Young Archaeologists in the Pandemic

  This morning Colchester's young archaeologists honed their excavating skills at an extensive site in the village of Fordham, which Colchester Archaeological Group (CAG) has been investigating for more than ten years. Colchester Young Archaeologists' Club leaders brought trowels and kneelers to the site, which CAG supplemented with further trowels and kneelers, buckets, shovels and sieves. Among the finds were Roman brick and tile fragments a possible flint scraping tool, animal bones, and fossils.      The site director gave health and safety instructions before the group made their way to the current part of the site being investigated. Changes in the colour of the soil gave clues to the possible presence of Roman wall plaster and mortar and there was an abundance of Roman brick and tile fragments. The actual function of the site is a conundrum. CAG archaeologists on the Roman site have discovered many large loose tesserae pieces, brick and tile fragments, a water...

  We had a warm sunny day for our trip to the coast. The time on the beach went all too quickly. Evidence of the wooded banks of the confluence of the Thames, Medway and proto Rhine rivers at this particular spot was noted from the amount of fossilised bark, which was collected in quantity, especially when the young people realised that millions of years ago,  long necked dinosaurs nibbled on the trees. Rising sea levels wiped out the land-based dinosaurs, but jurassic fossils have been found on this coast, swept down the rivers from the midlands. We founds fossilised whale bones and sharks teeth, fish eggs, and freshwater snails from the river areas. This year we hired a room in the visitor centre, where YAC volunteers prepared refreshments and our expert could examine and help us date our finds. One young man had brought in a worked flint used by early man and found on a previous trip he made further along the coast. On our visit to Fordham last month, the chair of Colcheste...

 Colchester Young Archaeologists' Club met in St Botolph's church hall, Colchester, today. Four young people had brought in artefacts they had discovered to be identified, dated, and handled. Our teenage mudlarker brought in some Roman replicas and explained their use, and how they were made, to the others. One of our volunteers had studied glass blowing, and was able to explain how the Roman replica glass was made. More difficult to date were the sharks teeth and belemnite found on the Essex Coast, which could have been between 250,000,000 to circa 66,000,000 years old. The young people found the quiz, which had been devised for them, was challenging. They used their imagination to work out what the duties of the sacrist were and how a "necessarium" in a monastery was used. Other activities included monastery-style illumination techniques and our popular game of Aquila. Two groups took a tour of the priory church remains and discovered fragments of the medieval tiled...

Metal detecting in Fordham revealed a surprising number of objects.  When Colchester Young Archaeologists' Club visited Fordham, they found out the village had been occupied since the Stone Age. They learned that ring ditches had been identified from satellite images, many flints had been discovered, together with a plethora of artefacts from more recent centuries. They learned metal detecting techniques and discovered a considerable number of metal objects, considering what a small site it was. They were instructed in magnetometry to discover more about changes to the environment and occupation of the village. They solved some archaeological puzzles and identified some animal bones from a bag. One YAC brought in the c. 300,000-year-old fossil bison bone she discovered on East Mersea beach to show our host, the chairman of Colchester Archaeological Group. Coastal erosion from exceptionally high tides had dislodged the fossil from the cliffs and washed it on to the estuary mud. Arch...

 Our April meeting of the Young Archaeologists' Club started with some interesting finds which members had brought in. One had found a flint scraping tool at Wrabness, which dated from the Stone Age or earlier. We compared life in Ancient Egypt with that in the British Isles, ending with Roman rule in Egypt and the Roman invasion of Britain. This we illustrated with pictures of the doctor or druids grave excavated in Stanway in 1996, which revealed the game interpreted as Aquila. Inspired with pictures of Egyptian artworks and hieroglyphs. The young people then set to and wrote their own names in hieroglyphs, or designed cards, or played Aquila. From the Stone Age, a flint scraping tool, which the young man who found it demonstrated it's serrated edge was still sharp and that it was easy to handle.

  The picture shows a young archaeologist making a detailed drawing of a Roman pot sherd, having created a Bronze Age hut from a kit. Young Archaeologists met at Roman Circus House to share their finds and treasures with us this morning. These included a piece of Roman tesserae,  Roman, Greek and English coins, fragments of clay pipes, fossilised creepy crawlies in stones, and a vole skull. They also shared the stories of where the artefacts had been found. Some were handed on from grandparents. The finds were arranged in trays and taken round the room for everyone to look at and handle.     We had a presentation from two volunteers, who told a story depicting Bronze Age life and showed pictures of Stone Age, Bronze Age and Iron Age sites, which included, Skara Brae, Orkney, a Neolithic flint mine at Grimes Graves, Norfolk, and a Bronze Age copper mine at the Great Orme, Llandudno. The YACs were eager to share  their site visits. One had visited the Bronze Age s...