A postcard from Oslo

At the end of the March I spent four days at the University of Oslo for the Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology (CAA) annual conference. AAL were fantastic and supported my attendance, as did a low income bursary from CAA International. Last summer, prior to getting a job with AAL, I agreed to run a session with Stuart Eve of LP Archaeology at the conference focussing on digital approaches to multisensory engagements with the past (Interpretations from digital sensations). We decided to run the session on the back of a series of discussions we have both had on twitter about each of our research trying to move beyond a visual interpretation of the past.

Piotr Dziewanowski from the National Maritime Museum in Gdańsk presenting scans of the Soldek

Lawrence Shaw’s 3D printed Digital Elevation Model

I presented a paper in the session and we had two other speakers; Lawrence Shaw of the New Forest National Park and Piotr Dziewanowski from the National Maritime Museum in Gdańsk. My paper seemed to go down fairly well, which is always nice, and the other two papers were fantastic. The team from Gdańsk presented a series of scans of the museum ship the Soldek, which looked like an incredibly complicated project and produced some amazing outputs. While Lawrence Shaw and his team demonstrated the use of 3d printing to engage the public with the Lidar; letting people “get tactile” with the landscape.

While I was out there I also had some great conversations about how to introduce more digital techniques or applications into commercial archaeology, a slightly ignored subject, and “enthusiastically” discussed over a few glasses of wine at the fantastic Museum of Cultural History… The underlying theme of those discussions was not that commercial archaeology did not need to introduce new and shiny methodologies and applications, but rather that there was no time in the commercial world to roll out and field test new on site approaches and in the UK archives are frequently not willing to accept digital data. For example, I saw numerous approaches to using tablets onsite for recording, instead of the traditional context sheets. This would allow us to avoid digitizing these at the end of the project and should in theory force the appropriate data to be collected in the field. However, setting up and ensuring this system works on the software end would require a lot of development. There are costs associated with buying in the kit. And also is the hardware capable of dealing with a British winter… (Though Mike and Flo from LP highlighted that you can buy ruggedized tablets; the issue is ensuring they are cleaned and dried on return from the field).

One of the Viking Ships and the incredible building they are housed in

Detail of the woodworking from one of the ships

Somewhere along the line we went to visit the Viking Ship Museum, where my inner maritime archaeologist got very excited. The boats, the artefacts, the preservation, and the building they are presented in is amazing!

One of the sessions that really stood out for me was run by Gary Lock, Agiatis Benardou, Costis Dallas, Paul Reilly and Jeremy Huggett; a roundtable on scenarios for the next five years of archaeological computing. It was a really challenging session making us all think about the future of digital archaeology and I’m looking forward to hearing about the follow up to the session.

Finally on the last day I “conference-bombed” the digiTAG session ran by my friend Sara and her colleagues. They had a couple of presenters drop out and wanted to fill a couple of spots. All I can say what seemed like a good idea at 10pm after a few pints seemed less appealing at 6am the next morning. But I gave a quick presentation on theorising archaeo-acoustics, a presentation I had wimped out of submitting to their session in the first place; and I think it was well received (or at least twitter seemed to think so). The whole session was fantastic and drew together a number of my thoughts on the lack of theoretical engagement with digital approaches. I was sad to miss the concluding discussions.

Best site hut biscuit with Pickle

Site visit selfie #safteyfirst

What is your job role?
Office dog

How long have you worked for Allen Archaeology?
Nearly 6 months

How would describe your excavation technique?
Fast! But possibly in need of direction

How long have you been working in archaeology?
Nearly 6 months

How did you get into archaeology?
One member of my household staff had to go away for a week so the other had to bring me to the office. Everyone was so nice I couldn’t possibly consider doing anything else.

What is the best thing about your job?
Engaging with people, when I’m in the office everyone wants to talk to me and see what i’m “working” on!

Working hard in the office

Specialist skills?
Claiming sites – if you want that piece of masonry or mud marked, I’m your dog!

Best site hut biscuit?
Any within nose height!

Best site hut biscuit with Jedlee

Jedlee Chapman Welcome to the first post in a series where we meet some of the AAL staff and ask the important question of which biscuit is best!

What is your job role?
Project Archaeologist – I dig and record archaeology to the best standard possible

How long have you worked for Allen Archaeology?
Nearly 3 years

How would describe your excavation technique?
God like – controlled to get a good understanding of the archaeology I’m excavating and not to injure myself

How long have you been working in archaeology?
Almost 14 years

How did you get into archaeology?
My uncle was kind enough to get me on a job he was working at the time when I was 15 (16, I mean 16!) and I’ve been doing it ever since

What is the best thing about your job?
Archaeology is just like other jobs most days; but then you have those days out in the field where you come across something special, like an upper Palaeolithic blade. Those days make the wait till pay day or home time seem inconsequential!

