Since Spring 2005 two teams have been gathering and processing archaeological data from the study area. The aerial photography team, based at English Heritage in York, have been working on vertical and oblique photographs obtained from the National Monuments Record, the Unit for Landscape Modelling at Cambridge University and regional Sites and Monuments Record offices, identifying and mapping archaeological evidence from cropmarks, soil marks and earthworks.
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Cropmarks near Doncaster, South Yorkshire. ©Crown copyright NMR
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Parch marks on grass, near Doncaster, South Yorkshire. ©Crown copyright NMR
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At Archaeological Services WYAS a researcher and a GIS officer have been compiling data from three types of archaeological events: geophysical survey, field excavation and fieldwalking/metal detecting. Where possible geographic data from these events (excavation plans, survey plots, find spots) are being geo-referenced and imported into a GIS program. This information can then be displayed on different layers together with data from the aerial photography mapping, as shown here:
Archaeological investigations at Barnsdale Bar,
North and South Yorkshire
The ALSF Magnesian Limestone Project involves the use of several archaeological methods, as described above, in order to investigate the archaeology in and around quarry sites. With this evidence it has been possible to build up a picture of land use during the Iron Age and Romano-British periods. Barnsdale Bar straddles the parishes of Kirk Smeaton in North Yorkshire and Norton in South Yorkshire and is the site of three active limestone quarries that have been extended over recent years and have been the subject of archaeological mitigation strategies.
The aerial photography mapping has examined photographs ranging in date from the 1940s to 2002. These have revealed evidence of a number of cropmarks, indicating enclosures and trackways that formed part of ancient field systems possibly dating to the Iron Age/Romano-British periods.
Numerous geophysical surveys have been undertaken between 1989 and 2003. These surveys have revealed the presence of positive linear anomalies (buried features) that have been interpreted as the ditches and enclosures of an ancient field system. During some of the geophysical surveys a number of surface finds of flint and pottery were recovered providing evidence of past activity in the area dating from the Neolithic period and the Roman period.
Nine excavations have been carried out in the Barnsdale Bar Quarry area between 1989 and 2004, revealing more evidence of an ancient field system. Pre-excavation field walking has recovered some 110 pieces of Neolithic flint. The evidence suggested a complex system of activity that involved the development and expansion of enclosures over time. The enclosures mainly functioned as stock control, whilst domestic refuse dumps and a crouched human burial indicate settlement. The dating evidence has been supplied from the artefacts recovered during the excavations and comprised Iron Age and Roman pottery in addition to the worked flints dating to the Neolithic period.
The image below clearly demonstrates at this early stage of the project how each form of evidence adds to the overall picture of how the landscape has been used in the past. Aerial photographs (green lines) display soil or cropmarks not susceptible or accessible to geophysics. Geophysics (red/orange) reveal field systems not recorded on aerial photographs, and excavation (blue) can confirms the archaeological nature of the evidence and provide information on form, depth, stratigraphy and date. The fieldwalking evidence on this figure (black dots) shows grids producing finds rather than individual find spots. Together the results show a complex field system incorporating an agricultural, domestic and funerary landscape dating to the Iron Age and Romano-British periods.
Barnsdale Bar on the borders of South and North Yorkshire. ©ASWYAS 2005.
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For details of other NMP and ALSF projects, click the English Heritage logo
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