Ryan Prescott gives an update on what happened on the first day of digging at Newhouse
The first day of our excavations at Newhouse has provided some promising results already. This week we are excavating two trenches across the earthwork identified last year from geophysical survey (please look at our aims for this year on the CST Blog).
Trench 1 was swiftly opened with the aid of our JCB. It was hoped that this trench would help corroborate twelfth-century sources that a castle had existed prior to Newsham Abbey, founded here during ‘the Anarchy’. This trench was excavated diagonally from the west to the south-east of the earthwork in order to cut across two of its sides. However, we decided to extend our work in this trench with a perpendicular channel to the southern boundary. At a length of over 40m and 2m wide, the trench has yielded large quantities of flint, some of which appears to have been worked. We have also recovered evidence of burning and pottery finds which we will investigate further as the week progresses.
Figure 1: Trench 1 looking south.
To provide more comprehensive insight into the nature of this three-sided earthwork, Trench 2 was dug across the eastern side of the raised platform and extends from its middle into the ditch on this side at a length of around 25m, slightly longer than initially planned. At first, this trench appeared to show little of interest. Undeterred, we decided to dig deeper into the ditch, and much like in Trench 1, it is clear from this that the earthwork would have been higher than the remains which are left behind. We plan to dig deeper into this later in the week. We cleaned the rest of this trench and discovered a masonry slab, hoping to have a better view of any potential finds and features on our second day when we return to focus on this trench.
Figure 2: Trench 2 looking west with a view of the masonry slab found there.Figure 3: The ditch being opened up in Trench 2 looking east
We are excited to see what the second day of the excavations reveals and will be posting updates as soon as we can.
In Week Fourth and final week of the Lowther Medieval Castle and Village Project 2024, the team moved into the UCLan labs. This crucial phase allows us to draw together the evidence we’ve collected last year and this, from the recording of trenches to the analysis of soil samples.
A major part of this process is the transfer of trench plans onto a Geographic Information System (GIS). During excavations, the dig team thoroughly recorded the contents of trenches in situ. This included the painstaking task of drawing the cobbled surfaces found inside the ringwork castle at 1:20 scale. Now, these hand drawings are transferred to the GIS and the outline of every cobblestone is traced digitally so that the archaeological contexts within the trenches be plotted with pinpoint accuracy.
Figure 1 Both last year and this, student archaeologists painstakingly recorded by hand the contents of all trenchesFigure 2 With hand drawings of trenches transferred to the project GIS, each component of the drawing needs to be traced digitally
Meanwhile, the team is also plotting onto the GIS hundreds of data points from around the ringwork castle taken using a Global Positioning System (GPS). This allows us to create a three-dimensional digital model of the ringwork castle, in order to investigate its form and plot the positioning and contents of trenches from this year and last, building up our picture of the castle, its features and finds.
Figure 3 Taking hundreds of data points via the GPS enables the team to construct a 3D digital model of the ringwork castleFigure 4 Trenches from both phases of excavation can be plotted onto the 3D model of the ringwork castle using the GIS
While one cohort of student archaeologists has been busy in the computer labs, another has been hard at work processing soil samples. Throughout the excavation, the team has been collecting bulk soil samples of 40 litres from all trenches. These samples have now been processed using water flotation, in order to recover charred plant remains, as well as small bones and artefacts. This has so far yielded environmental evidence such as tiny snail shells, which can be analysed to reconstruct the surrounding environment at the time the ringwork castle was built.
Figure 5 Dozens of soil samples have been processed using water flotationFigure 6 Soil sample processing yields environmental evidence, such as tiny snail shells
Now that Phase Two investigations are drawing to a close, the team has also been able to take stock of the small finds garnered this year. As discussed in our last Dig Diary, this year’s finds have included cockle shells and gritty ware pottery, both of which will help us to date the castle and trace activity at Lowther in the Middle Ages. This builds on intriguing earlier finds this year of animal bones, including an articulated fetlock (discussed in our first Dig Diary this year). We can now add to this a bone bead, small but delicately carved, which looks to be dateable to the Middle Ages.
Figure 7 A small carved bone bead found during this year’s excavation
Work on analysing these finds – and the broader phase of analysis – is ongoing, and will be compiled into the project’s second interim report in due course.
Jo Kirton and Graeme Young, co-director of the Bamburgh Research Project (BRP) outlines what happened during their 2023 season and what the CST funded part of the research at this iconic castle revealed.
Throughout July 2023 BRP staff ran our annual field school at Bamburgh Castle, which is currently exploring the medieval outworks at the northern tip of the castle. We also welcomed several experts to site, funded by our CST grant, to undertake complementary survey alongside our excavation.
