CAER: Chester Amphitheatre Environs Research Project

David and the A team had another day of rain and trowelling… The A team persevered through the horrible weather and substantial mud to clean up the trench. This was difficult as the mud was close to making us fall over due to the substantial weight it added to our shoes. We successfully cleaned back around 3/4 of trench 8 however it is to be seen if the continued unfortunate weather will ruin the hard work we put in today. Hopefully, the weather will improve before tomorrow. Lucy’s group makes some discoveries… Powering through this less than pleasant weather, my group and I were focusing on removing the backfill still remaining in the north east corner of the site. Under the backfill lay a Roman pit (shown in the photo below), which has been cut by a gully. Exciting finds were uncovered during the excavation work today, such as a clay tobacco pipe bowl and some pottery dating to the post medieval period. Hopefully we’ll have some clearer skies tomorrow along with more discover...

Jake reports on Team B… Unfortunately the weather got the best of us today and excavation of both trenches 4 and 8 wasn't possible. So instead we sheltered in the pavilion from the rain while much deliberation ensued on what tasks were to be completed in the morning. The decision was made that Team B would bag the finds that have already been discovered so far in this year’s excavations until break time. After a very cold break Team B were then tasked to clean some finds. As it was Team B's half day [ahem, study day! Ed.] we were able to retreat to the warmth of our own homes in the afternoon. Happy diggers keeping busy out of the rain! A good selection of (now clean) pottery and building material! James enjoys finds washing… We joined the excavation just after lunch to find a collection of cold archaeologists trying to warm themselves up in the pavilion. The harsh and consistent morning rain had flooded the trenches and so we were forced to briefly abandon th...

From Holly … Throughout the day team D have been continuing to dig out our section of the trench by removing the backfill above the gully and Roman road which should allow us to move on to some more complex archaeology in the days to come, with only small pieces of pottery really being found around this area. We also took part in some level reading, which can be seen in the photo below, which will later allow us to measure archaeological features relative to sea level. The ducks from the previous days also decided to check in on us again whilst completing this activity as well as some friendly squirrels who decided to join in on the fun as well. Hopefully there will be lots of friendly animal visits as well as some interesting excavation in the days to come.  Establishing a bench mark for the site using the dumpy level Natasha … Today Team Bee and Team A continued trowelling work on our trench, this involved carrying on where we left off on Friday as well as u...

As Sophie describes, Day 2 of the Grosvenor Park excavation consisted of continuing to remove the backfill from the trench… I was cleaning a section of what may possibly be a foundation of a wall. Many others in the trench were cleaning backfill from the terram that was laid after last year's excavation to protect the archaeology and mark out the extent of the work. Team work! Abigail’s cleaning exposed a layer of orange/brown material and highlighted the edges of Roman pits discovered in the excavation last year. There was also the discovery of a potential feature located next to the ditch in the picture which appears to be a distinct in shape and a much darker colour than the soil around it. As well as the discovery of finds like Roman pottery, post-medieval glass and animal bone. 'Cleaning' of the surface reveals an orange-brown coloured deposit Robert reports for Team C… my team were excavating a section through a ditch which seems to lie on the ...