| Val Whittaker Memorial Prize 2022 |
| 02/11/2022 |
 | | This year’s Val Whittaker Prize was presented at the November CAFG lecture in the McDonald Institute. The winner is Mikael Steeder, a final year student in the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology. He won the prize for his project report on a commemorative bronze head from West Africa – one of the Benin bronzes. The report contains a commendable discussion of historical, political and scientific aspects if his investigations into this topical and controversial subject |
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| AGM 2022 |
| 8th June |
| The AGM on the 8th June 2022 retained subscriptions at £12 for individuals, £18 for families and £1 for non-member attendance at lectures. The post of secretary remains vacant; Martin Bacon has replaced Robert Skeen on the committee, otherwise officers and committee members remain as before. |
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| A new field at Eltisley but slim pickings |
| 27/11/2022 |
After yet more rain it was no surprise that underfoot conditions were a little on the sticky side but ground visibility was good. However, a total of only 10 bags - each containing two or less pieces - was the result. The photo shows what we found - mostly post medieval wares and some clay pipes - but also some very medieval-looking wares. Two shell tempered pieces and a very smooth sandy piece spread over the field don't suggest any settlement present.
We will complete this field and its neighbour this coming Sunday, weather permitting. | |  |
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| Yet more medieval pottery at Eltisley |
| 20/11/2022 |
Returning to our incomplete field from last week it was a pleasant surprise that, after heavy overnight rain. the conditions were as good as they were. However, what was different was the amount of probable medieval pottery that was turned up on the western edge of the field. The photograph shows just some of the pieces recovered, including post medieval stuff like the Staffordshire combed ware and the inevitable GRE.
The medieval pottery included quite an amount of shell tempered ware and a nice piece of a whitish ware with embossed surface and thick green glaze. Many of the pieces were very small (approx 0.5cm square) and quite abraded. There was also an area of cobbles that may represent part of a farmyard surface. We hope to go over the hedge next week and see whether the material continues there. | |  |
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| Back to Eltisley |
| 13/11/2022 |
This last weekend we returned to fields at Eltisley owned by Papley Grove Farm. After an invigorating walk to the field, we were contemplating a field with beans already growing but not enough to make observation difficult.
The photograph shows a selection of the finds which were few in number. There were the usual post medieval wares - creamware, GRE and manganese wares - but also finds of fine sandy coarseware sherds that look quite medieval. There were also some iron slag lumps like the one in the photo.
We will return next weekend, weather permitting to finish the field. | |  |
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| Test pitting at Wimpole 26th - 29th October |
| 26/10/2022 |
This was an exercise carried out at the request of the National Trust, following a series of geophysical surveys across Trust land due to be planted with trees. Top 20 field revealed traces of potentially Iron Age and Roman date that required confirmation by a series of test pits.
A total of 9 test pits (all 1m x 1m square) were dug at 50m intervals across the area. The first 5 pits to the north (across the presumed iron Age features) produced no real finds apart from a single piece of possible Iron Age pottery. Pits were generally excavated to 30cm before the clay base layer.
However, the 4 pits to the south revealed Roman pottery and one exposed a feature going some 50 cm deep with no obvious signs of reaching a base clay level. The test pitting, therefore, produced confirmation that the geophys results were most likely to be Roman in the south but the north is still unproven.
This field is due to be ploughed next Spring so we hope to be able to field walk it then to cover a much wider area. | |  |
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| Return to Thornberry |
| 16/10/2022 |
| After a not very productive weekend at Childerley we returned to our Roman site at Wimpole and completed the field. This showed that the concentration of finds we found previously did not extend much further north or west than the area we had already covered. The photograph shows that a few pieces of Roman or medieval pottery remained but that the majority was post medieval in origin. GRE, stoneware, white ware and a piece of Staffordshire ware. | |  |
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| Return to fieldwalking at Childerley |
| 10/10/2022 |
After the large number of Roman finds last weekend at Wimpole we returned to the real world at Childerley. Witherow Field held promise of producing some flints but in the event it produced 5 finds bags of post med origin. We are closing in on walking the whole of the available land on the Childerley Estate - just 3 more small fields to go.
We will return to Wimpole this coming weekend to complete the productive field we started last weekend. How big the area of Roman pottery is will soon become clear. |
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| More information on our Samian find |
| 8/10/2022 |
Member Colin contacted Steve Willis (University of Canterbury) who provided this update
Looking up the stamp it's the output of the Maritumus workshop. The stamp is very clear fortunately. Maritumus according to Hartley and Dickinson worked at Vichy and Lezoux. This is his Die 6a. Stamps with this die are found across Britain, including on the Drag form 33 which is what I suspect this vessel is. A Drag 33 with this die (6a) was found at Water Newton (so fairly close to this find). Maritumus was active AD 155-200 but this item may be 160/165-200 as it seems his early career is likely to have been at Vichy, while this item is probably from Lezoux. | |  |
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| This photograph shows a complete Drag 33 cup. | |  |
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| The star find was the Samian cup base which had the partial remains of a potters stamp. To my knowledge we have never found a potters stamp before in decades of field walking so a real first. The photo shows the stamp which is damaged on the right hand side but appears to read. ()M()RITUM. We need an expert to tell us who this might be. | |  |
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| Mid-summer update |
| 26/7/2022 |
Just a quick update to events at CAFG. Our planned summer test pitting at Wimpole has been put off until October. The hot, very dry conditions mean that excavating in the hard clay soils would probably do more damage than good.
In the mean time we have sorted all the pottery finds from our 2019/20/21 excavations at Ickleton and when you see the total it becomes obvious that the medieval pot (in some quantity) increases markedly as you proceed down the contexts. We are now ready to get it to Paul Blinkhorn for his verdict on what we have.
Our September date at Oily Hall to dig some more test pits is still on. We remember this site for the large numbers of worked flint that came from our field walking and the first batch of test pits - if you want to learn about flints it is the place to go. |
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