Historic Building Consultant Peter Ryder joined us to undertake a preliminary masonry survey of the extant outworks while Tony Liddel from Vindomora Solutions created several 3D models of the standing outworks and internal structures of Elmund’s Tower and our associated trenches. Dr Kristian Strutt and his team from the University of Southampton undertook a geophysical survey of the castle ditch and explored how this interacts with the outworks, as well as identifying related features and access ways to St Oswald’s Gate. BRP staff and students worked with the team, trying their hand at GPR, resistivity and magnetometry.
The reports from the masonry and geophysical survey, plus the associated3D models have now been completed and incorporated into the BRP’s Interim Report on Work on the Outworks Beyond St Oswald’s Gate. This is a summary.
Background
The Bamburgh Research Project (BRP) was set up in 1996-97 to undertake archaeological investigation of Bamburgh Castle and its environs. The area immediately within St Oswald’s Gate was investigated in an effort to identify early elements of the fortification and structures associated with the entrance; documentary evidence indicates that this gate was the principal, and perhaps only, entrance to the fortress in the 8th century AD and likely remained such until the main gate was relocated to its present position in the 12th century.
The rock outcrop on which Bamburgh Castle stands is comprised of volcanic dolerite that rises some 30m above the external ground surface. The surface of the plateau is c.3 hectares in area. It undulates in height, sloping downwards from the Inner Ward area at the south-east, which reaches 45m OD, to the north-west end of the West Ward where St Oswald’s Gate lies. Here a natural cleft in the bedrock on the landward side leads out and down the slope of the plateau. This has formed a natural route up to the summit from earliest times bridging, if awkwardly, the height difference between the West Ward at some 22m above sea level and the surrounding ground surface that lay at 13m OD. St Oswald’s Gate is written about as the entrance to the fortress of Bamburgh in the 8th century AD (Symeon HK, III. pg 37) and was very likely the earliest route up onto the rock plateau.
The present phase of work began in the summer of 2021. We are investigating the entrance, the access routes up to the entrance and the structures and outworks built to control this route over many generations. One area of focus was the recovery of the site of the Tower of Elmund’s Well, named in records from the 13th century (Colvin, H. M. 1973, 556) and onto which a cottage was constructed in the late 18th century.
The plan outline of the cottage/tower structure was quickly revealed during the first phase of investigation by the removal of foliage and a modest volume of aeolian sand. One of the first exciting discoveries during the 2022 excavation was the presence of two splayed lights (open window-like features) in two of the walls.
Figure 1: Aerial photo of the outworks with the cottage/tower seen in the top right corner. The steps that lead back to St Oswald’s Gate, through the Wing Wall, at the bottom of the photo. Facing west. Copyright Bamburgh Research Project
The elements of the cottage are now exposed fully in plan and when interpreted alongside the available cartographic evidence would suggest that the entrance was re-aligned due to the build-up of sand deposits in the area that have been slowly burying the standing structures during the post-medieval period. Two short flights of more recent stairs, each turning through a right angle, lead to a long straight set of stairs of older character and showing substantial wear, that extended down through the arch to the basement of the tower where we know from cartographic evidence the well was once present, in what is now a basement room. Here excavation must be getting close to the floor level and some four phases of build are seen in the exposed walls that now reach almost two storeys. The lower two of these phases are likely to be elements of the medieval tower and the upper, by default, phases of the cottage that was built on and into the tower from the 18th century.
There was further work on the postern gate that lies beyond St Oswald’s Gate that leads out to the village which had been subject to limited survey and excavation in previous seasons. Continued excavation immediately behind the wall that leads back to the castle rock has uncovered more of the structure. We intended to uncover more of the wall, recover some datable finds and identify the level from which it was constructed. The structure as uncovered is a single well-constructed feature of coursed squared masonry that ended abruptly and deliberately short of the rock. A further constructed face abutted the bedrock and the gap between the two faces is a little more than 1m wide, forming what must have been a second gate. The eastern of the two is likely the earlier of them and must have led to a timber stair as it is well above ground level. The western, that is currently still in use, may have replaced it as more practical as it is closer to ground level, though still reached by stairs, the current version of which appear to be late post-medieval. This wall extends well to the west where a form of it turns to the north towards the tower/cottage. All the elements that are currently exposed appear to be late in date and the medieval wall must lie beneath the current ground level.
In 2023 we opened Trench 5E, sited outside of the wall with the postern gate and the outworks. It was placed next to a short length of wall that we investigated last season to see if it had once extended further. It has revealed a stone alignment that extends parallel to the two standing walls. Those of the outworks and the short wall length. So far only the upper level has been uncovered, so it is possible that it could be either a wall top or a foundation or the surface of a narrow path.
Work supported by funding from the CST
CST funded BRP to undertake additional non-invasive survey work to offer additional context to the excavation outlined above. Initially, and to better frame the results of the geophysics and limited excavation a walk over study was undertaken by BRP and Peter Ryder. This aimed to provide a description of the standing structures in their historical context, as they are currently understood and was supported by selected areas of photogrammetry survey.
