Grant Award by Jockey Club from GC100 Fund

GlosArch is excited to announce that we have been awarded £2000 a grant of from the Gold Cup 100 Community Grant Initiative administered by the Jockey Club and Rotary Clubs of Cheltenham. The grant is to support post-excavation analysis of finds from the excavation of the Cleeve Common Racecourse grandstands and the creation of a digital 3D reconstruction of the building based on the evidence we uncover. This will be available to view via our website and on the Common.

Excavation at Miserden 9-10th and 20-22nd June

The excavation at Honeycombe, near Miserden, north of Stroud at the site of a ruined building on a terrace in a steep sided valley is now under way.  A trial excavation last year showed remains of a substantial and well-built structure and finds landing from 14th century to modern.

We have made good progress over the first two days determining the footprint of the building and have exposed a well-constructed doorway. The work continues on 20/21/22 June.

The dig is fully subscribed, but in case of cancellations (GlosArch members only) please email Neil Cathie at fieldwork@glosarch.org.uk to go on the waiting list.

No previous experience is required.

Excavation on Cleeve Common

Following four successful, if sometimes windy, days of excavation on Cleeve Common, at the site of the first Cheltenham Racecourse, GlosArch members have uncovered the remains of a substantial building, with walls over half a meter thick. We have also recovered polished plaster from the inside of the building, roof slates, nails of various sizes, glass, pottery, a clay pipe stem with he makers mark and .. a racing horseshoe. Altogether a successful dig. We are now recording the site, and will then fill it all in until next year, when we will be back!

Thanks to #cotswoldarchaeology for support with surveying and Jamie Kyte for drone photos.

Winter Lectures and Summer Visits

April Lecture and Annual General Meeting. Monday 29th April at 7:00pm

Well that’s it for the 2023-24 lecture series! We finished with Tony’ Roberts’ update on the excavations carried out by Archaeoscan during 2023. Slimbridge and Guiting Power become more and more interesting the further into them they get.

If you want to find out more about digging with Archeoscan, go to: https://www.archeoscan.com/

The 2024-24 lecture series is being prepared and the first talk will take place in September. In the meantime, GlosArch members can access the archive of recorded lectures by logging in to their account on the website and going to Resources>Recorded Lecture Archive.

2024-25 LECTURE SERIES

The programme for the 2024-25 lecture series, will be available in the next couple of months. Lectures are free to members and non-members (non-members are invited to make a small donation towards the cost of running the talks – £5 is suggested). Payment can be made by bank transfer to Gloucestershire Archaeology; Sort code 08-92-99; A/c no. 67285787.

Talks can be attended in person or via Zoom. For the Zoom link please email mailbox@glosarch.org.uk

To get a flavour of the range of topics covered in 2023-4 click on Lectures below and follow the link.

Summer Visits 2024

The programme for 2024 is as follows:

Saturday 11th May, 2pm

For a brief report on this interesting tour click here

Saturday 1st June. 2.30pm

A guided walk around the route of the Roman walls of Gloucester with City Archaeologist, Andy Armstrong. Meet at the Cross in Gloucester city centre at 2.15.

Saturday 8th June, all day

Coach trip to Avalon Archaeology and Wells. Cost £42.50 to include coach travel and guided tour of Avalon Archaeology. Afternoon in Wells to explore at your leisure. To book a place contact m.milward1@yahoo.co.uk

For full details of these visits see the Summer Visits page under Activities.

Fieldwork

To take part, email fieldwork@glosarch.org.uk (members only).

Excavation

Return to Honeycombe

There has been strong demand for places on this excavation and all places are now full and there is currently a reserve list.

Following the five highly successful days we spent on site at Honeycombe in June excavating the remains of late medieval/early modern buildings hidden under trees on a terraced platform on the side of a steep valley, we will return to the site on the following days in August to continue excavations:

Sunday and Monday, 11^th and 12^th August

Friday and Saturday, 16^th and 17^th August

This time we have four new and specific objectives:

·       To clear out the doorway into the smaller room (south west side) down to floor levels both inside and outside the room.

·       To clear rubble and soil away from the northern part (inside the larger room) of the interesting feature we found bridging the dividing wall between the small and large rooms, in order to reach the floor level and understand what this structure may be.

·       As above but clearing rubble and soil from the southern part (inside the smaller room) in order to reach floor level and understand the structures purpose.

·       Try to find wall lines of the second building to the north of the building we have been excavating (nettles will be strimmed to death before we start)!

Each of these areas can only safely take two people and so on this occasion we will limit numbers excavating on site to eight per dayplus one or two finds cleaning, drying, bagging, marking and sorting. Please do not apply for more than two days per person at this stage but let me know if you want to come for more than that. I will let you know if spaces become available. Note also that most of this work is rather heavy due to the fact that we now mainly have about 1m deep of stone with a bit of soil to shift in order to get down to floor levels around the features.

Phil Cox will be bringing a borrowed GPR (Ground Penetrating Radar) on one or two of the days to help find the extents of the original surface outside the main room entrance door. He is happy to demonstrate  it or train people in its use if you are interested.

If you would like to volunteer to help please  mail to fieldwork@glosarch.org.uk to register your interest.

Looking forward to seeing you on site again soon!

Best regards

Neil Cathie

07802 272035

Excavation at Honeycombe, Miserden. 9/10 and 20/21/22 June 2024.

The second excavation of 2024 took place at Miserden. A preliminary excavation in 2023 had showed substantial building remains in this quiet valley. The excavation uncovered extensive well-built walls of a two-roomed building. For more details see the fieldwork page.

We are hoping to return to the site later in the year.

Excavation on Cleeve Hill 14th-15th and 19th-20th April 2024

This excavation has been completed for 2024. For a brief report see ‘Latest News’ above.

We intend to return to the site in Spring 2025 to continue investigating the layout of this interesting site, with the aim of producing an interactive 3D visualisation of the building which will be publicly available.

Excavation at Brookthorpe, 12-13th and 17-18th November 2023

Excavation at Minsterworth, 6-8th August 2023

The excavation at Minsterworth is now complete. A short report appears in the Autumn newsletter. Neil Cathie presented a summary of the findings at the fieldwork update meeting on December 18th. A recording of this talk is available to members in the Recorded Lectures Archive page in the members’ area of the website.

Geophysics

Ground Penetrating Radar Survey at Castlemeads, Gloucester. 19th and 21st August, 2024

In August we will be returning to Castlemeads, Gloucester to undertake a GPR survey of the area previously examined by resistivity and magnetometry. The aim is to determine the nature of the features seen previously that do not correspond to the known electrical cables. This work is being undertaken in collaboration with Exeter University.

We need two volunteers on each day. To take part please email fieldwork@glosarch.org.uk

Magnetometry Surveying at Castlemeads, Gloucester 

This activity is now complete.

In rather wet conditions and after having to abandon the original survey due to flooding (it is on a flood plain after all) we managed to complete the magnetometry survey on a chilly, slightly damp December day.

The results show a number of underground electricity cables but also features which appear to correspond to the LIDAR images. The findings were presented at our members update meeting on 18th December.

Geophysics Training

If you are interested in receiving training on our geophysics equipment, please contact Phil Cox via: fieldwork@glosarch.org.uk as a further session can be arranged if there is demand.