Vindolanda 2022 Day Ten - Soggy Farewells

Only the half way mark for my one month excavating stay but for most of my digging mates it was the last day.  The weather was not cooperative although we did get in a full mornings work and an extended post lunch tour of the trenches with commentary on current findings and future plans.

On a damp, misty day you can still work floor surfaces.  Here the three folks I've been working with for two weeks are peeling back surface stuff to expose a cobbled floor.  First time it has seen the light of day since the 3rd century AD.  

The lady on the far right had been looking daggers at me yesterday.  I try to be helpful and had offered to clear up a part of the trench she was having trouble getting done.  Up popped a coin.  Today no help offered, as none would have been accepted!  And the Universe evened things up by sending here a coin of her own.

A soggy team photo.

With a large team on a large site you don't get to know everyone, but let's say most.  Hopefully we'll dig again in the future.  Speaking of which in one corner of the site a small area of the deeper anaerobically preserved organic material is peeking out.  Planks from 150 AD....

Vindolanda 2022 Day Nine - A Good Day

Perfect weather today.  Yesterday evening we actually had sun and brisk winds.  This dries the site off quickly.  We were working in the same area as in recent days but with new features peeking out.  Also peeking out were some small finds.  First up a chunk of amphora, one of those whopping big Roman storage jars for wine, olive oil etc.  Usually very generic this one has either graffiti or logo.  Perhaps this was some low end stuff....Brand X?

A tooth.  Consensus in our trench was possibly wild boar.  Whatever it came from it looks a nasty bit of dentition.

Lesson in oxides part one.  When you are carefully troweling you will sometimes encounter rusty shadows.  Do they indicate some iron thing more or less intact just below?  In this case just a bit of rusted out "something".

Lesson in oxides part two.  Most people are pretty sure about iron oxide, but what does it mean when you encounter this?  A sort of greyish blue leaching into the soil.  I'm not permitted to show excavated coins (which is too bad this year!) but the crumbling ghost of a decayed silver denarius that was under this would in no way tempt illicit "night hawks" with metal detectors and larcenous inclinations.

And for those interested in "features" here's our trench at the end of the day.  Remember that interpretation is above my pay grade and in any case provisional.  But you should be seeing here a mix of early 3rd century flooring and mid 2nd century road cobbles and pavers.  Might there eventually be a road side drain full of interesting things?  Stay tuned.

Vindolanda 2022 - Day Eight....Rain

Weather is always a gamble on an archaeological dig.  A certain amount of mist and gentle rain is actually helpful.  But, as happened today, when it rains all night the exposed surfaces turn into soup and the wheel barrow run to the spoil heap becomes precarious.  So it was all hands on deck for pot washing in the morning.  Tolerable fun, and we had a bonus trip to the storage facility where lots of stuff is awaiting identification and possible incorporation into museum displays.

There are always a few "shiny. pretty" things in the wash up trays.

Nicer than the fragment I showed yesterday.  Here's another interesting bit.

This is a bit of box flue, a hollow ceramic channel that conveyed warm air from heating furnaces.  Think underfloor heating, Roman style.  Although they may have also been used to heat walls.  The XXX cross hatch pattern would make a nice decorative touch but probably was for adhering these duct systems with mortar.

Group pot washing in the new excavator's shed.  It has a rather monastic air to it.

We did get back on site for a short while in the afternoon before the clouds opened up and we were rained off entirely.  Naturally warm sunny skies followed.  Forecast tomorrow is favorable.

In lieu of more good stuff from the digs I present random images from the UK equivalent of a flea market, the Hexham Car Boot sale.  In addition to some actually useful items I picked up I observed these things.

A basket of angry wrestler figurines.

Peculiar deer hunting trophies, apparently French.

Who knew?  Big Mouth Billy Bass was popular over here in the UK for a short while.  I showed this to several people who recognized it immediately.

Don't know, don't wanna know, don't need to know.

Vindolanda 2022 Day Seven - Happy Bunny Edition

First a bit of Roman fun....a nice bottle lip.  Interesting how the technology has not changed in 2000 years.

Here is Happy Bunny number one.  He or she lives on the site.  I guess it is actually a hare, and as these are less destructive to the archaeology it gets a free pass.  Rabbits are dealt with emphatically.  It likes to graze near where we excavate and as you can see is not too concerned about us.  It lives somewhere underneath the Praetorium, perhaps in a covered drain.

And Happy Bunny number two.  This is my friend Pete Savin.  Excavator, raconteur, and while not the actual inventor of the phrase Happy Bunny he is a frequent employer of it.

Today was another day of pursuing features not finds.  Here's what I've been up to.  It started out with a large oven inside the schola or officer's mess. 

Great whoppin' stones.  Note the pinkish color on the inside of the oven.  This is a mixture of heat changed soil and probably collapse of a ceramic top to the oven.  Underneath was the Antonine era wall that needed to be traced.  By the way, archaeology is always destructive to some extent, but this was just one of three ovens in the officer's mess.  Here's the same area after removal of the oven and careful excavation of the wall.

And what I've come to regard as "my" wall in detail.

A rather neat bit of work.  It's fun to realize that I'm the first person to see this structure since the early 3rd century when it was covered by the later construction.

Vindolanda 2022 - Day Six

Because everyone likes neat finds, here's something my friend Pete dug up a few trenches over.  Image is from the official Vindolanda site:

This is felt to be a perfume bottle.  Given the presence of communal latrines, night soil jars in the floor, bones everywhere suggesting discarded food....well, you can see why this stuff came in jumbo size.

As for me it was a day of defining features.  Here's what I'm working on:

I know, less exciting.  I'm showing up where an Antonine era wall (about 150 AD) meets up with a floor surface.  I had to remove a later cooking oven to do this and it had some whopping big stones.  Still, no aches and pains to speak of.  More digging tomorrow.

Vindolanda 2022 - Day Five....Implausible Discoveries

Ye Gads the weather was nice today.  Shirt sleeves and sun screen.  Why, one does not even object to the necessary but mundane chore of washing up finds.  Doing so in bright sunshine and with good company is pleasant duty. 

Of course you find lots of clever bits of pottery, but you are looking for more, for the things that were not identified when they went in the bag.  For instance graffiti which we did not encounter today.  And oddities, which we did.  The iron item on the top appears to be a small, bent knife blade.  The pot rim has a series of notches carved in its rim.  Boredom?  Or a way to indicate ownership?

Other things that come along in the finds bags.  This one is obvious.

This one less so.  Vindolanda is famous for the immaculately preserved wooden writing tablets.  But what was used to write on them?  With ink by the way.  Well this is the nub of a Roman ink pen.

For reference it once looked like this, a modern reproduction based on examples found here.

And for fun here's a mystery item.  Looks like an iron chicken drumstick.

I did get back to excavating in the afternoon, but was mostly doing a bit of demolition work.  Even there I had an implausible find, but as we are specifically forbidden to show coins you'll have to trust me on that one.

Vindolanda 2022 - Day Four

A day of incremental progress.  We lowered our floor level a bit.  Fewer exciting finds today although I did find this.  Once a roman spear head now a lumpy bit of iron.  We are not allowed to post fun metal objects lest unscrupulous "night hawk" metal detectors swoop in under cover of darkness.  I figure this one is OK.

Next trench over a few bits of Samian ware turned up.  Here's a fine lady striking a pose:

And this bit.  I thought it was a satyr, as the leg looked a bit shaggy.  Now I'm not sure.  We are not supposed to just take a brush at this stuff, some of it is more fragile than you'd expect.

A fine day of perfect weather.  On my trek home by public walking path these guys mistook me for the farmer who brings them food.