{"id":13660,"date":"2026-04-29T11:31:43","date_gmt":"2026-04-29T10:31:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/?p=13660"},"modified":"2026-04-29T11:31:43","modified_gmt":"2026-04-29T10:31:43","slug":"wickham-house-2026-day-13-blog-28th-april","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/2026\/04\/wickham-house-2026-day-13-blog-28th-april\/","title":{"rendered":"Wickham House 2026 \u2013 Day #13 Blog (28th April)"},"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> Stuart, Julian, Thalia, Millie, Ben, Kira, Jean, Jill, Malcolm, Geoff, Carrollanne, Lindsey, Philip, Phil C, Martin, Debbie C, Jill, Tim L, Tim H and Keith <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In Trench 15 work again focussed on removing topsoil from the north end of the trench to reveal the occupation surfaces west of the lane. The mattocking\/wheelbarrowing proved a useful means of keeping warm in the strong northerly wind! Keith and Martin updated the plans and context sheets so that the trench records were up to date, and Carrollanne discovered a beautiful Roman melon bead AND part of a Roman copper-alloy nail cleaner as seen in Figure 2. Both these finds are amazing \u2013 melon beads are particularly associated with military sites as they are believed to have been worn by soldiers as tokens of \u2018good luck\u2019. These finds not only emphasis the role of Ermin Street as a military supply route from Silchester to Carleon, but the nail cleaner also speaks to the large number of finds from the local civilian population of Roman Wickham.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 1. Debbie, Carrollanne, Martin and Geoff excavating in Trench 15<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Figure 2. An exciting day for finds in Trench 15 with Carrollanne finding a glass melon bead (left)\u00a0 AND part of a copper-alloy nail cleaner (right)!<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

Meanwhile in Trench 16 Stuart and Lindsey continued the excavation of the pit at the southwest end of the masonry wall to investigate if could have been an a area of burning that might indicate a possible industrial function of the masonry wall, however further areas of the chalk mortar were revealed together with Roman colour-coated pottery and a fragment of a shale bracelet \u2013 so further work is required to explain this complex series of deposits.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 3. Lindsey and Stuart excavate a pit at the southwest end of the masonry wall.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

At the north end of Trench 16 Jean and Tim L were looking for features identified on the GPR survey. At the other end of the trench Kira and Ben revealed a new horizon of archaeology that it is also hoped will shed further light on the structures being revealed in this trench\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 4. Ben cleaning the southeast corner of Trench 16<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

In Trench 17 Millie, Thalia and Julian started to remove the upper layer of the flint deposits revealed last week, that now appears to have been sitting directly on top of the deposits of \u2018dark earth\u2019 rich in pottery\/bone artefacts seen on the west side of this trench. Work stopped to record, photograph and take levels \u2013 and will continue tomorrow to identify archaeological features beneath to assess whether they correlate with the GPR anomaly seen at this depth and location when surveyed at the start of this season\u2019s excavation. Millie also found her first Roman coin in context \u2013 an eroded 4th<\/sup> Century AD numus!\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 5. Thalia updating plans and context sheets for Trench 17<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Figure 6. The deposit of large flints partially removed in Trench 17 revealing a horizon of \u2018dark earth\u2019 beneath\u2026<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n
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Figure 7. Millie having just discovered her first Roman coin in context in Trench 17<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

The geophysics phase of the project entered its final week of data collection. Today Philip, Malcolm, Tim H, Phil C and Jill captured an impressive 12 grid squares of data. Today\u2019s results show the Roman road start to fade from view as it heads northwest, but there are further hints of new rectilinear roadside features emerging that will add new insights into the extent and possible functions of this roadside settlement\u2026<\/p>\n\n\n

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Figure 8. The earth resistance geophysics image at the end of Day #13<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Part of a series of bulletins from the\u00a0BAS excavations at Wickham HouseFollow the project on our\u00a0YouTube channel Attendees: Stuart, Julian, Thalia, Millie, Ben, Kira, Jean, Jill, Malcolm, Geoff, Carrollanne, Lindsey, Philip, Phil C, Martin, Debbie C, Jill, Tim L, Tim H and Keith  In Trench 15 work again focussed on removing topsoil from the north … Continue reading Wickham House 2026 \u2013 Day #13 Blog (28th April)<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-upcoming-event"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"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=13660"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13660\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13679,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13660\/revisions\/13679"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.berksarch.co.uk\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}