Find of the month: June – Why mend a mortaria ?

Director, Mark Allen discusses why anyone would pay good money to fix a broken pot

Our find of the month for June is rather intriguing. It is a Roman mortaria, the ancestor to the modern day pestle and mortar we use today for crushing seeds and spices, and was found during monitoring of groundworks for a housing development in Suffolk.

Mortaria are not particularly rare objects, and they often turn up on Roman sites. However, what is rather special about this example that it was made in the 1st century or early 2nd century AD and has clearly been dropped and broken into a number of pieces, before being repaired. The repairs consist of twin sets of holes drilled through the sherds with lengths of lead used to ‘staple’ the pieces together: no UHU (other brands of glue are available) or sticky tape existing at the time!

Roman mortaria, used for grinding food, which has been broken and mended using lead staples

This may in itself sound pretty unimpressive, but the mystery is that with the repairs the mortaria would have become far less useful and could not have been used for crushing or mixing liquids anymore. ‘How is this interesting ?’ I hear you cry! Well, it gives us an insight into the social activities and values of the Roman who owned this nearly 2,000 years ago, a rare opportunity without inventing a time machine and popping back to observe the people themselves.

If we examine the vessel more closely we see other clues: the spout (to right of the photo) is quite worn suggesting it had seen a lot of use. This is further confirmed when we look at the inside of the bowl. Mortaria were made by pressing small, hard grits into the soft clay before firing, producing a rough, jagged surface to help crush the food inside the bowl. Modern mortaria do not do this because the grits would occasionally pop out and end up in the food, which is not very good for your teeth! In this instance, the grits have been all but lost or worn down, again showing that the mortaria had been used for a long time.

The time, effort and expense required to repair the mortaria would have been considerable considering it was now next to useless as a household item and it’s much more common to see repairs on fancy vessels like Samian ware (Willis 2005, 11.4), so why on earth would you repair such a thing? The most plausible explanation is that it held some intrinsic value to the individual who had it repaired. The object itself was important, less so its functionality. We can never be sure, but perhaps it was a present or had been inherited from a deceased relative or friend, and just the presence of the vessel was a reminder of them.

Archaeology is not just about preparing a record of the physical remains of former activities, it is also the study of past behaviour. Through the physical objects we gain insights into past lives. At a time that A Level archaeology has been scrapped and fewer universities are offering degree courses in the subject than once did, we should remember that the study of the past is important, in that it gives us the opportunity to learn from the mistakes of our ancestors. Perhaps now, more than ever, this needs to be highlighted.

References:

Willis, S, 2005, Samian Pottery, a Resource for the Study of Roman Britain and Beyond: the results of the English Heritage funded Samian Project. An e-monograph. http://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue17/1/11.4_5.html

Geophysics as endurance training #OpStretcher

Rob Evershed, Geophysics Project Officer

Normally I’m either found sitting at my desk, analysing geophysical surveys, or out in a field walking around with a machine that goes beep (a lot) whilst the magical pixies within it draw a picture of what’s under the ground. Recently there’s been a very large amount of walking whilst conducting a geophysical survey of a proposed cable location. I’ve probably been averaging 15 to 20km a day, 4 or 5 days a week for a large part of the last 6 to 9 months. This has been wonderful for my fitness if not for the health of my work boots – I’ve managed to wear out two pairs so far.

Nothing stops Rob’s dedication to walking for geophysics

Fortunately all this walking has an added benefit, it’s turned out to be perfect training for a charity event I’m taking part in from the 26th May to the 4rd June. Away from archaeology I like to play a lot of field hockey. Depending on who I’m talking to I either describe myself as an archaeologist who happens to play hockey, or a hockey player with a sideline in archaeology. I have been very fortunate and proud to belong to a charity hockey team called ‘Hockey for Heroes’ for the last five years. We raise funds for Help for Heroes, by mixing exceptional physical exertion combined with playing hockey.

Playing hockey in rather better weather

This year’s challenge is our biggest yet and involves walking from Sophia Gardens in Cardiff to Marlow Hockey Club in Buckinghamshire. Along the way we’ll visit various hockey clubs and play 30 games of hockey over the 10 day period. We will also be taking it in turn to carry a stretcher containing former Royal Marine Dominic Lovett who was injured during a military training exercise and is now tetraplegic.