Specialist skills?
I don’t really have a specialist skill; I’m more of an all-rounder, I know a bit of this and a bit of that!

Best site hut biscuit?
The hobnob (or the last biscuit in the pack!)

Digital techniques – Reflectance Transformation Imaging

Since starting at Allen Archaeology in September I’ve been involved with expanding our potential for digital recording and imaging. As you will hear in a later post, AAL have been using some techniques on site for a while but had not experimented with Reflectance Transformation Imaging (RTI).

A photo taken under normal lighting conditions

The same piece of wood viewed under novel lighting conditions and an acute lighting angle making the surface marks clearly visible

RTI is a technique which allows multiple images to be manipulated under varying lighting conditions to capture subtle surface information. Put simply when a surface is illuminated from an extreme angle it shows different information to a surface lit from above. By taking a series of photos from a single position but lit from different angles the images can be combined into an RTI, capturing a very accurate record of a surfaces shape. Imagine turning something in the light to discern changes in the surface. It can also allow the object to be viewed under novel lighting conditions allowing further information to be gleaned. Internet Archaeology have developed an online viewer with some examples here.

RTI has been used in research to record and study a whole range of objects and surfaces. Conservators have found the records useful in assessing the condition of artefacts (see here for some examples from the Smithsonian). While specialists in other fields have found the ability to compare artefacts located around the world has allowed their research to evolve (here are a variety of examples).

A normals visualisation of a pot from one of our sites

A normal visualisation of a Saxon pot from one of our sites

A close up of a coin under specular enhancement

At Allen Archaeology we have been using RTI as a supplementary record to photogrammetry, recording some of our particularly special finds. The results can then be sent on to our specialists to help them prepare our reports or to researchers with an interest in particular finds. They can also be used for us to send detailed information to our conservators in advance of the actual objects, helpful where objects are particularly fragile.

Chris and Josh having a go at capturing an RTI

The joy of RTI is it is quick, simple and low cost. The only equipment needed is a camera which can be used on a manual setting, a shiny ball (which the software uses to identify the position of the lighting) and a way of moving the lighting conditions (this can be a fancy remote flash or a light from a mobile phone). The software to combine the images is freely available (via the Cultural Heritage Imaging website).

Archaeology in the commercial world

The discipline of archaeology is as old, or older than some of the finds we dig up every day, with the first documented archaeological dig dating to the 6th century BC when the Babylonian king Nabonidus led excavations to find the earliest phases of several palaces and temples in ancient Babylon.

Roman colonnade discovered in Lincoln in 1878

In recent history, the discipline of archaeology began as a gentlemanly pursuit, with the profession gradually developing an increasingly scientific approach thanks to a number of scholars in Europe and America during the 19th century, such as General Pitt Rivers; a British soldier and adventurer, who brought military precision and organisation to the process of archaeology. Nevertheless many archaeological discoveries were still chance finds during development. In the 20th century, another military man, Mortimer Wheeler, also employed military precision in his numerous excavations in Britain and India, and helped bring archaeology to a mass audience through numerous TV and radio appearances.

General Augustus Pitt-Rivers 1827-1900

As the pace of development increased in the post-war years, the relationship between archaeology and development changed. It became apparent that many important archaeological sites were being lost, with little or no record. This led to the evolution of a whole new discipline of ‘rescue archaeology’ or ‘salvage archaeology’, which introduced new techniques to maximise the recovery of archaeological data with the limited time and resources available. This led to the development of a number of archaeological organisations, often based within and partially funded by local authorities, as well as by developers, to undertake these rescue digs.

Legislation was slow to catch up however, and it was not until, in 1990, with the implementation of PPG 16, the ‘polluter pays’ principle was applied to archaeology and development. This piece of planning guidance placed a burden upon the developer to ensure that archaeological remains at threat from development were adequately recorded, with that funding coming directly from the developer, and the work more often than not being secured by planning conditions. In some local authorities there was a feeling that more work should be undertaken pre-determination, both to limit future delays to construction programmes, and due to the concern that should important remains be exposed, there was little chance to offer them legal protection or record them adequately once a grant of planning permission had been issued. This finally manifested itself with the release of PPS5 in 2010, which placed greater emphasis on providing more information on a sites archaeological potential prior to submission of a planning application. PPS5 was short lived, but much of the guidance in PPS5 was adopted into the new National Planning Policy Framework in 2012.

