There’s nothing more oddly satisfying than pieceing evidence back together, and that’s what our Finds Team has been doing – literally! During our excavations of a Roman town at East Park, on the outskirts of Sedgefield, we discovered a large number of broken pottery fragments. Although we could tell they were Roman, we couldn’t tell what type of vessel they were from:

That was until our Finds Team pieced it all back together, to reveal the full shape of the pot. We now know that the pot dates from the 2nd-3rd century AD (100-200 AD).

This beautiful artefact was originally found placed inside a pit within the Roman settlement, along with another 86 sherds pot, a broken quern AND a roman coin:

We’ve also been examining another amazing Roman bowl from our dig at Sedgefield. Our archaeologists found this in another small pit within the settlement:

It likely dates from the first half of the 2nd century AD (between 100-150 AD). What’s really cool is that when we turned it over after cleaning, we saw a unique squiggly star-shaped decoration on the bottom:

Our pottery experts are now putting the final touches to their analysis, which will soon be available when we publish our official Dig Report. Stay tuned…

Backfilling is away and it’s time to say goodbye to our trenches at Roman Sedgefield. It’s been an amazing six weeks full of Venturers, archaeology and sheep – but just because we’ve stopped digging doesn’t mean it’s over just yet!

It feels like years ago we pulled up to East Park on a chilly autumnal morning to start prepping our trenches for the work ahead, the past six weeks have certainly kept us busy at DigVentures. We’re not ready to say goodbye yet though.

The great thing about archaeology is that it just keeps going! Now we have finds, plans and records ready to be pondered and analysed for weeks to come. But before we get into, let’s revisit the past for a moment.

We’ve picked a few questions from our lovely ‘Meet the Archaeologists’ livestream yesterday that we think help us to give a nice summary of what we’ve been up to. If you missed the main event, don’t worry, you can catch up here!

Let’s get started, shall we?

Back to the start: how did we choose where to dig?

This is a question we get quite a lot as archaeologists and considering this is probably one of the most important parts of starting an archaeological investigation, we’ll never get tired answering it!

For this site, we started with a geophysical survey done in East Park a few years ago. We also sat down to consider what exactly we were hoping to achieve here: we wanted to investigate the enclosures (plots of land) – what was in them and what they were for – and the trackways that we could see spanning across this site in that lovely organised way, typical of Roman sites.

We knew there were some previous interventions (excavations) at this site; our own trench from 2019 was to the south and there were several previous digs to the north. This also factored into our chose of location. We noticed there hadn’t been much done in between these two areas, so this seemed like a good place to start.

On top of that, we also noticed there was a lot of information gathered about the insides of these enclosures, but not so much about the ditches that mark them out. Since this would help us understand a bit more about the phasing, or evolution, of the site we definitely wanted to take a look at them.

What were our favourite discoveries?

There’s certainly a lot to unpack from this year’s dig at East Park. From bulk finds to small finds to indications of structures we were definitely blessed with an abundance of material. But, what are the highlights?

Nat found that lovely line of postholes in the southern area of the trench. The buildings here seem to be wooden, so other than the ‘packing’ around the postholes, we weren’t expecting to find any worked stone. Regardless, looking at the postholes and considering the kind of pottery we lifted from this area, it looks like we have some sort of non-domestic structure.

Could this be a shop? A trading post? It’s very likely! We’ll keep assessing it in post-excavation analysis using our in-depth records to make extra sure, but it’s definitely got us thinking. More on that later though …

Another great find, though small in size, was the lovely bead uncovered by our Venturer, Bill, in one of the ditches. It stood out immediately because of its dark colour and the hole in the centre. We instantly knew this was no stone. It looks like it’s made of jet and was possible part of a piece of jewellery that someone dropped thousands of years ago. A shame for them, but very lucky for us!

A find like this, so personal in nature, really does help bring to life the residents of Roman Sedgefield, we just hope its owner wasn’t too upset when they lost it.

