Comment: How to see the Romans in Ravenglass!

(Photo by Rowan May)

Now that the project is nearly complete, there are several new Roman attractions visitors can see in Ravenglass ...

There is a new interpretation board next to the Roman Baths, in addition to those installed by English Heritage:

And there is a display in the Pennington Hotel, which means the display free to all, and open when the hotel is:

In addition, at the Ravenglass & Eskdale Steam Railway (aka La'al Ratty) there will also be a small selection of the Roman finds collected by local people over the years.

Appearing not just in Ravenglass, the dig report is currently receiving final touches and will be available to download soon.

Report: Focus on the Finds Hut

Whilst the diggers worked hard excavating trenches, the finds team grappled with the mass outbreak of slag this season, as well as the other various categories of finds.  The slag all needed to be dried out, weighed and bagged up.  Leo was instrumental in getting this done:

Leo weighs lots and lots of slag ...

Meanwhile, Rosalie and Janice worked on sorting out the trays (and sometimes buckets!) from the previous day.

 Janice and Rosalie sorting the slag before its laid out to dry

In between all that, they would supervise the washing of the bulk finds.

Rosalie and finds washers sheltering from the sun!

 
When they'd finished the initial sorting, they moved onto small finding items.  This involved giving small finded items a unique number and taking appropriate measurements. The finds would then need to be packaged and stored.

The Small Finds book

This year, due to the pottery actually drying, we even did a little bit of pottery marking!  This involves painting the pottery sherds with a line of Paraloid B-72, which is a clear acrylic resin. When it's dry, we can then mark the pottery with its context number in permanent ink. When that's dry, we then paint another layer of Paraloid B-72 over it. 

Janice marking the pottery - small, clear and neat handwriting is mandatory for marking!

When the finds are fully processed they can then be boxed up ready for removal from site. We stopped washing finds on the last Saturday, so we could concentrate on bagging up as much as possible.

On the last couple of days, whilst the trenches were being backfilled, Brian K finished up the packing of the finds and the finds hut due to the absence of Finds Officer - she is very grateful for him being able to step in and take charge at the very last moment.

The finds are now resident in York for the moment waiting for the processing to be fully completed and then they'll be dispersed to the various specialists.  The clear boxes are for small finds, and the other white tubs are normally (for Ravenglass at least) the slag.

The Ravenglass small finds - and some slag

More finds boxes awaiting their fate, along with some ... more slag!

My next blog will focus on some of the finds highlights from this year's season.


Sandra Garside-Neville, Finds Officer, Romans in Ravenglass

Report: Hectic week at the dig!

The weather held fair for another week.

On Thursday, we welcomed Laura from ArcHeritage who was here to lead the fieldwalking in and around the site.  There were trips to the beach to collect finds and record find spots, as well as much measuring of lumps and bumps in the fields and investigating woodlands.

Jo, Leo & Laura on the beach (thanks to Brian K for taking the photo)

Friday was our first Open Day this year,  and special events included Community Archaeologist Jon, from York Archaeological Trust, who supervised Trench 4. This trench is purely for the use of local school children, Young Lake District rangers and 'have a go' diggers. Outreach Co-ordinator Lisa brought four school parties to site, and what happened will be the subject of a future blog.

Jon and young trowellers in Trench 4

Trench 4 was open for business on Friday and Saturday, and will also be available on Saturday 27th September. We are, of course, open Wednesday to Sunday, and tours and further information are available.

On Saturday, the dig donned its Heritage Days gladrags. Janice, Tourism Development Officer for South Copeland Tourism, kindly provided lovely pink bunting and ballons which bedecked our gazebos. In addition to her tourism job, Janice is also a volunteer Finds Assistant for the dig, bringing her superb organisational skills to sort out unruly finds and staff.

 Gazebos and bunting (with Finds Assistants Rosalie and Janice - in hi-vis jackets - on the right)

We were also visited by the Chairman of the Lake District National Park committee, Mike McKinley and committee member Hugh Branney who toured around the site, as well as viewed the finds set out to dry.

Janice, Mike, Hugh & Jeremy with drying finds

At the end of Saturday, we waved goodbye to Jon, who winged his way back to York. Sunday was Laura's last day, and as there are no Sunday trains out of Ravenglass, she will travel back to Sheffield on Monday.

Next week, we're looking forward seeing Environmental specialist Nicola from Northlight, who will be offering the chance to process samples from the site. And of course, there will be much more digging and lots of finds!

Comment: Romans in Ravenglass video now live!

I’m pleased to say that the Romans in Ravenglass video is now available to view on the Lake District National Park website. Just click here to view.

The 5 minute version is a cut down version of the 13.40 minute one which is well worth watching. It gives a really good impression of the dig and what all your hard work achieved. If you are lucky you might even see yourself in the video!!

Report: Lake District Archaeology Conference, 3rd November

The Lakeside Theatre in Keswick was pretty much sold out for the conference about this year's Lake District archaeology.

 The whole emphasis of the conference was community archaeology. With the formation of the Archaeology Network, the Lake District knows it has a wonderful volunteer resource for helping out with various projects within the National Park.  Added to that, there are several projects (for further information, see this newsletter) funded by the Heritage Lottery, as well as other other types of funding.  All would not take place if it were not for volunteers from the local community.

There are currently three Roman vici or settlement projects going on in the area!  There was Papcastle, Maryport and of course Ravenglass. So it was intreresting to hear about the various findings of these three sites, and someone commented that there would doubtless be a monograph on Roman Settlements in Cumbria appearing in the next few years.

The conference saw the first showing of Romans in Ravenglass - the film!  The version we saw was around five minutes long, and featured some now well known faces, including Holly, Kurt, Brian K, Leo, and Peter Frost-Pennington, as well as some of the diggers talking about their experiences. This version is due to be uploaded to the Lake District website shortly.  There is also a longer version of the film, which will hopefully be shown at the community presentation next year.

Ravenglass Director Kurt came over from York for the day to talk about the Dig.  Having only very recently got hold of the Geophys results, he was able to provide additional information with regards to the Roman roads, but said there is much more to come (this will be the subject of a future blog).

 It was also a chance to catch up with some of the Romans in Ravenglass volunteers!  It was great to meet up and exchange news.

Overall, it was an interesting and informative day, which gave a great insight to the work being done under the auspices of the Lake District National Park, as well as further Roman sites in the area.