The groups attendance at the Chesterfield Canal Festival went pretty well, we managed to hand out plenty of application forms to the public and sell some of the books and pottery we took. We didn’t make as much as we’d like to have done but the persistent rain and other events in the local area probably kept the masses away.
The Society also now understands the need for better publicity we only had a short write up about the society and a couple of A4 flyers around the marquee on Saturday which weren’t very prominent. On Sunday David and Maureen Broadhead brought a larger stand in which we displayed some photos and a couple of the magazines in. I have to admit I was a bit disappointed we hadn’t managed to get a second run of magazines printed as I’m sure they would have sold well. Our next big event is in October so hopefully we can get plenty of literature and information organised for then.
My few days at the Besthorpe dig went well, The event was organised by the Trent Vale Landscape Partnership (This seems to be what the Trent Valley is called around the Stoke-on-Trent area) I managed to dig a ditch and record it with Sarah and an A level student called Meg from Cambridgeshire. The ditch is MPL10 1630 and contained several pieces of roman pottery and a few flecks of charcoal with a evidence of burning due to the oxidisation of the higher levels of sand. The weather was nice whilst we were there and I learnt how to locate ditches in sand which will be particularly useful around this area the local geology being made mainly from Sherwood Sandstone.
The site itself is amazing the area of settlement is huge and finds range from Neolithic flints to Anglo-Saxon finds. The amount of Romano-British pottery is such that most of it is left in situ as there wouldn’t be enough room to store it in. The ground kind of looks like a bull has been in a china shop! The site was open to the public on the Monday and Tuesday and I even caught a glimpse of Kevin Leahy there. According to the archaeologists onsite there are a few more years of this exciting project left to run so I guess all going well I’ll be returning for the next few seasons.
On August 21st and 22nd there is a Roman Living History weekend at Marton, Lincolnshire. The event will include an ‘excavation’ of the Roman site and volunteers have been asked to come forward. If that doesn’t interest you there will be a fashion display, cookery display as well as pottery and mosaic making. To book a place at these events contact Sarah Grundy at Lincolnshire County Council on 01522 553109. (http://www.lincolnshire.gov.uk/section.asp?docId=88979)
The Next South Yorkshire Archaeology day will be on 20th November – details of the lectures have not yet been finalised but it should be an enjoyable day out.
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