| Back on the chalk at Ickleton after a long break |
| 17/11/2024 |
| At last a site to walk and, despite the dire weather forecast earlier in the week, some good weather. Ground conditions were a little bumpy and dusty but we were walking again. However, not many finds, although we left a lot of small pieces of broken tile on the ground. The finds were mostly a mixture of glazed and unglazed post medieval redwares, as the photo shows. There were also a small number of other post med ware, such as transfer print and whitewares. Lots of flint but only a small number identified as flakes. The majority of surface items were the potatoes left behind after harvesting - in the very old days these would have been gleaned by local people. | |  |
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| CAS Conference |
| 9/11/2024 |
| Last Saturday saw the CAS Conference occur in a new venue at the Cripps Library. As part of the presentations CAFG gave a lecture (through Tom Midgeley) on our work at Wimpole over the last few years. We also had a poster presentation about our 2024 Parterre Gardens excavation, together with a few of the finds. | |  |
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| Our first walk of Autumn 2024 |
| 6/10/2024 |
After our summer break we gathered again at Wimpole for our first field walking day of the Autumn. The weather was good, there were lots of walkers and the ground visibility OK. The ploughed surface made walking a little difficult but we completed Clay Pits West in one go.
There were not vast numbers of finds and most of them were post med in date. One interesting find was part of a Hamilton bottle, used in the 19th C for mineral waters and other fizzy drinks - described as egg-shaped in appearance. There were some small pieces that looked medieval in date, like the part of a handle on the right. However, lots of GRE, some transfer printed ware and clay pipe stems formed the bulk of the finds. | |  |
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| An unusual find has emerged as we process finds |
| 16/8/2024 |
| What looked like an ordinary bone from a small animal (sheep?) when examined as we processed the finds suddenly became of interest when we noticed cut marks across the end. On research it appears this may be an Anglo Saxon stamp for decorating pottery. Examples have been seen which show similar shaped oval marks on vessels from the Anglo Saxon period. More research needed. However it does highlight how important a close examination of finds is for what might otherwise have been discarded. | |  |
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| Our excavations are over but the work of documenting begins |
| 28/7/2024 |
The digging work is complete but we are backfilling trenches
and recording section and plans. We are also processing the
more interesting finds. Our metal detectorists did us proud,
producing some nice finds like the Elizabeth 1 silver half
groat shown in the photograph. This is listed as a Fifth
Issue of her coins, dated to 1582 - 1600 with two pellets
behind her bust replacing a rose symbol seen on some other
coins. It was minted in London.
Although we did not recover
as much pottery as we did last year from the black hole in
the south-west corner, we still had some interesting finds
to add to our collection of Wimpole finds. | |  |
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| Today's best find |
| 20/7/2024 |
Yet again, another day of intriguing finds. The photograph shows a miniature pipkin-like pot which came from the lower levels we are now reaching. It stands 5.4cm tall, the rim is 5cm diameter and there are 3 small feet. The strange feature is the 3 small holes in the base, suggesting some sort of draining action perhaps. It is unglazed and very much hand thrown.
Other finds were a pilgrims badge in the shape of a scallop, either in lead or pewter, plus an Elizabeth 1 silver half groat. Both finds courtesy of our splendid metal detecting team.
Today was a very busy day with members of the CBA/CAS visiting along with a member of the MOLA geophysics team checking to see whether the geophys was confirmed by our digging. Tomorrow should be our last day but we may carry on next week if we do not finish our planned work. We are taking Monday off to rest our weary bones!!! | |  |
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| The Wimpole excavation day 7. |
| 19/7/2024 |
Today, as we get deeper into the archaeology, some nice finds are starting to emerge. Today's star find has to be the Neolithic polished axe. The photograph shows the axe which was broken in antiquity and remodeled, possibly as a scraper. The cutting edge is largely complete, with no chips to suggest it had been used for any length of time, if at all. It could be that the axe broke across a fault in the flint at a very early stage of its life. Imagine, having spent ages polishing the axe to an incredibly smooth finish, to have it break.
Tomorrow is the archaeology event at Wimpole where we hope to see lots of people and interest them in what we are doing and have found. | |  |
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| Our first interesting find |
| 15/7/2024 |
| Our digs progressed below the topsoil today and some interesting finds are beginning to appear. The photograph shows one - a piece of slate inscribed with some musical staffs. For the uninitiated these are the 5 lines/4 spaces used to write musical notes on when composing music of all sorts. In some ways this harks back to the slates at Mr Ratford's house where the slates were used to teach children to write and spell. We were shortened today by rain but hope to be back tomorrow where further progress may produce more interesting finds. | |  |
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| First day of the Wimpole dig |
| 21/7/2024 |
| Today was our first day of the latest Wimpole excavation. Not much was found but we are only just removing the the turf and the first layers of topsoil. A surprise was a fossil sharks tooth, presumably originally in the gravel used for the paths. Cambridge is not best known for its fossil shark teeth, although we have plenty of gryphea (or Devil's toenails as they are known locally). We had a reasonable number of visitors as the photograph shows. Lets hope for more interesting things tomorrow. | |  |
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| In the Footsteps of Fox |
This year marks the centenary of the publication of Cyril Fox’s seminal book: ‘The Archaeology of the Cambridge Region’. In November 2023, the McDonald Institute and Madgalene College hosted an international conference to celebrate Fox’s contribution to archaeology. CAFG was invited to provide two posters based on our work, which were displayed in Magdalene College, along with around 12 others from the UK and abroad, until the middle of December. The posters investigate how our fieldwalking results from two areas on chalklands (Fulbourn and Ickleton) and two on mainly claylands (Wimpole and Childerley) compare with Fox’s expectations relating to the effects of local geology on
human activity.
In the Footsteps of Fox - Part 1
In the Footsteps of Fox - Part 2
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