This is your chance!
I recently found a passage within a book surveying the landscape around Whitworth which mentioned a peat fire removing much of the rich vegetation thriving on the moors and on Brown Wardle Hill.
The majority of artefacts have been recovered at the edge of patches of peat or in areas where erosion has exposed the original land surface. Be a part of the journey to unveil the special stories of Spodden Valley by taking part in our Archaeology Research Workshop, taking place at Whitworth Museum, Friday 21st September, 11am-1pm. Peatland features can include ponds, ridges, and raised bogs. DigVentures is a social enterprise organising crowdfunded archaeological excavation experiences. These conditions are hostile to the microbes and fungi that would normally decay organic material such as the remains of plants, which are the principal constituents of the peat. a wildfire penetrating the subsurface), it smoulders. Community engagement through conversations, exhibitions, workshops and performances. 2015: As part of the two-week summer dig at Leiston Abbey; classes in post-medieval pottery and archaeological photography. The same anoxic conditions also offer protection from decay for organic archaeological remains. Curious about the past? In part this is because generating sufficient data to model the development of a bog in four dimensions (the fourth being time) is a formidable research challenge (https://phys.org/news/2018-09-bogsunique-history.html#jCp). The main focus for this residency and the archaeological dig is Brown Wardle Hill’s ancient past, its prehistory, when hunter gatherers moved through a very different looking landscape than the one we have carved out over years of ‘progressive’ agriculture and industry. It is composed mainly of wetland vegetation: principally bog plants including mosses, sedges, and shrubs. Over the past two months a series of 35mm photographic negatives taken of Brown Wardle Hill have been laying buried in peat, several inches below the surface of the hill. During the cotton famine of the mid-nineteenth century, a group of workers assembled and built a tower of babel twenty eight feet high before leaving it to elemental ruin. DigVentures Trailer 2019 Announcing... dig season 2019!
Please note, each adult will need to fill out their own sign up form. Notebook work; drawings, writings shared. 1.Mattley, R.D Annals of Rochdale. 0000044266 00000 n
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Board, Dig Digital Beta Group members and all those who have responded to surveys and consultations for providing comments and thoughts about digital archives. 0000004959 00000 n
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Wilkins, Brendon; Bamforth, Michael; Britchfield, David. This will be the first of many workshops to get involved in, through which you can help lead this exploration into the past.
13:00 (Demo) Flint Knapping! 2015: Poulton, near Chester, opportunity to work with The Poulton Research Project on their large multi-period site. Taking part is FREE, and no previous experience is necessary. 0000003653 00000 n
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In his comprehensive gazetteer Rochdale and The Vale Whitworth (Its moorlands, favourite nooks, green lanes, and scenery), William Robertson also speaks of Brown Wardle and the surrounding moors being “Luxuriantly covered with whimberry bushes, cranberry bushes, heath and rushes… the pasture land was divided by thorn hedges; and a large number of birch trees; the ‘the lord of the woods,” the long-surviving oak; the mountain ash, and the waving pine grew in the hedgerows. trailer
Want to learn more about the history on your doorstep? Spodden Valley Throwback… The Characters of Whitworth, Magic is all around us as long as we need it…, The Limer’s Gal and the Queen of the Well…, Join in on this amazing journey of discovery…, Digging a Little Deeper in Spodden Valley…, https://phys.org/news/2018-09-bogsunique-history.html#jCp, The Limer’s Gal and the Queen of the Well…. This slowly creates wetter conditions that allow the area of wetland to expand. Jan was among the founders of Bilbasen and Benjamin Media which he successfully exited, and subsequently began a … 2014: As part of the two-week summer dig at Leiston Abbey; classes in post-medieval pottery and archaeological photography. Processes, methods, activities will include: There will be several main outcomes of the project: All the work undertaken will be recorded and made available on this blog.
Collaboration with oral dialect readers / brass band / school choir and more. If you have a spare day between Tuesday 1st – Sunday 6th May 2018, why not join us for a FREE Dig Day and help us solve an age-old mystery on Brown Wardle Hill.