CAER: Chester Amphitheatre Environs Research Project

Holly M and Jack D report from trench 4... Holly M : Today we have carried on excavating the ditch and have been looking for the gulley for the Roman road as well as looking for the cut of the ditch. We also spent the morning interacting with various spectators, all with an interest in what we were looking for and whether we had found any ‘treasure’ 😂. It had been a long day in the sun and it was a nice end to the day when we were surprised with ice lollies to help us cool off after a hard day’s work. Hard work in the sun! Jack D:  Today the weather was boiling even before we arrived on site, and we had to put sun-cream on before anything started to prevent sunburn. Our group began the day bailing out one of the pits alongside the ditch we have been excavating as it had once again filled with groundwater, which wasn't too bad as there was less than previous days. Once the water was all but bucketed out, we began to take down the baulk section between the sections th...

Abigail’s group make a nice find in trench 4… Today we continued to dig down into the next context alongside the Roman road. Upon doing so we discovered a range of Roman pottery, building materials and animal bone. The discovery of a copper alloy Roman coin by Kayleigh was also a highlight. A copper alloy coin dating to the Roman period. Keep an eye out for more info towards the end of the dig! Alfie’s group find a big cat… Today Group C’s main job was using tools such as the mattocks, shovels and hand trowels to slowly work down the section in the supposed Anglo-Saxon ditch whilst occasionally cleaning it to see if there were any changes in the soil’s context. The main kinds of contexts we worked through today were mixed clay soils and a grey silty deposit. In terms of finds, many sherds of pottery, including samian ware and black burnished ware, were found along with ceramic building material all dating to the Roman period. Lots of animal bones were found as well. Mos...

Sophie’s team has mattock mania… Today Teams A and Bee were tasked with mattocking trench 8 to determine whether we had reached a new context. The mattocking was hard work but we all cooled off in the breaks in the shade after the first full sunny day in Grosvenor Park! Finally  some sunny weather for excavation in the Park! Alex  discusses dust and discovery… The mattocks were out for the A-team on a roasting day. The dry mud caused hassle but once in the swing of it the A-team and team B continued on with their work finally getting past most of the backfill and into the new contexts. Discoveries were plentiful with large pieces of bone and pottery being found. Throughout the day the A-team engaged with the interested public answering questions and showing our finds. However, the heat was a difficult opponent causing much needed water and shade breaks, yet the A-team continued through this and completed the day. Now the A-team is in preparation for the next day of...

A spell of wet weather brings the week to a muddy and wet end... Jack gets stuck in….MUD, MUD, MUD, MUD EVERYWHERE! As you can guess it was quite the muddy day. But certainly not uneventful. Focusing on finds cleaning today was originally a slow start. However, after intensive cleaning and just as intensive rain, Team A unearthed a rather interesting find. Believed to be a shoulder bone (from an animal) the piece was an exciting discovery, sparking much buzz in the trench. Team A will continue to strive to uncover more archaeology as we finally excavate the new deposits. Rain makes work on site more difficult! Sammy  puts his foot in it… Activities today were varied and mostly overshadowed by intermittent downpours. Despite this and a thoroughly sodden foot some interesting artefacts were found; notably large quantities of Samian pottery. In the afternoon we took up the task of cleaning finds. A combination of warm water, toothbrushes and patience allowed for the a...

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 ...

Day One was all about removing last year’s backfill and cleaning up the trench ready for this year’s digging to start…highlights include some unusual visitors and we introduce Keith the Spade and Kenneth the trowel. Hear how they got on…. Jack … Whether being bombarded by rain, baked in the sunlight or being invaded by a stray pair of ducks the first day was a great success. Focusing on the removal of backfill in an attempt to uncover the previous year's excavation efforts today was a day purely dedicated to manual labour. Continuously chipping away at the soil today only saw the occasional small find. With no major finds, it was painful to witness but, the overall experience was enjoyable and educational regardless. Interactions with members of the public provided insight on public interpretation while effective team-working served as a foundation of what is to come. As it stands, Team A and all other teams present found the experience highly enjoyable and can't wait to ...

Welcome to our blog and our 13th season of excavation in Grosvenor Park, Chester!  Our second year archaeology students are raring to go and excavation starts on Thursday 2nd May continuing until Friday 31st May 2019 (excluding Bank Holidays). You might see some activity in the park from Wednesday 1st May as we start to uncover our trenches ready to continue excavation. What will we uncover this year? The excavation is open for public viewing and students will be on hand during weekdays 9.30am to 4.30pm (except Bank Holidays and between 12.30pm - 1.30pm), to tell you about the park’s Roman and medieval archaeology. An Open Afternoon will be taking place on Wednesday 29th May, 1pm – 4.30pm, giving you the chance to see first-hand what the students have found and to learn more about the archaeology of this corner of Chester. The site will also be open to view on Sunday 2 June during Deva Triathlon 2019. You can follow our progress on this blog as well as updates via Facebook ,...

