For forty years FoPH members have been digging into Pendle’s past. In its 40th year, well 2023 into 2024, we have been hunting for physical evidence of a cattle pool known as Brericar, one of the many Lancashire holdings, many within the Blackburn Hundred, of Queen Isabella (c.1295 to 22 August 1358), wife of King Edward
Forty years! That’s how long the Archaeology group has been digging into Pendle’s past. Quite an achievement, and there is more to come. The group started out in the Middle Ages investigating the origins of what is now the Pendle Heritage Centre, and it looks like we are back there again with our latest explorations.
CHIPPING OVER INTO PREHISTORY Our current Prehistoric dig has revealed a surface studded with fragments of abraded and worked chert under 5mm, many under 2mm, suggesting it was where someone sat up to 10.000 years ago making stone tools. If you look at the photo, the material we are interested in is the small black
Pendle’s Hidden Valley Field Walk (14 April 2018) Upper Craggs The Joy Of Flexibility – aka. The Best Laid Plans Of Mice & Men Alex Whitlock The intention had been to look at possible prehistoric features between the Nick Of Pendle and Ogden Clough. And for the first few hundred yards we stuck to
Yesterday we finished digging, so today we had a few things to do before we could start throwing all the stuff we had taken out over the last fortnight back in again. Sooooooooooo in the morning we photographed and recorded all the sections (the sides) of the trench. Only then did an elite task force
Last day of digging today. Even hotter than yesterday so regular retreats to the shade with bottles of water were necessary. A bit more Context 3 was peeled back & Features 1 and 2 were recorded and excavated. The trench photo was taken at close of play today. Find Of The Day made up part
We had more fathers than mothers on site today and it was scorchio. Sondage D has been taken down to ‘the natural’, Feature 1 has been cleaned up and recorded, ditto Feature 2, and elsewhere more of Context 3 is being peeled back. Judging from the pottery found in it, Context 3 looks like it
Today I started recording some of the sections and to help me do this I used some high tech – to wit a camera & some cotton buds . Well I do like the sections to be kept nice & clean. We make a record of the sections so that we have some idea of
We have been concentrating on the feature previously known as Idris’s Doughnut and trying to find ‘the natural’. The Doughnut continues to grow and now seems to be a made cobble platform of some sort & probably pre-dating the existing buildings in the area. The surface a short distance below it certainly pre-dates them –
I’m sure the site’s archaeology is taunting us. Sondage A revealed what looks like the rest of the Doughnut. It’s a feature built of medium sized pebbles and it may well be a pad to go under a wooden post. After a day of finding mostly worked stone, today continued in much the same way
We returned to the past today. In order to make the most of the time we have left we are opening three sondages in the existing trench. A sondage is basically a trench within a trench. We must be getting further back in time as today was aceramic. Our finds trays were all devoid of
Just another Manic Monday. Started off trying to make sure the small finds (individually numbered and measured in because they may be important) & bulk finds (recorded in bulk by context) were bagged and labeled properly and that all the paperwork matched up while the others started attacking context 3 in earnest. Its been an