St Oswald’s Gate itself extends out through the curtain wall to the landward side at the northern end of the castle. It passes through a vaulted tunnel to the gate and appears to represent two phases of medieval build with a third – post-medieval – phase represented by internal and external refacing, likely of the late 18th century.
One of the most enigmatic features is the Wing Wall (W2 (see Figure 2) that forms a partial barrier to the route down from the gate. It appears to be one of the older elements of the defences with at least four phases of masonry (see Figure 3) and is relatively narrow compared to the later medieval defensive walls, such as the South Wall (W2) that cuts and post-dates it. It also contains an unusual arched doorway of early form that may be reused from elsewhere.
Figure 2: The northern extent of Bamburgh Castle showing the site of the outworks and the silted tidal port. Copyright Bamburgh Research ProjectFigure 3: The narrow ‘Wing Wall’ showing the narrow archway and multiple phases of construction, facing north-west Copyright Bamburgh Research Project
The south Wall (W1 and W3) comprised at least two build elements that joined with an overlapping joint. The wall as we now know through excavation had two postern gates that would have led to the village.
In addition to the masonry and photogrammetry survey, Dr Kristian Strutt undertook magnetometry, resistivity and Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) survey of areas of the Cricket Ground to the west of Bamburgh Castle. The results indicate the possible presence of a large ditch, some 45m across, immediately to the west of the outcrop, in addition to trackways, walls and other features.
Figure 4: GPR survey under way across the Cricket Ground using an Impulse Raptor 8-channel system and GPS (photo: K. Strutt)
One of the principal questions we were hoping to address with the geophysics was if the castle ditch extended across the sports field at the base of the castle rock. A ditch cut through sandstone can been traced in the area of the modern entrance that is at the site of the 12th century gate. This feature extends across the front of the castle as far as the sandstone ridge. The results of the GPR seem to strongly indicate a large feature in the area where we would anticipate the castle ditch to be and the magnetometry and resistance surveys seem to support this. It is intended to conduct further fieldwork, starting with coring, to confirm this.
In addition, several features seen on the 1865 1st Edition Ordnance Survey (Accessed via National Library of Scotland online 23/04/2024) appear to be picked up on the surveys. Two trackways are evident, that lead to St Oswald’s Gate and to a cleft in the castle rock called the ‘Miller’s Nick’, which allowed people to scramble up to the West Ward in the 19th century. The second is an S-shaped path that meandered towards the area of St Oswald’s Gate, perhaps originally skirting around the edge of the ditch feature. One further route-way or path extends across the field parallel to the road in the village to the south, called the Wynding, that appears from records to have had a medieval origin. This path runs alongside a linear plot boundary and field boundaries and it will be interesting to see if more can be made from a number of anomalies within the enclosure areas to the south and west of the plot.
The resistivity and ground penetrating radar surveys so far cover a more limited area, due to time constraints and public access. There is an area of low resistance that lies just where the ditch would lie and matches up to the path towards the Miller’s Nick. The enclosure areas picked up in the magnetometry to the south-west also seems to be present on the resistivity. Notably, there is a high resistance feature that the S-shaped pathway may curve deliberately to avoid at the south part of the plot. A further T-shaped high resistance feature is present in the north-east extending from the area of the modern pavilion that will bear further study. The GPR further reinforces the presence of some of these features and indicates some depth to the anomaly that is interpreted as the ditch, though the signal attenuates before it could indicate a true depth.
Together, the on-going excavation and non-invasive survey work undertaken in 2023 are providing us with the opportunity to better understand the castle outworks, north of the castle, and the wider environs in which they were situated. That this area of the castle was its original entrance, and for a time gave access to a modest port, ensures that there is much yet to be discovered and understood.
Interim Report
If you would like to read more about the excavation, masonry survey & 3D models and/or the results of the geophysical survey with accompanying discussion, please take a look at
Ryder, P. 2024. Preliminary Assessment of the Standing Masonry Elements: St Oswald’s Gate, the Western Outwork and St Elmund’s Well Tower, Bamburgh Castle, Unpublished Report
Strutt, K and Barker, D. 2024. Report on the Geophysical Survey at Bamburgh, Northumberland, July 2023Department of Archaeology, University of Southampton: Unpublished Report
Symeon, H. K. Historia regum Anglorum et Dacorum (trans. J. Stevenson), 1858, Church Historians of England
Berkeley Castle Project Excavation Director Dr Stuart Prior takes a look at one of the many interesting discoveries made during the dig which is part of a new book looking at 15 years of excavation.
Between 2005 and 2019 the Berkeley Castle Project (BCP), conducted by University of Bristol, carried out excavations and survey work at Berkeley Castle, which have led to the publication of a new book. Excavations in 2015, of Trench 19, were able to gain insight into the early origins of the castle and the donjon that was constructed when the castle was built in stone by Robert FitzHarding in 1153–1154.