And finally, how could we mention our top finds without bringing up the three lovely Roman vessels that will be the subject of our upcoming livestreamed micro-excavation. All three were found at varying points in the dig, but in close proximity to the structure in the south of the trench.

The first two pots aren’t complete, probably due to plough damage that occurred post-deposition. However, a lovely little bowl-like vessel that David uncovered in the final week is complete and ready to be excavated in closer detail next week. We can’t wait!

Speaking of pottery, do any have decoration?

Yes, they do! We’ve found lots of great pottery on site, and some appear to have incised decoration. One example would be the Nene Valley hunt cups which have hunting scenes depicted on them. Pretty cool.

On top of that, David’s vessel seems to have something a little unusual that we’ve not really seen before. We can’t make it what it is exactly, but there’s definitely some sort of design incised into the base. A decorated base is something that not even Nat has seen before, so we’re excited to explore that a bit more later.

If you read last week’s site diary, you’ll also have seen about our lovely potential potter’s mark. If you haven’t, why not give it a cheeky read now!

So, have we found any evidence of anything pre-Roman?

No, that we can say at the minute there doesn’t seem to be any material evidence earlier than the late 1^st or early 2^nd century. There’s none that we know of from any previous investigations either. It seems that all Iron Age settlements in this area went out of use after around 80 AD, probably in response to the Roman occupation.

Spot dating of our pottery suggests we have finds mostly from the mid-2^nd to mid-3^rd century in date.

What does this mean for this site? What do we think we have here?

Well, we have something really exciting. By all appearances, it seems we have the largest civilian market town in the North East. Combining our own findings with everything we know of previous investigation here, everything seems to point towards this theory.

Think about market towns today: you have people living there and working there, and others who travel from outlying areas to bring goods to trade or just to have a little shop. Not much has changed over the years, and even our Roman market towns would have been the same.

It’s likely that this settlement might have been a response to one of the most famous Roman structures in Britain: Hadrian’s Wall. When this was built, it created a huge demand for support of its infrastructure, and trading centres would have definitely been needed. Not only that, but our Roman settlement seems to be at a point were a series of ancient trackways appear to be meeting, making it a perfect place for trading with the amount of movement this would generate.

Pretty amazing, right? This site could potentially be of major national importance.

What’s next for East Park?

We still need to continue investigations if we want to support our theory. Archaeology is a wonderful field of study that will always continue to generate new questions and ideas to be challenged. That’s why we love it!

The story of Roman Sedgefield isn’t over yet, and we can’t wait to see what else is found!

About Discover Brightwater

This dig is part of Discover Brightwater – a huge project which aims to restore, reveal and celebrate life around the River Skerne.

It is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, and the events which focus on the historic environment are the initiative of Durham County Council’s Archaeology Section. As part of the project, DigVentures is organising public participation in events at five different archaeological sites, including East Park, Legs Cross Bolam, and Bishop Middleham. Find out more.

With only a week left of our dig at Roman East Park, the field team is feeling the pressure to find out as much about this unique and though-provoking site as possible in the time we have left.

So, what have we been up to?

We started working on another trench:

Completely untouched archaeology: our dream! That’s what Ben has been working on in Trench 3, one of the smaller trenches to the south of our largest (the focus of our digging until now). Despite being much smaller in size, this trench has already given us some nice archaeology to look at.

Ben started by cleaning back the surface, just like we did at the very start of the dig in our big trench. Immediately we could see all sorts of things poking out the surface. We could see animal bone, pot and even possible ditches only a matter of hours into digging.

We weren’t wrong either, Ben excavated a lovely assemblage of Roman pottery from what appears to be another large ditch, similar to those we found previously. Strangely though, when he dug a section into another feature, all he found was a single animal tooth. That’s pretty unusual for this site, where we seem to be finding decent amounts of pottery within each feature.

We noticed something really cool on a pottery sherd:

A piece of pot excavated from the main trench proved to be very exciting when the team noticed a possible potter’s stamp. In archaeology, this is the initials of the person who made that particular pot. They’re super useful for archaeologists because with certain stamps we can trace them back to the manufacturer. We have fingers crossed hoping we’ll be able to do the same here.

