New Project: TBC

We are excited to report that a new project is on the horizon. As meetings are being arranged we can't give out any details yet, but this would be an archaeology project on an important national heritage site.   

Season's End

 

The Digging season has ended early this year. Although we did not find much in the way of features, especially the 'Great Seller', we have had a massive increase in artefacts, especially architectural stonework (see previous articles below). 

We were held back by lack of access to a digging machine and had to strip the 5m x 5m trench by hand, but through the hard work of our volunteers we had a successful year, considering we started late in the season too. 

The 2018 technical report has been written and copies sent to the Dorset County Council Archive and Dorset County Museum. The finds have been archived and stored by the Stalbridge History Society. The 2019 report is in progress and nearly ready to be archived. 

A big thank you to all our volunteers who dug this year. See you in 2022. 

Fancy a tipple?

The baluster glasses of the late 17th and early 18th centuries owe their distinctive style to necessity and English invention. A Georgian baluster glass owes it's existence to the slower cooling lead metal (lead crystal or flint if you prefer) developed at the Savoy glass house. The glass was not suited to the production of the earlier Venetian styles with thin and light funnel shaped bowls, although examples do exist.

I was told that this is mid to late 17th c. There is a good chance that it was handled by Sir Robert Boyle himself.

 

Keep it buttoned

Special Find of the Day:

In 1774 a foul anchor surrounded by rope edging took the place of a rose and in 1787 the same device, with the addition of a wreath of laurel leaves, was adopted for Admirals. When the Merchant Navy started to use the foul anchor device a crown was added for all naval officers in 1812. The same basic design remains in use today.

The foul anchor device itself was first recorded in use in the seal of the Lord High Admiral of Scotland in 1402. It was subsequently adopted in the Admiralty seal and by a large number of navies throughout the world. The rope 'fouling' has no specific twist and may be deemed to be correct however it fits around the anchor.

It is nice to think that someone from the navy visited Stalbridge House and then lost a button!

 

 

 

 

Get stuck in

Special/Small Finds are recorded apart from the general bulk of artefacts in UK Archaeology. This is the first of a series of SFs from the Stalbridge House excavation (1613-1823). Early forks had two tines.  

• Early 17th century - Forks became commonplace across Europe as a tool of steadying food while cutting, and in a lesser case for providing easier transfer of solid food between the plate and mouth. Majority of people still used sharply pointed knives for that purpose.
• 1630 - Forks and blunt tipped knives start arriving at colonies in North America.
• 1669 - French King Louis XIV of France banned the use of sharp tipped knives in France as a means of reducing violence. This introduced new era of blunt tipped eating knives.

 

Book

 'A Digger's Life: trowels & tribulations in archaeology' is available on Kindle via Amazon Books.

Chris Tripp has dug into his personal archaeological story to tell how he has touched the past. He describes how and why he became a professional archaeologist and began excavating fascinating sites, finding wonderful artefacts and experiencing the deeper past during a thirty year career. How he saw Roman London’s first beginnings, unearthed a medieval hospital and exhumed a Bronze Age skeleton.  Meet his fellow diggers, some friendly, some not so friendly and some just eccentric, but all equally interesting to know. Chris also began his work with local communities, helping them find the heritage they share under their feet. If you have ever wondered what diggers really do and why they do it, this book will give you a unique insight into the small world of archaeology and archaeologists, to the extent that you will never watch ‘Time Team’ in the same way ever again.  

Trench trial

As we do not have access to a digging machine at the moment we are confined to trial trenches and recording what we can. Back filling by hand is the real trial. 

The Great Ditch was picked up again and with lots of finds, but we could not dig to the base as it was getting too dangerous - again. Frustrating.

The shovel is standing in a 600mm wide cut into bedrock. 600mm is the standard width of walls on this site, so may be a robbed out one. The cut can be seen in the section and reaches to just under the subsoil. The surrounding land is made up of dumped material.