Duration: 10 days
Distance carrying stretcher: 200 miles
Hockey Games: 30
Squad size: 40

The #OpStretcher squad

We will also have the Great Britain Men’s Hockey Team Manager, Andy Halliday, supporting us on our journey by dribbling a hockey ball along the entire route behind the stretcher!

As you can probably imagine it’s not an easy task we’ve set ourselves this year, and hopefully we will be able to raise as much money as possible. If you’d like to help sponsor me visit https://www.justgiving.com/fundraising/Robert-Evershed or text OPST71 £5 or OPST71 £10 to 70070

I’m very hopeful that the many, many weeks of geophysical surveying that I’ve done will provide perfect training for this event, and I’d like to thank you for taking the time to read this. I will be making regular updates on twitter https://twitter.com/robertevershed to let everyone know how we’re getting along, and more information can be found at https://hockeyforheroes.co.uk/

Best site hut biscuit with Mike

What is your job role?
Project Manager

How long have you worked for Allen Archaeology?
4 years

How would describe your excavation technique?
Formerly rapid bordering on cavalier

Mike in his digging days

How long have you been working in archaeology?
19 years apparently!

How did you get into archaeology?
It was this or a trainee manager for a DIY store chain and at the time I didn’t know the simple joys of owning a shed.

What is the best thing about your job?
Changing the staff planner when Gav isn’t looking.

Specialist skills?
I know several ways to disarm angry people, which comes in useful when I change the planner.

Best site hut biscuit?
Always Jaffa Cakes by choice, even if for tax purposes they are technically cakes

More than just stuff and things: desk-based assessment

Harvey Tesseyman, Project Archaeologist (Heritage Research)

My job in the Heritage Research team mostly involves writing desk-based assessments (DBAs) to establish and record what might be damaged if construction or demolition was to go ahead on a particular site: I take thousands of years of archaeology and history and condense it into a report. There’s a real joy in the neatness of it (if you’re into that kind of thing). If you’ve ever stood back and looked at your newly tidied living room or desk, with everything in its place, it feels a bit like that. It’s about teasing a coherent and useful narrative out of a seemingly endless set of information to a strict deadline. Generally DBAs are made up map regression, place name analysis, and analysing HER (Historic Environment Record) data, accompanied by a visit to the site to see what is ‘on the ground’.

Harvey at work

Map regression refers to comparing a series of maps made over a period of time so you can see the changes and consistencies within a landscape. Some rural areas change very little, but as time goes on you often see huge spikes in the density of buildings. Medieval maps are often as artistic as they are utilitarian, drawn with an unusual perspective and often with hand painted illustrations. As the common land utilised by everyday folk was privatised and enclosed from the early 1600s, enclosure maps refer to prominent landowners and the winding medieval field boundaries give way to the authoritative grid-like structure that we still see today. Tithe maps keep track of what areas of land belonged to whom, and how much wealth that land was expected to render. Historic mapping is intrinsically linked to social and political history, what seem like simple changes to the borders of a field system or the establishment of a new settlement often represent huge societal changes.

Looking at place names also offers insight into the history of an area. Place names ending in “..chester”, or “..caster” often refer to Roman period occupation. Most people live near somewhere with the suffix “..ham”, which is derived from the Anglo-Saxon name for a farm or settlement. The “..thorpe” or “..by” suffix in a place name derives from the Old Norse “þorp” and “bȳ”, both meaning a small village or farmstead. A derivation alone isn’t enough to confirm settlement for a particular period, but it’s a good start. You’ll find lots of names like Kiln Street, Butchers Row, Mill Row, or Gallows Lane, which suggest how a particular street may have once been used. The history of Britain is quite literally written in its place names, although in typical fashion it isn’t usually written in modern English and requires some degree of translation.

HER data is a log of every important aspect of the historic environment. Artefacts, the location of settlement cores, listed buildings and anything else historic or archaeological are included and the data arrives spread across any number of PDF files and GIS shapefiles. First it needs sorting, then it gets categorised by period in a spreadsheet and imported into a GIS to get an idea of how it looks spatially. A strong concentration of Roman finds taking on a roughly straight distribution might indicate a ladder settlement belonging to a lost road, whilst medieval and post-medieval settlement cores often remain unchanged even into the modern period. The same goes for little villages centred around medieval churches. For the prehistoric period you can often see clusters of activity in particularly fertile areas, or along waterways.

