{"id":12748,"date":"2025-05-11T17:53:58","date_gmt":"2025-05-11T16:53:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/?p=12748"},"modified":"2025-07-29T17:18:32","modified_gmt":"2025-07-29T16:18:32","slug":"wickham-house-blog-day-21-9th-may-2025","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wickham-house-blog-day-21-9th-may-2025\/","title":{"rendered":"Wickham House Blog \u2013 Day #21 (9th\u00a0May 2025)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Part of a series of bulletins from the\u00a0BAS excavations at Wickham House<\/a><\/em>
Follow the project on our\u00a0YouTube channel<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Attendees:<\/strong> Tim L, Martin, James, Mark, Bob, Andy, Margaret, Jean, Julian, Terry, Barbara, Sarah and Keith<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Today marked the halfway point in the planned season of excavation on this site. Not only did the fine weather continue, but some exciting new discoveries by the BAS team position us perfectly for the remainder of our time on site this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Trench 1A work continued by Margaret and Jean to complete the sampling of the two ditch fills. Final tasks and recording of this trench will be completed next week. Work also continued in Trench 1B to explore the deposit of large stones close to a possible ditch boundary seen on the gradiometer geophysics survey. Removal of some of these large stones showed they they had been placed on a bed of gravel.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 1. Margaret and Jean excavating in Trench 1A.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Figure 2. Sarah excavating in Trench 1B whilst James reviews the recording.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

At the north end of Trench 2A, Tim continued to explore the sandy surface aligned with the edge of large flints. Tim spotted evidence of a ditch\/pits in the side walls of the most northly context revealed that will need to defined further next week.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 3. Tim L exploring a new context revealed in Trench 2A.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

At the southerly end of the site work continued to define the rectilinear ditches cut into the densely packed clay\/gravel surface revealed last week. Whilst these gravel\/clay deposits are thought likely to be extant remains of the Roman road, evidence of roadside ditches, needed to confirm this interpretation, have yet to be located. Further work is also needed to explore the rectilinear ditches seen on the high-resolution earth resistance geophysics survey to confirm the morphology and date of this likely Medieval building.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 4. The fill of one of the rectilinear ditches in Trench 2B being excavated by Martin and Julian.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Recording of the deposit of a large flint surface revealed in Trench 2A and its adjacent deposits was completed. At the southerly end of Trench 2A an area of the less dense deposit of large flints, thought to have been deposited later as they overlaid fragments of CBM, was identified. An area of these large flints was removed to reveal dark\/organic occupation deposits. Initial assessment of this new context showed that not only did it contain a number of pottery sherds, but also a 7cm copper-alloy pin and the first Roman roof tile (a\u00a0Tegula<\/em>) found on this site. These artefacts mark a distinct change in the character of the occupation deposits seen so far and will be explored in detail in the coming week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part of a series of bulletins from the\u00a0BAS excavations at Wickham HouseFollow the project on our\u00a0YouTube channel Attendees: Tim L, Martin, James, Mark, Bob, Andy, Margaret, Jean, Julian, Terry, Barbara, Sarah and Keith Today marked the halfway point in the planned season of excavation on this site. Not only did the fine weather continue, but some … Continue reading Wickham House Blog \u2013 Day #21 (9th\u00a0May 2025)<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-12748","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/12748","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12748"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/12748\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12766,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/12748\/revisions\/12766"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12748"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}