This isn’t the first find of this nature we found at East Park. Previous digs have uncovered pottery that has potentially been linked to the nearby Piercebridge Roman Fort. If we could find similar links, that would be amazing! Let’s see what post-ex analysis reveals.

We hosted a couple of super virtual events:

This week was our busiest week yet for virtual content! Ginny was busy hosting our Virtual Tour for families live from the trench. And what a great session it was! We had an amazing time sharing the archaeology with you all and hearing all your lovely questions.

Then, we wrapped up the week with our photogrammetry workshops, led by DigVentures’ very own Chris. He did a fantastic job teaching some of you about how to build your own 3D models of Legs Cross. It’s been super exciting to involve you guys in the beginning of our investigation at Legs Bolam, another Brightwater site. Keep an eye out to see the results of the workshops!

Next week we have our Wrap Up Q&A with the field team, so if you fancy hearing what we’ve found – straight from the archaeologists themselves – or just fancy a bit of a chat, sign up on our Eventbrite!

What’s left to do?

Nat is a man with a plan. The team are full of energy and ready to jump into next week. We’ve been busy recording everything as we go, which takes a bit of time but is probably one of the most important things we do on site.

Either way, we’re making great progress in our main trench, and soon enough we’ll be heading into even more untouched archaeology when we begin working through our final trench.

Are you looking forward to the last week? We definitely are!

Feel free to drop us a message with your thoughts – we always love to hear from you all.

About Discover Brightwater

This dig is part of Discover Brightwater – a huge project which aims to restore, reveal and celebrate life around the River Skerne.

It is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, and the events which focus on the historic environment are the initiative of Durham County Council’s Archaeology Section. As part of the project, DigVentures is organising public participation in events at five different archaeological sites, including East Park, Legs Cross Bolam, and Bishop Middleham. Find out more.

As another week draws to a close, our dig at East Park – looking into the massive Roman settlement as part of the Discover Brightwater project – continues to give us a lot of interesting things to think about.

Last week we might have said goodbye to the Venturers face to face, but our new concoction of virtual events means we can still stay in touch with everyone, familiar and new!

So, what did we actually get up to this week?

We tried our best to just keep digging, despite the British autumnal weather:

This week the weather definitely kept us on our toes. Rain, fog and overall soggy Britishness made cleaning our archaeological features pretty difficult. When we clean the soil (a strange term, we know!), we take off a thin layer to even up the ground and to help us see all the colour changes in the soil. That way, we can identify possible features to investigate on a deeper level.

Additionally, when we record features by photographing them, to make a record for us to refer to when we finalise our interpretation and write up reports post-excavation, we want them to look nice and clean. That way, we can look back and see exactly what was going on in and around the feature.

What does this have to do with rain? Well, a bit of damp can completely wash away any cleaning, which can set us back a fair bit. This week, it felt a bit like a race against the heavens to get some of these features cleaned and photographed! Although, it made for some pretty atmospheric mornings.

We lifted another Roman pot:

If you read last week’s diary, you’ll have heard about our second pot. Somewhat smaller, and less complete than our first, it’s still a pretty juicy find. The potential pots have to give us some key info about the people who lived here is huge. Like before, Nat made sure to leave the pot in section until he had everything fully recorded. Then, he carefully lifted the pot, being sure to make certain it was nicely supported.

As per usual, he did a cracking job, and we now have a second pot ready for micro-excavation in the coming weeks! Want to find out more? Keep an eye on our virtual events in the coming weeks …

We hosted our first virtual tour:

On Thursday, we got to see some of our Venturers again! Well, sort of. We hosted our first Live Virtual Tour, lead by Ginny. Any observers got to take a look at the site and ask about finds, features and our field team themselves.

Missed it? You can watch it here!

What’s this about virtual events?