The provision of developer funding for archaeology resulted in the development of numerous independent archaeological companies, and in recent years, the local authority based units have largely died out. Most companies nowadays are small, with tens of employees rather than hundreds, as well as numerous sole traders, particularly in the fields of specialist finds analysis. The fact that archaeology is developer funded also means that it is subject to competitive tendering to win projects, with the best price to fulfil the councils brief for the works usually being the winner. As such the whole process is very different to the preconceived notion of a cohort of academics and university students spending season after season studying every aspect of a single site in painstaking and minute detail. Furthermore, we can no longer choose where to go and what to dig up, rather, we are driven by the needs of our clients, so one week we may be excavating an Anglo-Saxon cemetery in Norfolk, then the next week Victorian tenements in Sunderland. Unfortunately, this also means we cannot, like academic research digs, restrict our digging to a few months in the summer, but have to be outdoors all year round, so a decent set of waterproofs and some woolly socks are a must!!

Hoeing snow at Sleaford Power Station

Because of the restrictions imposed by the nature of the industry, commercial archaeology can often seem a brutal process, with a lot of the heavy work undertaken by mechanical excavators, or a ‘big yellow trowel’ as they are colloquially known. That’s not to say there is not a lot of manual work after that. As soon as the topsoil is stripped off a site, its down to the mattocks, spades and shovels, and yes the trowels do still make an appearance as well. An experienced archaeologist can move a remarkable amount of soil with a trowel, and they have also been known to come in handy for cutting birthday cake in an emergency!!

In the 21st century, development led archaeology represents by far the majority of archaeological work undertaken in the UK, and the fact that this archaeological work is driven by the location of new developments, rather than a research focussed programme intended to test or prove a certain theory, has resulted in a new understanding of the country’s history and heritage, often leading to reappraisal and revision of traditional theories. The vast majority of the output of commercial archaeology is in the form of reports required by the planning authority, ‘grey literature’ as it is known, with only a minority of key sites reaching formal publication. However, numerous attempts have been made by academic researchers and commercial archaeologists alike in recent years to collate and interpret this ever growing body of data to further the understanding of the finite archaeological resource that lies beneath our feet.

International Women’s Day

In the most recent profiling (2013) of those working in archaeology it was found that 46% of staff were female. The number of women in archaeology has been steadily increasing and in some areas women outnumber men considerably. Of the private limited companies the ratio is quite different with only 29% of the employees being women and in field archaeology the split is closer to 40% women (see the report here). The breakdown of those jobs shows that (of the sample) 72% of Directors were male, Project Officers were of an equally male/ female, supervisors were mostly men (87%) and 84% of the project managers were male. In comparison [today] Allen Archaeology employs 16 (of 34) female staff. 50% of our supervisors and Project Archaeologists are female, 1/3 of our Project Officers and 1/4 of our management team are female.

To celebrate the women working at AAL we have asked them why they became archaeologists and what do they love about their jobs!

Fee on site at Nevern Castle in 2013

Fee
I got into commercial archaeology almost accidentally. I’ve always loved history and it became pretty obvious during various work experiences that I wasn’t the type of person to do well in an office environment; so when it came to choosing what to do after school I figured archaeology was as good an idea as any (although I admit that I had absolutely no idea how to become a real trowel welding archaeologist…). I went to study Anthropology and Archaeology at Durham, largely because they let me live in the castle, and although I enjoyed the lectures it wasn’t until my second year that I caught the digging bug. By some happy accident I ended up spending three weeks excavating at Nevern Castle in Pembrokeshire and I fell in love. It was hard work but it was almost definatly the highlight of my university experience and I wouldn’t be in this career now if it hadn’t been for that site. I still go back every year to dig there, and I still love every minute of it. After I got back I applied to be a volunteer with a company not far from my home town, but I didn’t hear back from them until over a year later when I got a phone call offering me a job. I started with AAL in September 2013 as a trainee site assistant and almost 2 and a half years later I’m still here, happily standing in the middle of a field, a little bit cold and covered in mud, watching a machine open up some trenches and hoping we find something exciting, I love every minute of it.

Rachel planning at a training dig in Derbyshire in 2010

Rachel
When I tell people I’m an archaeologist, more often than not, the announcement is met with surprise. Before I worked in commercial archaeology I had thought there were more Lara Croft’s than Indiana Jones’, and commercial archaeology in general there often appears to be more woman than men on site. But any site benefits from having us all there as we all bring different skills to the job and usually it’s nothing to do with gender stereotypes! I enjoy archaeology because it’s a varied job, and a practical way of learning about the past; though I enjoyed being a student, I definitely love digging more! And as a woman in archaeology I have found I am often the muddiest person on site- not very ladylike!