It was originally believed that the first stone castle erected at Berkeley comprised a circular shell keep, but the BCP was able to shed new light on this aspect of the site’s past and its architectural evolution. In a Castle Studies Group Bulletin (CSG Bulletin 18, 2014), Neil Guy suggested that the castle may have had a square or rectangular donjon or keep that may have been modified as the basis for the Thorpe Tower by Thomas [III] Berkeley (1292–1361). Trench 19 was designed to look for evidence of the north-west corner and west wall of this postulated donjon. The argument here was that Thorpe Tower was not wholly created ‘as new’ in the 14th century but was instead a part-relic structure arising from a 1340s re-modelling of the 12th century castle. Namely, two corners and one side of a square donjon which abutted the north side of the ‘motte’, and for which the shell-keep encasing the motte was an inner (and elevated or upper) bailey.
Figure 1: Plan view of Trench 19 showing heavily robbed-out building foundations copyright Berkeley Castle Project
The archaeological remains observed in Trench 19 (Fig. 1) appear to demonstrate the presence of a heavily robbed-out building with structures of two later phases overlying it (Fig. 2). The orientation of the first structural phase (contexts 1912 and 1916) and the robber trench (context 1908) associated with it is in alignment with the south-facing elevation of Thorpe Tower. This orientation suggests that this first phase was associated with, and presumably connected to, Thorpe Tower. It is probable, therefore, that context 1912 represents a heavily robbed wall which is comparable, and most likely contemporary with, wall J3, identified by the 8th Earl, who was an amateur archaeologist, which extended from the northern elevation of Thorpe Tower (TBGAS, 1927, vol.49, 183-93 & 1938, vol.60, 308-39).
Figure 2 – Location of proposed donjon overlying plan of 8th Earl’s excavations. Copyright Berkeley Castle Project
It appears then that the shell-keep and Thorpe Tower are of a single phase, most likely dating to the mid-12th century. While there is no evidence currently that contexts 1912, 1916 and wall J3 are contemporary with this primary construction phase, it must be noted that the wall (1911) overlaid context 1912 and re-used some of its stone. Further to the evidence from Trench 19, the rear wall of this fortification can still be seen, incorporated into the castle’s later form (Figs. 3 & 4).
Figure 3 – 17th century painting by Dankerts showing original height of donjon along with remnant of projecting wall (heading north towards church).Figure 4 – Aerial view of Berkeley showing reduced height of donjon; and with addition of 18th century laundry attached to north. Copyright Berkeley Castle Project
Accompanying the donjon, there are several medieval documents that record the cutting of moats around Berkeley Castle. In The Cartulary of St Augustine’s Abbey, Bristol, an entry made between 1171 and 1190 records a grant made by Maurice de Berkeley [I] to St Augustine’s of a rent of 5s from his mill below the castle, some tithes of pannage, and common pasture for a plough team ‘pro emendatione culpe mee de fossato quod feci de cimiterio de Berchel circa castellum meum’ (charter no. 78; Walker, 1998, 46–7), which roughly translated means ‘in recompense for my offence committed upon the cemetery of Berkeley in cutting a ditch around my castle’. This suggests that Maurice cut a moat around his castle, which encroached upon part of the cemetery, and he was subsequently fined for his actions. The grant is again confirmed sometime between 1190 and 1220 by Maurice’s son, Robert [II] (charter no. 119; ibid., 69–70).
During this period then, the castle comprised an ovoid shell-keep with adjacent forebuilding, the curtain wall of the inner ward and the Norman Great Hall, all wrapped around the skeleton of the earlier motte and bailey. Excavations carried out by the 8th Earl between 1917 and 1937 (TBGAS 1938, 321) demonstrated that the shell-keep was already adequately defended by a moat that ran around its base on the southwest, north-west and north-east sides – which may have encircled the earlier motte and bailey – and records show that Maurice [I] dug a deep moat around the south-east side of the castle, presumably to complete the defensive circuit, and diverted the Newport brook and others towards the castle to fill it.
With the excavation report on the third and final season of excavation which the CST has funded now published on our website, project lead Dr Nigel Baker looks at what has been achieved since the first work in 2019 to now.
Just over a century ago Shrewsbury Castle began a new phase in its long life. In 1925 its principal surviving building, having been in use as a private dwelling since the castle was finally de-munitioned in 1686, became the meeting hall of Shrewsbury Borough Council, set in extensive landscaped gardens covering the remains of the motte and inner bailey, the outer bailey having (mostly) disappeared beneath the growing town by c.1300. Shrewsbury Castle remained more or less untouched by archaeology for the remainder of the 20th century. This changed in 2019 with the award by the Castle Studies Trust of a grant for a season of geophysical survey and excavation in the inner bailey. Following permission from Shropshire Council, the site owners, and Historic England, its legal guardians, the work took place in May and July 2019, the geophysics by contractors Tiger Geo and the excavation team made up of experienced local volunteers and staff and students of University Centre Shrewsbury. The results were unexpected.