We’ve mentioned the virtual events a few times now, and we’re hoping you’re feeling the anticipation! With our new plan of action in accordance with recently implemented government guidelines, we wanted to make extra sure that everyone at home still gets their archaeology fix. So, we’ve planned out a series of online events and handy skill-building guides to help you all keep up to date with the site and brush up on your skills.

You can find out more here.

What do we have to look forward to?

We ended this week by extending some of our slots to look into some untouched potential features. We could tell there were more to be found from the original plan of the site. The plan, a drawing of the site when it was first cleaned, showed some more ditches and features ripe for investigating. Given how much we’ve found already, who knows what might show up…

As always, drop us a comment or get in touch with your thoughts!

About Discover Brightwater

This dig is part of Discover Brightwater – a huge project which aims to restore, reveal and celebrate life around the River Skerne.

It is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, and the events which focus on the historic environment are the initiative of Durham County Council’s Archaeology Section. As part of the project, DigVentures is organising public participation in events at five different archaeological sites, including East Park, Legs Cross Bolam, and Bishop Middleham. Find out more.

It’s the third week of our excavation for Discover Brightwater and we’re starting to understand a bit more about the massive Roman settlement buried under East Park, Sedgefield.

With a new lockdown coming into place to help prevent the spread of COVID-19, we’ve had to make some changes to our plan of action. On Wednesday, we sent our Venturers off for the last time and the dig moved into a staff-only operation.

We’re going to miss them, but they certainly made the most of their last week, and it shows.

We lifted our beautiful Roman pot:

Last week we found a mostly complete Roman vessel placed upright inside one of our features. Now that pot has been carefully lifted from site and is ready to be micro-excavated. On that topic, keep an eye out, because we have a super exciting event in the works!

But just when we thought we’d already hit the jackpot, we found another one nearby. This vessel looks to be just as complete – if a bit smaller. We hope we’ll be excavating it in the upcoming week.

We found a beautiful Roman bead:

A ditch in the south west corner of the trench revealed a small find that’s as pretty as it is mysterious. If you’ve been following our social media, you’ll have seen the lovely possible bead our Venturer Bill found.

We’re not quite sure yet what it could be made from, it looks similar to jet, but it’s quite lightweight. So far we’re juggling around a few ideas, from jet itself to maybe polished shale. There’s also the question of what it is. We loved hearing everyone’s ideas on social media! Looking at it closer in post-ex will help us to identify it conclusively.

We reunited pieces of a broken Roman quern-stone:

While extending a section investigating one of the features in Nat’s area of the trench, Erin uncovered what looked like a piece of worked stone. We could tell this because of the neat circular cut in one end of the artefact. This was exciting in itself, but we didn’t expect what came next.

After seeing the artefact, Nat noticed there was something familiar about it. As it turned out, we had two other pieces of worked stone with similar circular cuts, found earlier in the dig. When we placed them together, we could clearly see that these three pieces were all part of one single quern-stone, which would have been used for grinding.

What makes this even better, is that the two other fragments of the quern-stone came from a feature a few meters away. Things like this make us archaeologists really happy, because it helps us build the possible story of an artefact.

In this case, what might have happened is that the quern-stone broke after a certain period of use. The people who lived here possibly then took these broken pieces and used them as packing when constructing postholes.

What were our Roman postholes for?

We mentioned these postholes in last week’s site diary, but now we think we might have a bit more of an idea of what they could be part of. There definitely seems to be a structure here, and as we’ve continued digging, the types of finds we’ve found have given us a few ideas about the nature of the structure.

So far, we’ve found barely any domestic waste. The large amount of pottery we’ve found is varied, and only a small amount of it seems to be domestic in nature. Not only that, but we haven’t found much animal bone at all. Granted, this could be due to the poor soil preservation, but could it have another meaning?

Domestic Roman structures often produce lots of animal bone in archaeology. Combine this, our pottery clue and the fact we’re so close to a trackway and it suggests one possible thing: we might have a Roman shop! We can’t be confident yet, but that would be a really awesome find.

