Archaeology Live! Autumn Season 2013 - Site Diary

[YAT]

Training weekend and open day.

The weekend began with a site open day running alongside the training excavation. Toby and Kath were on hand to explain the archaeology to visitors while Maddy was talking people through the latest finds.



In Ben's area, Juliet, Vina and Dave continued to remove demolition and robbing backfill deposits from the inner face of the church's south-east corner.



Tom, Robin, Camilla and Ellen worked on similar deposits within the church, close to the east wall. This context proved to be post-medieval in date.



In Arran's area, Duncan, Helen and Jeremiah focused on the northern boundary of the church. This proved to be quite complicated, requiring the removal of a large levelling dump which obscured key relationships.



On the north wall of the church, Joan, Tamise, Yvonne and Jane continued the excavation of demolition material over the wall, exposing some impressive stonework!



By the end of the day, 405 people had visited the site!



Many thanks to everyone who attended the training weekend, it was a great success and there will be more to follow in the new year.

[YAT]

Autumn Training Week (21st-25th October 2013)

The week began with rain, lots of rain! Luckily, there was lots to do indoors as the trainees were shown through finds processing, ceramic dating, an introduction to osteology and the recording system. Luckily, the rain eventually gave way.



Dave cheerfully led the charge to remove rainwater from the trench.



In Ben's area, the team finished excavating and recording the demolition features close to the south and east walls. They then turned their attention to the interior of the church. This revealed a number of graves and structural features that prove the church was modified during its lifetime.



This resulted in a lot of recording and the team did a great job in finishing this on time!



In Arran's area, Alison and Lynda faced the task of working out the complex features we were interpreting as a possible churchyard boundary. A strategic slot was excavated and showed that a clay bank sitting over natural clay did indeed seperate medieval pitting from churchyard deposits.



Clive, Megan, Martin and Rania did a great job of exposing and recording the rest of the north wall. Work on the churchyard also revealed the level at which intact graves survive.



Clive and Megan were suitably pleased with their work!



This week almost certainly represents the end of excavation on Block H. This year, Archaeoloogy Live! has achieved more than we could have hoped and while it may seem frustrating to step away from St Johns, we now know the story of this fascinating and enigmatic little church. Thank you to everyone that joined us in the trench this season!



A noteworthy find this week was this copper alloy object, possibly a somewhat squashed ring.