Shrewsbury Castle Excavation 2019 showing the width of the ditch around the motte using deckchairs (copyright Dr Nigel Baker)Arrow heads found in Shrewsbury Castle Motte Ditch (copyright Dr Nigel Baker)
Immediately under the turf was natural glacial gravel: the top of the hill on which the castle had been built; the ground surface had been lowered sometime in the past, removing nearly all archaeological remains. This was almost certainly the work of the young Thomas Telford who, from 1786 to 1790, lived in and ‘restored’ the castle for its owner, Sir William Pulteney, M.P. for Shrewsbury. However, archaeological strata were found to have survived within cuts into the natural gravel, and two of these were of major significance. The first was the edge of a previously-unknown ditch around the base of the motte. Medieval cooking-pot sherds of late 11th-13th-century date were found in its lowest excavated layers, along with two armour-piercing crossbow quarrel heads. The second significant find was of a pit containing in its fill a piece of decorated bone and two types of pre-Conquest (Saxon) pottery: Stafford-type ware, distributed widely across the emerging towns of the region and already well represented in Shrewsbury; and a limestone-tempered fabric, TF41a, never before seen in Shrewsbury, which had been made in the Gloucester area and probably imported up the Severn. This confirms that there was pre-Conquest activity on the site of the castle, and, along with the Domesday evidence that there was a church of St Michael there by 1086, may point in the direction of a high-status pre-Norman presence on this tactically-significant site controlling access to the ancient borough.
Shrewsbury Castle Excavation 2020 (copyright Dr Nigel Baker)
Excavation resumed in the autumn of 2020 with a trench seeking a sample profile through the west rampart of the inner bailey. This turned out not to be medieval in date. Both the west and the north rampart were probably created as part of Thomas Telford’s landscaping work in 1786-90. But, intriguingly, below the west rampart there was no sign within the trench of the natural hilltop gravel found close by in 2019 at a depth of just a few centimetres. The explanation may be that the bailey was enlarged westwards between the Norman period and the later medieval period, by dumping soil and levelling-up behind a new curtain wall.
Shrewsbury Castle Excavation 2022 on the motte top (copyright Dr Nigel Baker
The final season of excavations took place in 2022 on the top of the motte, and outside the north curtain wall. Telford is known to have demolished ruined medieval buildings on the top of the motte and replaced them with the surviving two-storey Gothic summerhouse there. Excavation showed that Telford’s activities had, again, removed most of the archaeology but that the foundations of early medieval timber buildings (beam slots, a post pad, post holes) survived where they had been cut into the motte material. No definite trace was seen of the ‘great wooden tower’ which is documented on the motte top until its collapse in 1269-71.
New light was also shed on the motte by vegetation clearance on its south side, revealing for the first time remains of buildings incorporated in the masonry of the retaining walls. This work was undertaken on behalf of Shropshire Council for a new conservation-management plan, currently at consultation stage, which includes photogrammetric surveying of all the castle structures. This permanent stone-by-stone record not only forms the basis for the next vital stage of work – identifying and specifying long-needed repairs – it also offers new archaeological insights, including the identification of the probable primary sandstone rubble fabric of the curtain walls. This was in turn followed by some research carried out by Jason Hurst on Civil War musketry damage in 2023 (Potential shot damage at Shrewsbury Castle – Castle Studies Trust Blog) . And now, the process of publishing this body of new archaeological, architectural and historical information is just beginning…
Jason Hurst from the University of Leicester’s School of Ancient History and Archaeology and expert on civil war damage to castles looks at the damage at Shrewsbury Castle.
In June this year I went with Dr Nigel Baker, and Dr Morn Capper of University Centre Shrewsbury, to examine suspected musket/weapon projectile damage inflicted on the Castle, possibly during the Parliamentarian assault of February 1645.
Dr Morn Capper showing the damage to Shrewsbury Castle’s main gate
When inspecting the marks on the main castle gate I concluded that these were from musket/pistol ball strikes with some indication of possible fragments of these projectiles still embedded in the woodwork, along with possible residues.
Shrewsbury Castle Postern Gate Gun Shot Damage
On the outside of the Postern Gate the identification of some of the marks could not be positively made because of weathering, but intriguing larger impact marks seem to be from a small calibre artillery piece, possible a Robinet or similar sized calibre gun.
At the north end of the hall, facing the railway station, are marks that look like weapon projectile strikes but their trajectory is problematic. Some appear to have come in at a level trajectory towards the wall and some from a downward trajectory, so these need to be looked at in more detail to determine what has caused them.
Dr Jo Kirton co-director of the Bamburgh Research Project takes a look at the work they are doing at Bamburgh Castle, funded by the Trust.
