We began the day on site as we had yesterday, only with a slight hitch before breakfast. The incredibly strong winds overnight had caused our marquee to buckle under the strain, meaning we again had attempt a salvage mission. We decided to take the marquee down for the day as the weather was only due to get worse. Maggie and Colin again proved to be the greatest of hosts by offering the use of their kitchen to ensure we were all fed and prepared for what was to be a long and blustery day on site, as well as the use of one of their barns whilst the worst of the weather passed!
When we arrived on site, we found our Army tent still standing strong. With our equipment gathered we set out to trowel back the remaining section of the trench, to reveal the remaining features on site. One area at the Southern end of the trench was of particular interest, as it had provided some pottery sherds when the original top-soil and sub-soil had been removed. When this area was trowelled back several black burnished body sherds were found by James and James H. With the remainder of the trench trowelled several potential features were revealed.
Regrouping for morning break the team then split off to new features or continued to excavate features started yesterday. James H drew a plan and section of his feature and finalised the paperwork, as did Hayley, Samara and Josh. Holly-Ann, Tilly and James continued the gargantuan task of removing the layer at the Northern end of the trench to find any features hidden below, whilst Douglas and Sue continued excavating the Post-Medieval feature they began yesterday.
Hayley and Josh then began excavating the Southern side of the Northern trackway, making great progress. By mid-afternoon Ellie and Zara had finished excavating a feature with a natural sandstone base, they were then tasked with removing the section in Andy’s trench – in the hopes of finding more dating evidence. After the first few scrapes of the trowel they unearthed the first Small Find of this year’s excavation – the below fragmentary Millstone.
Thus marking a brilliant end to a day that had started so badly.