Cat working in the archives at AAL

Catriona
I have been interested in the past since I was little and gifted with my first horrible histories book- Vicious Vikings. From that day on, I was hooked on history, it was only when I reached university that I considered archaeology as a way to see and physically handle what the documents would tell you about the past. I gained a traineeship as an archaeologist after leaving university and haven’t looked back since. I love the variety, one day I am looking at rarely found type of Roman knife, the next a Victorian craniotomy or even the bog standard Roman ceramic tile.

Maria working in Rutland for AAL in 2011

Maria
Like many others, I grew up watching films and TV programmes such as Indiana Jones and Time Team which made history and archaeology seem fun and exciting. History was always one of my favourite subjects. Apart from playing treasure hunting games as a little girl, my career choice as a 19 year old was that of Informatics and IS/IT management. It was really only because I had an extra 10 weeks to fill for my MA Scs. at Gothenburg University that I decided to study a bit of archaeology purely for fun. Little did I know I would stay on to get a second degree. I really loved it! Although I knew a job in archaeology wouldn’t be as lucrative as one in IT, the thought of working within a field that continuously spurred an interest and perhaps get to combine this with travelling, seemed so much more appealing to me.
I landed my first job in Ireland 2006 and joined AAL in 2007 and as they say, the rest is History! I would be lying if I didn’t say the initial spark and excitement for the job didn’t get slightly jaded after a few years in the mud 🙂 but the core interest and fascination of learning something new about past times never really fades.

An early love of mud encouraged Beki to pursue a career in field archaeology

Beki
Initially I went to University to study history with archaeology, all bright eyes and bushy tailed with the intention of becoming a history teacher with one of those ‘stable’ jobs. A couple of archaeology lectures later and I was hooked. So here I am, 4 university years and over 3 commercial archaeology years later… still doing it. The reason that I particularly love archaeology is because in that moment, the one where you digging something or pulling an object out of the ground, you are the only person in the world seeing it for hundreds or thousands of years. An incredibly poignant sentiment. It’s also a chance to be outdoors every day, be surrounded by people with just any many quirks and similar interests as you and a chance to do something with a little more meaning.

Natasha excavating at Walton-le-Dale with Lancaster University Archaeology Unit as a fresh faced graduate

Natasha
I don’t remember ever really wanting to be anything other than an archaeologist…Blame children’s telly (particularly a programme about Skara Brae) and lots of early visits to museums. My Dad has a friend who worked with the Leakey’s so I was introduced to the idea that looking at old stuff could be an actual job pretty early on (though hominids are way too old for me!). I remember being taken to see the excavation of Waltham Abbey and being particularly impressed that there was a grave which was being left untouched because the occupant had died from smallpox. Mostly archaeology suited the fact that I am interested in both the arts and sciences. I did a mix of both for my ‘A’ levels and went to Bradford to study Archaeological Sciences. By the time I graduated, I knew that I wanted to specialise in human remains, but I also knew that I wanted to get some commercial excavation experience. I do enjoy a good matrix. I worked throughout the UK and Ireland and then went back to University to do a Masters in human osteology, paleopathology and funerary archaeology – the course too long for application forms. After that I worked in a mixture of field archaeology and osteology until I settled in London as an osteologist, trained as a manager and later moved to AAL. I’ve been (and am) involved in a huge number of really interesting projects and have worked with and for some really inspirational people. These days I don’t get outside much but I am very lucky to be able to flex my trowelling muscles at the Ness of Brodgar each summer – and finally get to Skara Brae!

Dominika handling a spade during her early days as an archaeologist

Dominika
When I was 7 years old my mother let me pick a book from the Readers Digest catalogue: I chose one about ancient Egypt, because I like the picture of Tutankhamun’s mask on the front. This was the start! I kept reading any history and archaeology books that I could find in the school library. I chose to go to Aberdeen University and study archaeology, then went on to Birmingham to do a masters in Egyptology. I returned to Scotland after completing my degrees and starting volunteering in the local museum in Perth and at Kinross Heritage Trust until I got my job at AAL and moved to Lincoln!

Emily processing samples with a celt at Silchester field school

Emily
Since a child I have always loved archaeology. Visiting castles, museums and places of national heritage has always been a fond pass time of mine. During Sixth Form I developed a keen interest in Classical Archaeology, through studying A- Level Classical Civilisations. I followed my interest into University where I received my degree in Archaeology and Classical studies. At University I had the opportunity to excavate and work at Silchester, the Roman town of Calleva Atrabatum. My time spent there heightened by love of Archaeology and made me pursue it as a career. Since joining commercial archaeology in 2014 I have thoroughly enjoyed working on a variety of different sites spanning across many time periods. Excavating and handling snippets of the pass on a day to day basis is fascinating and quite exciting as you never really know what you will discover next.

