types that Time Team use.

Ground Penetrating Radar does what it sounds like and gives an idea of the position of objects under the ground.

Magnetrometry looks for disturbances in the magnetic field in the ground that may be caused by metal objects or places where there have been fires.

Resistivity measures the resistance of the ground to electric currents. Damp areas, walls, ditches or any other disturbances to the earth can be picked up by this.

Don't ask me which sort Phil has got here!

Trench 3

I thought that Carenza seemed a little uncomfortable when she was giving her talk at the hotel but she was certainly enthusiastic when she was describing the progress of the dig, and her trench in particular.

You can see the outline of walls and other features clearly here.
You can probably see that Carenza's Geophys print out looks different to Phil's. Presumably they were produced by a different procedure. Either that or the colour printer ran out of ink! :) Carenza showing the path of one of the walls. These look clear enough but apparently, "If you're struggling, two bricks in a straight line constitute a wall!"

In all, we must thank the Time Team for an excellent, entertaining and informative day. (And England beat the West Indies!)

As I think I've said, you couldn't wish to meet a nicer, more considerate and enthusiastic set of people than the Time Team. It would have been nice to have been able to get to know them better over a pint or two - I know Phil wouldn't object to a pint!!

To complete the day, when we returned to the coach, the driver had got it stuck in a narrow country lane and was unable to turn round despite repeated attempts (and lots of helpful advice from the passengers).
It had been a fairly murky day for July 1st but fortunately the rain held off and it was reasonably warm. This photo gives an idea of the weather that we usually associate with Time Team!

We ended up having to go forward - past the sign saying "Road Unsuitable for Buses" - through the back lanes of Cheltenham. We only met 2 cars coming the other way. They had to reverse back down the road a considerable distance before they found a gateway to back into. Tree branches were banging into both sides of the coach not to mention the roof!

Strange to say, despite the dangerousness of the situation, all the passengers thought that it was hilarious!
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