Throughout 2023 and early 2024 the Bamburgh Research Project will be utilising funding from the Castle Studies Trust to further explore Bamburgh Castle’s medieval outworks, particularly the area outside St Oswald’s Gate where our current excavation is underway as part of our annual field school. Our project is titled ‘Contextualising Bamburgh Castle: wells, towers, mounds and more!’
crForeground shows the area currently under excavation by the BRP with St Oswald’s Gate visible at the top of the steps and West Ward of Bamburgh Castle present in the background.eated by dji camera
Bamburgh Castle
Bamburgh Castle rises from the North Sea coast of north Northumberland. It lies on an undulating, 3.2-hectare, outcrop of dolerite bedrock that stands up to 30m above the surrounding countryside. Bede describes it as a palace site of the Anglo-Saxon kings of Northumbria from the later 6th century and it remained a royal castle until its semi-abandonment after a great siege in 1464. Rebuilt by the Lord Crewe Trust in the 18th century and again by the 1st Lord Armstrong at the end of the 19th, the fortress has long held a special place in the history and culture of the region.
The majority of the archaeological work at Bamburgh has concentrated in the low-lying West Ward at the north of the castle. A complex deeply stratified, finds-rich, site has been revealed archaeologically. By contrast, the Inner Ward of the castle, at the very top of the hill, remains a built-up area. Modest scale excavation of the accessible areas has provided an important balance, giving insight into the heart of the citadel to contrast with the occupation and industrial activities we see in the West Ward.
Aerial shot of St Oswald’s Gate with steps leading down to current excavation area.
St Oswald’s Gate
St Oswald’s Gate and the outworks beyond lie in the area of the original entrance to the castle. It is very likely that the siege castle (named Mal Voisin in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle) was built close to this gate in AD 1095. When the main access was re-sited, the entrance here remained as an important postern, perhaps serving a small adjacent harbour immediately to the north of the site. This area now forms the BRP’s main investigative focus. The outworks consist of strong walls enclosing a trapezoidal area with the Tower of Elmund’s Well, with a more recent wall and postern to the west.
Map depicting current area of excavation (Base map Crown Copyright/database right 2022. An Ordnance Survey/Edina supplied service).
The outworks at St Oswald’s Gate are a rare case at Bamburgh as they have not been subject to extensive rebuilding in the post medieval period. Other than the reconstruction of the tower as a cottage, the outworks represent an astonishing window into mostly unaltered medieval fabric still standing at Bamburgh.
Aerial shot of Elmund’s Tower and suspected medieval well location.
Work to Date
Recent investigation by the BRP has revealed that a substantial structure still survives below ground. This is in the form of an L-shaped corridor and steps down into the room that is thought to be the tower basement that contained the well. The presence of two splayed narrow windows appears to further indicate that this is part of the medieval Elmund’s Tower. Our primary aim this year is to continue to reveal the full extent of the tower and identify any remains of the well depicted on the 19th century survey.
Steps down into the room that is thought to be the tower basement that contained the well.Arch into the well room of the tower
What will the Castle Studies Trust (CST) Funding be used for?
There are two primary aims for the CST funding:
The first is to contextualise our recent excavations at Elmund’s Tower through geophysical survey (GPR and Magnetometry) and to undertake a masonry survey of the castle’s associated extant outworks. This will include using photogrammetry to create a 3D model of the standing outworks and internal structures of Elmund’s Tower. The survey will be undertaken in conjunction with a metric survey of the structures outlines. This work is currently underway and we look forward to sharing the results with the CST. You can follow our progress on our blog: https://wordpress.com/post/bamburghresearchproject.wordpress.com
The second focus for the funding will be on disseminating our discoveries to the wider public. We will install signage for visitors, who cannot currently visit this area of the castle with a QR code for the 3D model, granting online access to Elmund’s Tower and the wider outworks over the winter period. This information will also be replicated and enhanced with the creation of a new webpage on the Bamburgh Castle website. Alongside these permanent additions we will continue to share our work through our blog and social media.
At the end of week two of the #LowtherMedievalCastle dig and project lead Sophie Ambler gives us the latest update.
At the end of week two, we’re half way through our excavation of Lowther Medieval Castle and Village, and revealing some intriguing results.
We now have four trenches open, three exploring the medieval castle earthwork and one across the routeway linking castle to village. There is still a great deal of work to be done, so much of what follows involves some speculation, and these findings are very much preliminary!
Trench One, on the western side of the castle earthwork, has revealed a small brick patio, bounded on the western edge with a course of cut stones. Miscellaneous finds, including a degraded iron doorhandle and pottery sherds, suggest that this might represent a phase of use concurrent with the nineteenth-century castle. Today’s Lowther Castle, the ruins of which overlook the site, was commissioned in 1806 by William, 1st Earl of Lonsdale. One theory is that the patio relates to the ‘Countess’s Stairs’, which once led up the steep slope from the River Lowther – perhaps towards the patio or a now-lost structure, which may have afforded a view across the river.