Cat on her first dig at Lake Mareotis in Egypt in 2008

Catriona
I started working in archaeology having completed an undergraduate, masters and PhD at the University of Southampton. I had been interested in archaeology before this, but it was not until I was making decisions about what to study I had really considered it an option (and if I’m being honest I chose it because I wanted to study something that would allow me to travel….). Spending 8 years studying archaeology at university I realised that I couldn’t envision working in another sector. For me it’s the variety the job brings: picking apart different buildings, looking for clues in the landscape or experimenting with new techniques to get more about of what we find that has kept me interested.

Nikki digging this December for AAL

Nikki
When I told my classics teacher I was going to study archaeology he stared at me right in the eyes and said “are you sure?” I can’t honestly say I was but I found myself in a hole (pun intended) and I haven’t been able to climb out since. I have always enjoyed history and the outdoors archaeology was the perfect answer and still is. The variety of people and places always keeps the job fresh and the communal atmosphere is one that I love. I dig it.

Alice on a Sheffield University training dig at West Halton

Alice
Today I was asked why am I an archaeologist? I have been in archaeology in one way or another for a long time so instead I asked myself why am I still an archaeologist? For me it is a chance to explore and discover in an ever changing environment. It allows me to constantly learn and develop as a person whilst spending time with a wide range of exciting personalities. However, I feel the most important thing is I’m doing something I love every day of the week and having fun whilst doing it!

Charlotte’s first day on her first ever training dig in 2011 with The Ardnamurchan Transitions Project

Charlotte
I originally applied for a place at university to study midwifery. I was good at sciences in school and decided that it would be a sensible degree, the NHS would pay for my fees and it had good job opportunities for the future. Two weeks before I was due to get my A-level results I realised that I didn’t want to spend my future working towards achieving something that was sensible. I wanted to spend future doing something that was an adventure, something that I was passionate about. I chose archaeology. I had always loved history and every weekend when I was a child I would ask my Dad to take me on a trip to our local museum so I could spend hours peering into cabinets at all the cool things people had used in the past, I found it fascinating! So in 2010 I applied to study Archaeology at the University of Manchester and I haven’t looked back since. The thing I love the most about being an archaeologist is that archaeology is something that is continuously interpretive and those interpretations are always changing from the beginning to end of the archaeological process, so no matter what part of the process you are involved in, no day is ever the same and I love it!

Cova at work in the archives

Cova
I first wanted to be a princess, and then an archaeologist. So my interest in history and archaeology started when I was very young. I always felt fascinated about the past and I was lucky enough that my father encouraged me to extend my interests further. When I went to university, I studied History and it was then that I had the opportunity to take part in archaeological projects, both on site and in the laboratory. After leaving Spain, I took other jobs relating to Art and auctions, but I couldn’t get Archaeology out of my mind, so I decided to go for it and applied for a job as an Archives supervisor in commercial archaeology. I don’t regret it at all, it is a busy job but very fulfilling.

Hello World

Welcome to the first Allen Archaeology blog! We are going to be posting every Friday afternoon little bits and pieces for people to enjoy in their tea breaks. These blogs are going to include exciting things that are going on at the company, profiles of our staff, stories from some of our sites and the things that we do as a commercial unit.

The blogs will give you the chance to hear from staff across the company, from our Trainees to the Directors, and to find out about what it is like to be an archaeologist from the people who are, quite literally, on the ground. We hope to start a conversation about what’s going on in the commercial world, at Allen Archaeology and further afield, so please engage with us!

If you’ve not visited us before why not have a click around our fancy new website and check out who we are and what we do! If you have found your way here then here are some pictures of what we’ve been getting up to this week.

Our directors checking out the video of our excavations at University of Lincoln, made by the Lincoln School of Journalism click here to see it for yourself

Josh is getting started on the Lithics from the Mesolithic site in the centre of Lincoln

Josh Hogue is getting started on the Lithics from the Mesolithic site in the center of Lincoln

Charlotte and Gavin have been out and about undertaking an earthwork survey in Worcestershire

Look at this beautiful (modern) stratigraphy from Lidl's development site in Dartford

Look at this beautiful stratigraphy from Lidl’s development site in Dartford

Chris has been mapping pottery distributions from one of the North Killingholme sites