I have more than a passing interest in landscape archaeology partly due to the ephemeral nature of early finds and the lack of maps for certain periods. The prevalence of barrows, trackways, and enclosures paints a reasonable picture of how the landscape was used. You can level a building, but it’s far harder to completely obliterate its place in landscape. My favourite thing by far about working in the team is the closeness to the historic environment; I can take a privileged look into the minutiae of someone else’s life, and the work goes a long way to arguing the point that the historic environment is something that needs protecting and preserving. Archaeology is more than just “stuff” and history is more than just “things”.

Find of the Month: An Iron Age loom weight

Our find of the month for May enables us to have a look at textile production during the Iron Age. It is a large, triangular loom weight which was found during an evaluation in the village of Kirkby on Bain, Lincolnshire. Archaeological evidence for the actual process of textile production is scarce as the wooden looms and associated threads and wool don’t survive. What do survive better are the spindle whorls from the spinning process and loom weights from weaving.

Loomweight

These triangular shaped loom weights are thought to have been used during the Iron Age and are usually made from fired clay, though stone is common on earlier sites. The clay is normally of low firing and as such the weights are prone to break. Later Anglo Saxon loom weights are circular and many Roman ones are pyramidal in shape. The reason for choosing a particular shape is not known and is likely a personal or cultural preference. Loom weights are a fairly common find on sites in Northern Europe and in the Near East where a certain type of loom was used.

The loom which would have been in use during the British Iron Age was the warp-weighted loom which became obsolete in the Roman period but had been in use since the Neolithic. This was a fairly simple loom which consisted of two wooden uprights and a horizontal bar, which would rest against the wall. The warp (vertical) threads would hang freely from the bar and would be tied individually or in bundles to the loom weights. The clay loom weights hanging from the bottom of the threads would keep them taut enough to enable the weft (horizontal) threads to be more easily passed over and under in the weaving process.

This particular loom weight is quite large, weighing in at 2.27kg which would create quite a bit of tension in the yarns. As mentioned earlier, due to the low firing of the clay, they can break fairly easily and several of these heavy items hitting into each other as you weave would cause frequent damage. This loom weight has lost the tips of two of the corners but is still a remarkably complete example of the type.

Best site hut biscuit with Feenagh

Excavating a skeleton in October 2014

What is your job role?
Project Supervisor

How long have you worked for Allen Archaeology?
I started working for AAL in September 2013

How would describe your excavation technique?
Erratic – It’s a messy process, but normally produces good results!

How long have you been working in archaeology?
Since September 2013!

How did you get into archaeology?
Through a love of history, a burning desire not to work inside and just a little bit of luck I guess.

What is the best thing about your job?
The community aspects of it. I’ve been lucky enough to work on a few of our recent community projects and I love the buzz you get from engaging with the public and talking about archaeology. We have a pretty cool job and it’s nice to show it off!

…Also mud.

Specialist skills?
The ability to turn any conversation into one about cats??!

Best site hut biscuit?
The digestive. It’s a good honest biscuit that isn’t afraid of a little bit of tea.
Or a Custard Cream if I’m feeling fancy…

AAL: Winners of the Archaeological Training Forum Award!

This week we attended the CIfA Conference in Newcastle where we were proud to win the Archaeology Training Forum (ATF) award for the AAL Commerical Archaeology Trainee Scheme! It’s really fabulous to have everyone’s efforts in passing on their skills and knowledge recognised in this way and massive congratulations are due to our trainers and trainees alike!

AAL Senior Manager Natasha Powers collects our award (with congratulations to Worcester Archive and Archaeology Service for their highly commended)

We believe that knowledge and skills are best when shared and that a smaller company can provide a more diverse training experience. We also see it as our responsibility to provide a rounded set of experiences which staff can use to take their career in whichever direction they choose. I said in my acceptance speech (whilst facing a stuffed giraffe) that I hoped we showed that training doesn’t need to be rocket science, and the judges commended our straightforward and pragmatic approach. So what have we done that’s so special?

It’s short – The logic behind this is simple. When recruiting we ask for three months experience of UK commercial archaeology, so rather than relying on finding people who already have this, we offer three months with us to meet that criteria.

It’s affordable – It is important to us that our traineeships are accessible so they are fully paid. The wage enables people who are not in a financial position to volunteer on research excavations to apply for the role. Keeping the timescale short makes this an even more practical option. Overtime and subsistence allowances are available and, Trainees have free transport to and from site and free accommodation if they work away (as do the rest of our staff).

It’s diverse – Trainees are given experience of and support with all the tasks that a Project Archaeologist would do. At AAL this includes survey (GPS and/or TST), GIS and illustration skills, photography and assisting with geophysical survey as well as excavation and recording.