 

Finds Found

Some nice finds from the site last week. Here are some examples.

Wavy dish fragment.

Scraffito fragment.

Bottle tops are good for dating, as they changed over time. Late 17th c.

Decorated lead flashing.

Copper button possibly copying woven examples.

 

Pottery Lottery

This interesting pottery fragment came up in the ditch last week. If I had found that in London I would say it was Roman, but could be a Med import to the house. Hopefully a pot expert can ID this. 

[and so it happened - imported from Spain in the 17th c.]

 

Wall Walk

On a visit to Montecute House I took these photographs to show what our balusters would have looked like in situ. As can be seen, the half sections would have been fixed to the square columns at the end of a section of wall. Montecute is about ten years older than Stalbridge. 

 

Balust-raid

The last of the balusters from the ditch. some of these will make a good exhibit.

Some good on-site cleaning.

 

Bedrock, but no Flintstones!

 

Having taken out the charcoal fill of a large pit cut onto the greeny-grey clay we have now hit bedrock.

This strange and fascinating fossilised seabed is the Forest Marble that covers this part of Dorset/Somerset. so this 5m square is coming to a close and we hope to open up a second soon.  

Baluster Bonus

More balusters have been found in the 'mega-ditch. 

The 'mega-ditch' is quite deep and even in this small 1m wide section it is full of worked stone. 

The balusters in situ.

At least we had the gazebo to shelter us from the hot sun.

 

If you can't fight ...

'Careful' Colin wearing a big hat in this hot spell. Stay hydrated and have a break in the shade if you are on site at the moment, as the finds are hot but so is the weather!  

 

Coining it in.

 These nice examples of Charles I farthings were found by metal detector. 

Egg & Cup for Breakfast

A very hot day today, so we had the pot washing crew under cover.

The base of a 'Bellarmine' jug.

The body of a Bellarmine jug.

The ditch produced a fine collection of stone balusters.  

This fine carved stone is of the 'cup & egg' design. It would have been in a prominent postion. 

The large stone is a particularly fine example.

At the moment it cannot be said that we have the cellar or the corner of the house definitively. We plan to open another trench soon to answer this question. This photo is of a wall (bottom right) and a limestone slab with a petrified wave pattern. is this a floor?

 

De-cellar-ration

We are gradually reducing the area that we think is the cellar, but as with most features in the excavation that is provisional. 

This feature is a large ditch that cuts east west and is in front of the house. Not sure yet of its function.

This area is made up of burnt material inside this fragment of wall. 

We have now reduced this area of burning and have found that it is a fill of a shallow pit.

 

The reducing of the the fills of the cellar continue.  

Early clay pipe: In broad terms there were always two different styles of pipe in contemporary use; those with heels and those with spurs. Heel forms were the earliest style to be introduced in the late sixteenth century and remained the dominant form in most areas for at least the next century.

This mark will allow us to do some research into where this very early clay pipe was made.

 

As expected the cellar area is coming up with a rich vein of finds from the top rubble layer. Hopefully that vein will continue into the lower dumps. The layer below the rubble is a nice mix of silt and burnt material, so fingers crossed that we will have more finds to show soon. 

These finds are 18th-19th c.  

Possible furniture stud; copper pin; metal button.

Rim, body and handle from the same vessel.

 

Cellar-brations?

The first 5m square trench is being excavated stratigraphically to find the corner of the house at this location. This will allow us to measure the length of this elevation. Indications suggest that this is the location of the cellar, as shown on the painting by the small windows at the base of this wall.   

The stratigraphy is being taken down by hand. Hopefully, this is where the cellar is located.

The North East facing wall foundation.

Our collection of ceramic is building.

Nice pipe bowl fragment. Decorated and with a makers mark.

Our metal detector continues to find artefacts that could be missed by the naked eye. 

Our ceramic collection will hopefully allow us to build up a database covering the whole life of the house.