This just goes to show how our understanding of one site can shift so much over time.

As always, we’d love to hear what you think! Drop a comment below or get in touch with your ideas.

About Discover Brightwater

This dig is part of Discover Brightwater – a huge project which aims to restore, reveal and celebrate life around the River Skerne.

It is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, and the events which focus on the historic environment are the initiative of Durham County Council’s Archaeology Section. As part of the project, DigVentures is organising public participation in events at five different archaeological sites, including East Park, Legs Cross Bolam, and Bishop Middleham. Find out more.

Two weeks into our excavation for Discover Brightwater, and we’ve already made some cracking progress as we unearth the vast Roman settlement buried at East Park, Sedgefield.

It’s been a rainy week, and the trench has certainly taken the brunt of it, but despite the mud our Venturers have been as keen as ever. And it shows: they’ve made some fantastic progress.

We’re trying to map a Roman town

We began the week with a ‘big clean’. By removing a thin layer across the surface of the exposed site, we managed to highlight the features in the soil so we could better identify them for investigation.

As we noted last week, the research aims for this year are very wide-reaching. The settlement is huge, so rather than trying to excavate one small area in detail, we’re trying to reveal, map and record as much as we can so that we can see the layout of the town on a bigger scale.

We might have found evidence of Roman metalworking

At the start of the week, Erin and Ben began investigating a circular pit feature in the north west end of the trench.

This area gave us a lot in terms of finds: slag and charcoal were abundant, making us hopeful that our mysterious feature may be linked to some sort of Roman metalworking structure.

But as is always the case with archaeology, we were taken by surprise when we realised we weren’t the first to dig here.

No, we didn’t run into the aftermath of Time Team! Our visitor wasn’t even human: some sort of critter had burrowed its way into our Roman pit.

This isn’t the first time the field team have seen something like this on an archaeological site – our furry friends tend to seek out disturbed soil as its softer texture makes burrowing much easier. Not what we were hoping for, but a fun development all the same, and a reminder that archaeology has a unique way of keeping you on your toes.

Roman animal remains

The north east end of the trench gave us more human features, and animal evidence of another kind! The soils at East Park have a high acidity level, which means material like bone often doesn’t survive. However, in this area we found a pretty large assemblage of animal remains in one of the enclosure ditches.

Analysing this post-excavation could tell us a lot about the lifestyle of the people here: what animals they were keeping around, and maybe eating!

Roman postholes

One of the richest areas of the trench is in the south west. Our Venturers have been investigating several unusual features to build a picture of what this site looked like in the Roman period. One type of feature that we’re seeing a lot are these rounded ditches filled with stone assemblages. We have a feeling these might actually be postholes, but we don’t want to jump the gun!

Archaeology is ever-changing, it all depends on the material evidence, so the next four weeks might reveal something ground-breaking that changes our minds completely. If this is the case, though, then we could be potentially be looking at a kind of wooden structure – how exciting!

Highlight of the week: Roman pottery!

The pits in this area have also held some fantastic pottery. From amphorae to greyware, and even what looks like a mostly complete vessel.

Everyone on site is waiting in anticipation for the moment we carefully lift it from the muddy depths.

Already this site is shaping up to be a gift that keeps on giving in terms of Roman archaeology, we can’t wait to see where the next few weeks takes us.

What do you think our findings mean so far? Drop us a comment and let us know!

About Discover Brightwater

These dig is part of Discover Brightwater – a huge project which aims to restore, reveal and celebrate life around the River Skerne.

It is supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, and the events which focus on the historic environment are the initiative of Durham County Council’s Archaeology Section. As part of the project, DigVentures is organising public participation in events at five different archaeological sites, including East Park, Legs Cross Bolam, and Bishop Middleham. Find out more.

It’s the summer of 2003 and a new Time Team episode has just aired: ‘A View To A Kiln’. The crew spend three days unearthing the archaeology at East Park, Sedgefield. But, after several surprising discoveries and an ever-growing geophysics map, they leave the site with more questions.