…and so are out trainees – Our trainees have been recent graduates, early career individuals from outside the UK and young people with a genuine interest and aptitude but who have not followed a traditional academic route.

We advertise on our website based on the company workload and, whenever we can we overlap the start of each traineeship with the end of the previous one.

Each trainee is given a written training plan which references CIfA training standards and templates and is linked to NOS. Following feedback from our staff last year, a key set of skills are also evaluated by each Project Supervisor at the end of each site. If a Trainee is not considered to have achieved the required level in skills at the end of the three months, their traineeship is extended and they are given a documented forward plan. In the two instances where traineeships were extended, both staff put in tremendous efforts following feedback and completed their traineeships shortly afterwards. Our aim is that on successful completion of the final review, the Trainee is awarded a permanent contract as Project Archaeologist.

Alice learning single context recording at Lincoln Transport Hub

Tae on a rural, Roman site

The positive and constructive feedback from our trainees shows the scheme works and is helping us to improve it further.

“I found my trainee programme very beneficial as I previously had no experience digging – either commercial or academic, so was a great opportunity to get into archaeology and be paid for it.”

“It gave me a proper view of what commercial archaeology really was and I didn’t feel like my lack of experience prevented me from going on any site or prevented any opportunities. The staff at Allen are all very friendly and helpful which made asking questions, help and generally becoming a part of the team so much easier.”

“I’m very grateful the trainee scheme exists as it allowed me to get into commercial archaeology when it might have otherwise been difficult”

“There was a balanced mix of office-based and site-based work that allowed me to develop excavation skills on small to large scale excavations, whilst learning how to make the transition from site material to post-excavation reporting smoother for all involved. All in all, my experience was really quite rounded. I enjoyed it immensely and it gave me the skills to feel confident to work at any site, or in the office”

Recent reports show a 5% drop in university applications, particularly from those aged 19–25 years. In a discipline that currently draws 95% of its staff base from universities, we hope that the this provides a working model for a non-traditional entry route. Supporting and mentoring the Trainees also contributes to staff development and is particularly valuable in enabling newly promoted Project Supervisors to hone their skills. Giving staff the chance to build on and share their experiences is vital (even if it is potentially a little scary for the Management Team) and our ‘AAL Xmas lectures’ ensure that we have at least one day a year when the whole team gets together.

Since March 2015, ten trainees have joined us: both recent graduates and those with no formal qualifications. All but one successfully completed their traineeship and five are currently permanent members of staff.

Merely a mirror? Reflections from a conservator

Guest blogger Rebecca Plumbe, University of Lincoln Masters student

Objects can be very deceptive. Like people, most of them have secrets which stay hidden until you start questioning them. As a conservator, I am a nosey parker by nature. If I could, I would sit an object down under a blinding spotlight and interrogate it with endless questions: How old are you? What are you? What are you made from? And what were you used for? But I suppose that’s what I do when I conserve an object. Inanimate material things will not tell you anything and it is their silence which is the conservator’s challenge. What can I find out about this object to further our shared understanding of its purpose and its history? For the past three months, I have spent my time doing just this with an intriguing archaeological find excavated by Allen Archaeology that arrived disguised in the form of another object. But how can an object be misleading? Well, pull up a chair at the interrogation table as I reveal my findings . . . .

The suspected medieval mirror before conservation treatment

The object in question resembled a Medieval mirror case and had been found on a site close to a deserted medieval village. These kinds of mirrors were believed to be carried by Pilgrims, who thought that catching the reflection of a Saint would imbibe the mirror with their attributes. Initial observations and comparisons with other mirror cases from the period on the Portable Antiquities Scheme database revealed some striking similarities such as the circular recessed shape and the traces of a reflective metal inlay.

An 11th to 12th century mirror case (from Hinds 2010)

But all was not what it seemed! Underneath the layers of corrosion product hid a very different object all together. And one that was at least 900 years younger than was first thought!

Placing the object into the X-ray chamber for analysis

Cleaning the object

Analysis using XRF (X-ray Fluorescence) determined that the object was composed of a metal alloy (brass) as both copper and zinc were identified, the thinner, shinier metal inlay was nickel. But the real surprise came during the mechanical removal of corrosion product from the surface. Slowly but surely, small incised markings began to appear upon the nickel inlay, followed by a distinct horse-shoe shape bearing the letters ‘B_E_ A_ U_ C_ O’ stamped onto the main brass body.

