Archive

Worcestershire Archive Service has just launched a new exhibition on Level Two at The Hive which explores the lives and expectations of those who were servants and those who were masters. It also looks at the interactions between the two groups whose lives were interconnected and dependent on each other.   The Ideal Servant In an...

The Hive, Worcester is home to all recently excavated finds recovered by Worcestershire Archaeology, so it was here that Small Pits, Big Ideas headed for the third and final day. Splitting into two, half the group went down to our finds processing room whilst Jane, one of our finds specialists, helped the others identify and...

After promising finds during Day 1 of this HLF funded project, the four teams were eager to get going on the second morning and dig the deepest test pit. Spits 2 and 3 were soon excavated and the soil sieved for finds – several of the eagle-eyed amongst the group were particularly good at spotting...

The first day finally arrived and the participating young people and archaeology undergraduates turned up bright and early to dig the first four Small Pits, Big Ideas test pits. After a great introduction from Professor Carenza Lewis, who explained how the project is contributing to important academic research, the group split into four teams, gathered...

Our community excavation at Soudley Camp in the Forest of Dean has come to an end. Over eight days a team of local volunteers and WAAS archaeologists dug three trenches and five test pits in this enigmatic ancient monument. The investigations were part of the Foresters’ Forest Programme, a Heritage Lottery Fund project. Soudley Camp...

  Young people have been investigating a local village through digging test pits in a Worcestershire Village. Worcestershire Archaeological Society was awarded £9,700 by the Heritage Lottery Fund for Small Pits, Big Ideas, with £1000 match funding from the University of Worcester. The origins came from discussions with Professor Carenza Lewis, who has pioneered the...

Have you been enjoying the TV series Gunpowder on a Saturday night? Worcestershire people played a key role in the Gunpowder Plot, and this was where the plotters fled to after it all went wrong in an attempt to raise a rebellion. One of the plotters was Robert Wintour of Huddington Court, here in Worcestershire....

  During the early medieval period someone made several doughnut shaped rings of fired clay. Sometime later, these were placed in a pit. Around 1000 years later we excavated the same pit and found two whole and one fragmented ceramic rings. October’s find of the month are loom weights from one of our ongoing excavations...

In the second of our Halloween inspired blog posts we take a look at a recent site which produced a grave that was seemingly missing a body! During late 2016 and early 2017 a team from Worcestershire Archaeology carried out one of the largest excavations in their history in connection with the creation of a...

In the first of two posts with a spooky flavour for Halloween we’re taking a look at some ritual symbols intended to ward off witches and evil spirits that were discovered earlier this year in a barn in south Worcestershire. In January 2017 buildings archaeologist Tim Cornah went out to investigate a group of farm...