Jump forward to 2019 and East Park remains a unique and wonderful Roman site. On the 17 June, DigVentures get the chance to jump into the archaeology. After three weeks, we’re confident we have enclosures filled with signs of wooden buildings, farming and definite signs of trade. It’s safe to say we have some sort of settlement, but what’s unusual about this site is that we’ve found no trace of fortification, something we’d expect from a Roman site in such close proximity to Rome’s British frontier.

So, what’s going on here?

There are a few theories: currently, we think this site could really be a native site. When the Romans came to Britain, they didn’t just bring an army. Their occupation of this land generated huge opportunities for the people of Britain to take advantage of their need for industry. This would be particularly important in this area, as large fortifications – like Hadrian’s wall – were full of soldiers in need of food, equipment and domestic items!

Evidence of metalworking found at the site supports this theory. Over last year we also uncovered lots of pottery, including Samian ware, Roman Grey Ware, amphorae handles, and even parts of a Nene Valley Hunting Cup depicting a hound chasing a hare. Which could be evidence for the production of ceramic goods!

The most unexpected find of last year was a cremation urn! After analysing this we determined it contained the remains of a middle aged to mature adult male. Cremation urns like this are pretty common in Roman contexts, but human remains of any kind can provide a wealth of knowledge about the demographics and lifestyle of a settlement.

What’s our plan this year?

Even with these great finds, there’s a lot we still don’t know about this site, so we can’t wait to get in there and piece together some more evidence. This year we’re digging a huge area, with mind to a map and date – whilst also looking into the relationships between features. We expect we’ll find some similar things this year, and the geophysics looks particularly packed with potential archaeology, so we have all our fingers crossed that we might find something even more spectacular! The big question remains the same: what were the enclosures were used for, and what can this tell us what the people here were doing, and how they lived?

What do you think about this unique site at East Park? We’d love to hear your thoughts!

This was the very first excavation that has ever taken place at Bishop Middleham Castle, which means everything we’ve done is a brand new contribution to our knowledge about this site. This is all the more important because even though it was home to the medieval Prince-Bishops who protected England’s northern border and governed the buffer state of Durham, there’s not a huge amount of written history to tell us what actually happened here.

On behalf of Discover Brightwater, we assembled a team of archaeology-lovers from all over the country to investigate the site and in just three weeks, what we’ve managed to uncover gives us plenty of evidence with which to start painting a pretty good picture…

Medieval recycling

One thing history does tell us it that a license was given to decommission the building and ship off its materials at the end of its life, and we’ve found loads of evidence to confirm this actually happened.

In Trench 1, it’s clear that the building was taken down to ground level, and that all the expensive building materials were removed for re-use elsewhere.

The job was thoroughly done – although three was tonnes of material in the trench, it was primarily mortar and small, rough stone chunks that would have been used as the core filling the walls, not exactly valuable stuff. By contrast, we found no roofing or flooring material, and hardly any facing stones (the more expensive wall stones made by masons).

One early piece of window tracery – incredibly expensive stuff! We didn’t find any of the other stuff like glass or lead – both are recyclable, so probably also taken away and re-used.

Together, that’s clear evidence that these medieval removals team did a very thorough job, and were keen recyclers!

Earthworks

We know very clearly from the earthworks and landscape situation that there are three important sides to Bishop Middleham Castle, one of which drops away to the fish ponds. On the east and west it also drops away.

And that’s one of the key reasons why the Prince-Bishops chose this site for their less-than-humble abode – there was only one approach from the north.

The earthworks also form clear boundaries, and would have made the stone building even more impressive to look at, accentuating its prominence in the landscape. It’s not about defence, but about display and being seen from a long distance – it’s fundamental to how the Prince-Bishops demonstrated their power and wealth.

What we don’t know, and haven’t understood, is where the site finishes on the north side, where it runs of to the village and the parish church.