And so, we get to the bittersweet end of our dig. In fact, is our last day as second-year students, but as the weeks at the dig site have progressed, the routine and the work has grown on us, and it is with mixed filings I now have to end this year. I don’t know if I talk for all of us, but I would say that I would miss this experience. Most of the people that I have shared a trench with this month I did not even know that well beforehand, and now the only thing I wish for is that we could have gotten more time together before the year ends. But enough nostalgia, today me and Adam were excavating a context filled with a lot of stones. It seems to align pretty well with the wall in the neighbouring trench (just a little bit higher up). So, who knows, there might be something interesting for next year's students to find down there. Apart from that, just as the title suggests, the rest of the day pretty much rained away, and most of the remaining time left to us went i...

The final day of the dig for Team D consisted filling out the context sheets and completing the section drawings for Trench IV.   The afternoon rain flooded the trenches, making the trench very slippery underfoot, which made today’s tasks difficult to carry out however we managed to finish the section drawings, plans, and context sheets as a team.   Team F found the bottom of the Early-Medieval ditch, which was in the trench we were all working in.   The speculated bottom of the Early-Medieval ditch   A highlight for our team was finding the Roman flagon neck and the handle to go with it, which was found in Trench IV, near the sondage, yesterday.  Another highlight was finding Roman glass, found by Kelly, which is believed to be from a perfume bottle.  We also found a piece of iron that looked like it could have been a key. The flagon spout and the handle     Our overall experience as a team is positive; we ha...

Today was the much anticipated open day, where members of the public would be allowed on site to see the results of the months hard work. All teams strived to show off our excavation skill, and eagerly showed visitors what we had found. On display were various Roman and Medieval/ Post Medieval artefacts from both trench VIII and IV, including samian ware counters featuring makers marks, bone dice, and decorated tiles.  Team A have all enjoyed May's excavation, and are sad that it is now coming to an end. Thanks to all those involved in making this years dig a great experience! Team A

This afternoon team B did some recording of the Roman road and gully, whilst other members of the team did some level recording and filling out of context sheets. We are well underway to mapping out the road. The remainder of the road gully was removed, finding more in the second half of the ditch than the first, including metalworking and Roman pottery. Elsewhere in the trenches, people continued to excavate the unknown depths of a medieval (?) ditch. At the very end of the day, other members were uncovering a possible stone well cap. Overall Team B would like to say we have thoroughly enjoyed our time together over the last few weeks, with 21 ice creams consumed, 3 major sunburns, 4 animal invasions, an unknown number of buckets carried, and thousands of memories made. We’ve had a brilliant time! Team Bee and their tribute to the trench burrowing bees

The cannon backfire, before being excavated This was a productive morning in both trenches as headway was made digging into the ditch at the back of trench IV and much more excitingly the early modern feature in trench VIII was finally determined to be a cannon backfire because of the residue found on the end facing the Chester walls. Wasn’t long though until work began to remove it and excavate the context underneath Trench IV, after the cannon backfire had been excavated Find of the morning, a bone dice on top of a sandstone brick near the cannon backfire. This joins a matching set of five found nearby last year. The afternoon was also productive in both trenches, however, in trench IV we had a bit too much enthusiasm. During the early afternoon it took a while to get things going again after a blissful lunch break in the sun, to which we were joined by a group of Mexican school children keen to learn about what we were doing and what we had found. This session contin...

Day 13 has been another day of exceptional sunshine and heat, which made excavating fairly difficult as the soil had become hard, requiring plenty of energetic mattocking, especially in the west end of trench IV..  After another long day spent digging (and sweating profusely) in Grosvenor Park, we are still nowhere near the bot tom of our early medieval ditch and have been left with aching muscles, sunburn and mosquito bites.  This rather brings to light th e meaning of a certain  quote  we encountered (and ignored in disbelief) during first year : “Archaeology can be very boring, distressing and physically uncomfortable”  - unfortunately, it’s true (especi ally for Connor ,  who fell down Dave’s test pit  and was  promptly followed by a wheel barrow full of soil!) .   A piece of (very blue) Roman glass On a slightly more serious note, today’s finds include a piece of Roman glass, substantial Roman pottery, a medieval Cistercia...