You are currently browsing the monthly archive for February 2015.
A Google Earth image showing the Fornham All Saints Cursus in East Anglia, England
Mariam Ghaemi, writing for EADT24, reports that –
Prominent archaeologists and historians have called for a “major excavation” of a development site which sits in a landscape of potentially “international significance”.
These specialists have signed an open letter which is published in the EADT today concerning land on the edge of Bury St Edmunds, near Fornham All Saints, where building work for about 900 homes could begin in May. Concerns are over the proximity of the site to the Fornham All Saints cursus – a Neolithic processional way 1.2 miles long and a Scheduled Ancient Monument which has been dubbed as potentially “significant as Stonehenge”. The open letter says the cursus sits amid a landscape of high-level archaeological activity, “potentially of international significance”. It raises questions over the archaeological investigations at the development site, which Dr Tom Licence, director of the Centre of East Anglian Studies at the University of East Anglia, said the cursus may actually extend into.
More here.
A husband and wife team detecting in the Deverill Valley, Wiltshire, England
Video Credit: British Forces News/Forces TV
Until the end of this month (February 2015) …a special case in Salisbury Museum’s Wessex Gallery will display some exceptional objects discovered by members of the public in the Salisbury area. A husband and wife team, detecting in the Deverill Valley near Warminster, have discovered many treasured pieces.
The metal-detectorists found these pieces over a period of almost 30 years in the Deverill Valley, and have been working closely with the Portable Antiquities Scheme for 11 years. The objects they have found so far span 2,000 years of Wessex history, stretching right back into the Iron Age. The Scheme was set up by the UK government in 1997 to encourage the voluntary recording of archaeological objects found by members of the public in England and Wales.
Star pieces include a superbly modelled cast Roman bust of a Maenad (a female follower of the god Bacchus with a stunning plaited vine and ivy wreath head-dress). Another beautiful piece is an early medieval hooked tag showing an eagle stretching its wings and talons, possibly a symbol for John the Baptist, made from copper alloy with silver plate inlaid with niello. There is also a glorious gilded early medieval cloisonné brooch with a trifoliate leaf motif.
The exhibition will also include four finds from across south Wiltshire that have been recorded by the Portable Antiquities Scheme and donated to the Museum. Among these the pointed oval seal matrix from the sub deanery of Salisbury, made from copper-alloy between 1300-1400 AD, was donated by an individual who found it whilst gardening in Laverstock. The seal depicts the Virgin and Child standing before an elaborate altar.
More on the Salisbury Museum website here.