Trench Two: view down northward slope from top of northern bank
Trench Two, which cuts through the northern bank of the medieval castle earthwork, is starting to give us a real insight into how the fortification was constructed. We might expect with a ringwork castle for the bank to have been built using earth taken from an encircling ditch, but there is no evidence of a ditch at present. Instead, the bank appears to have been formed from material scoured from the immediate area: both the flat stretching north of the earthwork and the steep slope down to the River Lowther, a rich source of limestone. The bank appears to have been constructed in alternating layers of earth and stone. The team will continue working their way through the layers in this trench, in the hope of revealing more of the bank’s construction, and picking up any small finds that will provide us with dating evidence.
Trench Two northern bank of castle earthwork viewed from exterior showing layers of construction demonstrated by Jim Morris of UCLan
At the southern end of Trench Two, within the castle earthwork’s interior, is a metalled surface that may be the original medieval surface. This might tie into emerging discoveries in Trench Four.
Trench Four is our newest trench, opened over the entrance to the castle earthwork on its eastern side. Already this is beginning to yield evidence of what looks to be the same metalled surface evident in Trench Two. If so, this could suggest the original medieval metalled surface leading into the castle from the village and stretching across the floor of the ringwork. No evidence of this surface is evident so far in Trench One, either because it was destroyed by the intrusion of the nineteenth-century patio, or because the metalled surface did not cover the entirety of the castle interior. Within Trench Four, amidst a stone layer to the north of the metalled surface, is what might just be evidence of a post hole. Could this represent one side of the castle’s gateway? Watch this space!
Trench Three is another relatively recent trench taking in what is likely to be the routeway into the castle from the village, and what might be structures or plots lining the routeway. This has so far yielded two patches of disordered stone to the north of the routeway; one theory so far is that these represent demolition undertaken when the village was cleared in the seventeenth century.
All four trenches will hopefully have more to tell us as the team continues work over the second half of the project.
In part three of our dig diary, project lead Sophie Ambler talks about another type of digging, not of holes in the ground by through the archives to discover what if any historical evidence there is for Lowther.
Whilst the archaeologist are at work on site at Lowther, I’m attempting to piece together the site’s history from the documentary evidence.
Our biggest challenge is tracing the origins of Lowther’s medieval castle and village, which we think date to the late eleventh or early twelfth century. For most of England, historians have a phenomenal source for settlement in the eleventh century: Domesday Book. This was William the Conqueror’s enormous survey of landholding, compiled in 1086. It gives various details, settlement by settlement, such as landholders, land under cultivation, notable buildings and households (for an introduction to Domesday and the latest research, listen to this BBC History Extra podcast by Professor Stephen Baxter). Domesday thus helps historians to trace the process by which the Normans conquered England over the twenty years from 1066.
Frustratingly for us, the area of modern Co. Cumbria doesn’t appear in Domesday Book. Because this region wasn’t conquered by William I, it found no place in the Domesday survey. As discussed in our project’s first Dig Diary entry, the region was only conquered in 1092, by William the Conqueror’s son, William Rufus. The Anglo-Saxon chronicle states that William Rufus, following his campaign of conquest, ‘sent many peasant people with their wives and cattle to live there and cultivate the land’. This was, effectively, a process of Norman colonisation. We’re hypothesising that the ringwork castle earthwork and village at Lowther date to this era.
What was this region like when the Normans arrived in 1092? Here, historians have worked hard from patchy evidence for the Kingdom of Cumbria in the tenth and eleventh centuries. This was a Brittonic kingdom (distinct from the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of the south) but, as Professor Fiona Edmonds has described, parts of the kingdom were ‘multi-lingual and multi-cultural’ (including settlers we might think of as ‘Vikings’ and their descendants). These groups were encompassed by the term ‘Cymry’ (‘inhabitants of the same region’), from which the names Cumbria and Cumberland derive.
Who were the settlers dispatched in 1092 by William Rufus to colonise the Kingdom of Cumbria? There’s no hard evidence, but Dr Henry Summerson has suggested (in his book Medieval Carlisle) that they hailed from Lincolnshire. This theory has found some support from the late Professor Richard Sharpe, although he noted that evidence for a Lincolnshire connection dates to around 1100, so may represent a second wave of settlement.
Our first major evidence for Norman rule of the region comes in 1130, under King Henry I (William Rufus’ brother). This is found in a Pipe Roll – a record produced by England’s central government detailing the Exchequer’s annual audit, so-called because the parchment membranes were sewn together at the top and rolled up to look like a pipe (read more on the Pipe Roll Society website). The first surviving Pipe Roll dates to 1130. Professor Sharpe used this and other evidence to reconstruct the early Norman administration of the region. He concluded that the Normans formed the shires of Cumberland and Westmorland out of the old Kingdom of Cumbria by 1130, and were administering these shires under the aegis of central government. Even then, however, both counties were run ‘as a territorial unit’ rather than shires proper, overseen by an administrator rather than fully-fledged sheriffs. (You can read Professor Sharpe’s analysis in full here). This is perhaps not surprising, given that in southern England the Normans could co-opt the governmental systems of the Anglo-Saxon state, including shires and shire courts. Cumbria was a different beast.