More to the site than meets the eye

Until now, the archaeological extent of the site has been based on the topographic features that are visible at the surface, and excavation has confirmed that the earthworks do represent the remains of a great big building.

The initial geophysics results revealed part of the building, leading us to place our trenches over what we thought might be the edge of the site – we’ve got a big corner and a bank.

However, on the northern side, the assumed extent of the site just follows the modern fenceline, and doesn’t necessarily represent the actual archaeology. We didn’t manage to find the edge of the building on the northern side, which suggests the site does in fact continue beyond the fenceline. Another round of excavation on the other side of the fence would help us better understand the true extent of the site.

Wiggly walls

Walls, walls, walls. This excavation was very much about walls. By revealing more of them, we were also able to identify what type of walls they were – building, or external.

By looking at the coursing, we could see that one of the taller walls we uncovered is a boundary wall, and not actually part of the building itself – the coursing follows the humps and bumps of the landscape, rather than the landscape being leveled and the coursing laid flat. This indicates that it’s not a load bearing wall, and wasn’t designed to carry anything but its own weight.

Further down, there’s a separate and earlier wall. This lower wall is part of the building – it’s flatter and forms a big L shape, and is perhaps another part of the complex.

Medieval ‘Grand Designs’

If you were to step back in time and gaze out at Bishop Middleham Castle in its heyday, you would have seen a stepped series of buildings and rooftops – especially if viewing it from lower down.

Archaeologically, we can see that there are walls of different size, ages and types. It’s all a bit higgledy-piggeldy, which is a reflection of the fact that the Prince-Bishops used this site for 250 years, that’s the same as us back to the Georgians!

All of this tells us that there was  building and re-building, buildings ontop of eachother, which is exactly what we can see in the ground.

When people have money, they’re more able to keep their buildings in line with the latest fashion. What we’re seeing is money and influence in the ground, when they can build and re-build in response to changing trends, and update their buildings

Most of our finds date to the 14^th century, which matches up to another reference in the historical records which mention that Bishop Lewis Boarmont built a new chapel, hall and kitchens – and those are only the bits that were written down. There could have been more, and that’s what the archaeology suggests.

In the lower part of the trench, excavation revealed two different styles of wall – different size, and different masonry, and two different times.

The earlier wall is missing a good chunk of masonry, and it looks like they’ve actually taken a side of the building down, and replaced it with a whole new skin.

The only reason you’d do this is you’ve had a structural problem or are responding to fashion. To make your old building look like the latest kind of building, you can just replace the old front, with a new front – you see this in the Georgian period too. Re-front the house to make you look like you’re up to date – it’s a façade!

There’s also direct evidence of this medieval ‘Grand Designs’ job. We found some great big holes that were most likely for timber beams, like scaffolding, holding up the front of the building and the floors while the redevelopment work happened.

The uprights would have stayed in place while the new walls were erected around them, and would have ended up being encased in masonry. The builders would have been able to remove the cross beam supporting the floor above, but wouldn’t have been able to remove the uprights – which is why we can still see the great big holes this medieval scaffolding left behind.

The biggest discovery yet…

This three week excavation has given us a much better understanding of how the earthworks you can see today correspond to the buried walls of Bishop Middleham Castle. But the biggest outcome is identifying the possibility that the edge of the site could be much further out than is currently delineated, and much closer to the original end of the church yard.

Further investigation could radically change the interpretation of the site, and how it was used, so finding this northern edge at some point in the future is an important ambition. It could turn out that there were more enclosures, buildings and activities here than has been recognised.

This could help us update the existing interpretation board, which does not reflect the archaeology we’ve found. What we’ve found shows that Bishop Middleham Castle was much larger, much more extensive, and much more grand than what is currently being displayed. If nothing else, our work can update the interpretation, and inform what happens next!

It’s taken us a leap forward, and gives us our next step in the strategy for Discover Brightwater, and Historic England. There’s a whole paddock that hasn’t had any geophysics work done yet, and which could be a great starting point for a more in-depth investigation in the future…