Small incised markings in the nickel inlay

Stamped horseshoe-shaped makers mark

Markings such as these act as clues and allow us to do a little detective work. Although the lettering around the horseshoe was partially lost, due to the effects of corrosion, there was enough evidence to tie it to a French watch-makers, Pierre, Fritz and Louis Japy who manufactured under the name of ‘Beaucourt’. Time had finally caught up with the object’s true identity!

Beaucourt was the French town in which Japy Fréres (Japy Brothers) pioneered the mechanisation of time-piece manufacture, bringing the watch making process under one roof for the first time. Although Japy Fréres started making watches in 1770, the stamp located on this casing dates to around 1890-1900. Japy Fréres prided themselves on making time-pieces for ‘the common man’, so this particular pocket watch could be purchased at a reasonable price. The smaller incised markings appear to refer to the date at which the pocket watch was once repaired. The pocket-watch was nickel plated, which explained the presence of these thinner metal remnants along the lip of the casing.

Conservators tool kit and the watch case after conservation

The conservator’s tool kit. Mechanical removal of the disfiguring corrosion layers was achieved to stabilise and uncover the surface of the watch casing

So my time spent with a scalpel, dental tool pick and microscope was time well spent, as was the case (quite literally!) with this archaeological find. With the metal now stabilised and the maker’s marks once again visible, it can tell its true story. I like to think of objects as suspects: question everything until you discover the truth. Despite being inanimate, they can still pack a surprise or two!

References

Antique Horology, undated),Trademarks, Stamps & Signatures, [online] Available from http://www.antique-horology.org/Trademarks/default.asp [Accessed 1 March 2017].

Artclock, 2017, Japy Freres: Biography, History + Markings, Year, [online] Available from http://www.artclock.nl/horloges-pagina-2-info/11-japy-freres-history-marking-year-11a-kopie [Accessed 1 March 2017]

Artclock, 2017, Japy Freres: History + Mark, Year, Design Index, [online] Available from http://www.artclock.nl/11-japy-freres [Accessed 1 March 2017]

Hinds, K, 2010, WILT-F04EB6: A MEDIEVAL MIRROR CASE. [online] Available from https://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/384545 [Accessed 17 Feb 2017].

Stephen-Smith, M, 2006, The Emergence of Modern Business Enterprise in France, 1800-1930. 1^st edition, USA: Harvard University Press

Find of the month: April

This month’s find is a sherd of Anglo-Saxon pottery from an evaluation in Wellingborough, Northamptonshire. It was found in a small posthole alongside a narrow gully terminal, which may have been associated with a structure.

The fabric of the pottery sherd is known as Stamford Ware owing, unsurprisingly, to its manufacture in a number of small potteries concentrated around the Lincolnshire town of Stamford. It was produced between the ninth and thirteenth centuries; by the tenth century, Stamford was one of the major pottery centres of England, exporting its wares throughout the country. By this time, pottery would have been produced on a wheel as opposed to the earlier method of building up a vessel in a series of rings or coils. Stamford produced a variety of fine wheel-thrown vessels, mainly cooking pots, small bowls, spouted pitchers, jugs and dishes. Many of the fine table wares were decorated with a transparent lead glaze and, after circa 1150, with a bright copper green glaze, a useful piece of dating evidence for the archaeologist.

The pottery sherd from Wellingborough is unglazed and an unusually dark colour. This colour is the result of a lack of oxygen during the firing process, a process known as reduction, and is associated with the earlier fabric types. The sherd is decorated with a band of diamond-notched rouletting typical of the 10^th-century examples. At just 25mm in length, it is unfortunately too small to determine the form of the original vessel.

Stamford pot

So why choose a sherd of pottery barely bigger than a postage stamp as Find of the Month? Well, evidence of Anglo-Saxon activity in this area of Wellingborough is scarce, with reported finds being restricted to a single small find of a silver penny of Edward the Confessor (Pastscape Monument 345426). So, despite its diminutive size, this piece of pottery is actually a find of significant local importance.

References:

Kilmurry, K, 1980 The Pottery Industry of Stamford, Lincs. C. AD850-1250 British Archaeology Report British Ser 84

Blinkhorn, P, 2017 Pottery and CBM from 30 High Street, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire (Site WEHS17) In AAL Report AAL2017019

Regia Anglorum – Anglo-Saxon and Viking Crafts – Pottery

University of Leicester website