Is this all to say that written evidence can’t tell us much about the Norman conquest of Cumbria in general, or about our site in particular? Yes and no. It does highlight the importance of archaeological investigation in filling the gaps in written evidence – and suggests how findings from the Lowther Castle and Village project could be significant to both historians and archaeologists in tracing the process of Norman conquest and colonisation and its realities on the ground. On the other hand, we do have written evidence for the Lowther site dating from the thirteenth century onwards, which we can use together with the archaeology to trace the site’s biography. More of this in a forthcoming post!
At the end of the first week of four, project lead Sophie Ambler gives an update of what has been going on the excavation.
As we draw to the end of our first week of the Lowther Medieval Castle and Village project, the team has made excellent progress.
Before the archaeologists arrived, the ground staff at Lowther Castle prepared the site – a big task, with the mowing of large areas of the north park. In recent years, the Lowther team has been rewilding the estate, allowing the grass and wildflowers to grow as a haven for wildlife. This meant we needed to balance the demands of the project – ensuring ready access for geophysical surveying – with the requirement to preserve this rich habitat as far as possible.
The LiDAR and earthworks survey (discussed in our first post) allowed us to identify the principal north-south run of the medieval village along the eastern half of the site, together with the road or routeway connecting it to the medieval castle. This was the area we really wanted to survey and which had to be mowed. Meanwhile, a long strip running down the western side of the site, where we expected little medieval habitation, was left unmown. Walking across the site to the church yesterday, I was greeted by a kaleidoscope of butterflies cavorting in this long grass, and was glad we’d made this compromise!
Day One: Rob Evershed from Allen Archaeology leading student archaeologists on the geophysical survey. This is at the southern of the site, atop the village earthworks.
The geophysical survey is now largely complete. It has been led by Rob Evershed, a geophysical expert from Allen Archaeology, with the help of the project’s student archaeologists from UCLan. Rob first staked out thirty-metre grids, before training the students in the patient and disciplined task of geophysical surveying. As I learned this week, this means dressing ready for the task (no metal can be worn at all – including metal clasps and buttons – as it can interfere with the results) and carrying the equipment at a slow and steady pace across the grids.
Day Four: Rob and UCLan student, Dominic Scott, scrutinising the geophysics results.
The results are still coming in, but have already been hugely helpful. Rob was able to plot services running close to the castle (and thus where we shouldn’t be digging) and spot a target for trench three: what looks like a square ditch, potentially associated with one of the dwellings built along the east-west routeway linking the castle to the main north-south run of the village. As I left on Thursday afternoon, the team was busy opening Trench Three, incorporating the routeway and this anomaly, in the hopes of identifying features and finding dating evidence.
Meanwhile, on Monday the team had opened Trench One and Two at the castle earthwork. It wasn’t possible to use geophysics in this area, because the earthwork stands in woodland and the root systems would create too much disturbance for any results to be meaningful. The earthwork had been heavily overgrown but again, in advance of the project, the Lowther team cleared all the long grass and nettles across and around the earthwork.
Day One: the trench across the nothern bank of the castle earthwork, with Jonny Milton from Allen Archaeology (in the high vis trousers) and Jim Morris from UCLan directing the student archaeologists
This not only allowed the archaeologists easy access but also revealed the earthwork in all its glory. I was struck afresh with its scale, particularly its height, and its shape and features are now far easier to discern. The earthwork is roughly square, with an entranceway on the eastern side (presumably accessed from the east-west routeway from the village). At the south-west corner a significant continuation of the bank protrudes to form a platform. The great bank of a ringwork castle would likely have been surmounted by a timber palisade, and we’re speculating that this platform may have been home to a wooden tower, sited to give wide-ranging views north, east and south. Meanwhile, the western length of the castle was protected by a steep slope running down to the River Lowther.
The two trenches were sited on the north and western sides of the earthwork. Under the guidance of Jonny Milton of Allen Archaeology and Jim Morris of UCLan, the student archaeologists removed the turf and set about digging. The northern trench runs from the castle interior, cutting through the bank and down along the bank’s steep northern slope. We hope this will allow us to see how the bank was constructed and provide dating evidence. There is still a long way to go, but already the trench has yielded a fragment of roughly made pottery, which will be analysed to see if it is early medieval. Over week two, the archaeologists will continue working their way down through the trench, stepping it out to take account of the steep slope.
Meanwhile, the western trench yielded some curious results: a couple of trays’ worth of Victorian detritus, a stone wall, and a floor surface nicely laid with hand-made bricks: evidence that part of the castle interior was taken over and used for purposes that are so far unclear. The team aims to investigate this phase further and, after thoroughly recording these features, to dig further down in the hope that they’ve preserved features from the medieval phase.
There’ll be more entries in our Dig Diary to follow, and meanwhile you can follow the project’s progress on Twitter via the hashtag #LowtherMedievalCastle.
