Funding

Some good news coming soon on funding and the start of the BIG DIG! Keep looking in...

Fieldwalking

This month has seen DDCAG fieldwalking in West Dorset, near Pilsden Pen Iron Age hillfort. This involves careful examination of the ground after ploughing to find individual artefacts that are then plotted and bagged up.

Most items will be pottery or flint, but one never knows what will turn up.

It's always a thrill to find something from hundreds or thousands of years ago just lying on the ground.

Never mind Alison, perhaps next time...

By doing this exercise members 'get their eye in' when it comes to recognising types of finds and also adds to the possible areas of settlement in an area or a field, due to the exact plotting of the location of artefacts. Our finds will be looked at by experts and dated. Some pics will be put up here shortly.

Fossil Festival Lyme Regis

Dorset Diggers had a stall at the Lyme Regis Fossil Festival this May weekend. Lots of new contacts were made, including home educators, a Palaeontologist from UCL, a brick expert who will help us with our bricks from the Drift Road excavation and many individuals who are interested in the group.

 
The town was packed and several thousand people must have come through the marquee over the three days. Many other heritage and geological groups were represented.

Nether Compton site visit

Saturday 5th April saw DDCAG members visit the site we will be digging for the next few years.

We met at the car park and Alison gave out the new DD badges we have had made.

We headed up the lane toward the site in rather murky conditions, although it was mild. Being misty we did not have a nice view from the ridge when we arrived.

 The field had been ploughed and Chris pointed out the area next to the hedge where we will be excavating, to locate the pits and possibly have a look at the 'temple' that had shown up on the geophiz results. 

After a nice lunch at Sherborne we visited the museum in the town to look at the types of finds we may encounter on our site. The best of the finds will be shown at the museum. 

Nether Compton talk

Chris gave a talk at the village hall at Nether Compton on 26th March. He went through some of the hoards that have been found from the Neolithic to the Anglo-Saxons and what sort of materials were deposited in the ground. He then explained the NC project where DDCAG will be excavating the field where the 22,500+ Romano-British coin hoard was unearthed in 1989. The Metal Detecting club that found the haord was represented by several members in the audience, so it was a great opportunity to form a partnership between the groups so we can share information and help further the project into the future.  

Nether Compton - DCCAG talk

DDCAG are giving a talk at Nether Compton village hall on 26th March at 7.30pm on the forthcoming excavation project and putting the hoard found in a field there in context with other hoards from the Neolithic to the Anglo-Saxons. Call Chris on 0776 869 51 62 for more information.

Update

The new committee has been elected at the AGM in January. Chris (our new chairperson) showed a short film about the Drift and gave a talk on the new project at Nether Compton. We had many members turn up and some went to see the Drift Road excavation after the meeting closed. All are excited about the coming campaign for 2014 and into the following years. The new project could be one of the most important sites to be investigated in Dorset for many years and bring new insights into how people lived in the changing landscape of the county over thousands of years. Funding applications are in progress.

Meanwhile Chris is working on the report for the Drift, with much help from Brian and Jenny, who are working on cataloguing the finds.

Roman inner wall, Top O' Town, Dorchester

Last month the fund raising walk was cancelled due to inclement weather (no surprise there), but Chris is taking people around Roman Dorchester this coming Sunday, meeting at the old library car park opposite the county council buildings, at 10.30am. We will be looking at the Town House, the aqueduct terminus, the town wall and Maumbury Rings. Hope to see you there.