Still the rain falls, but thankfully just light showers. The site is still wet and sticky making progress slow. Each time you dig with the trowel you have to clean the clay soil from the blade, unless you are working on the upper level in front of the bath house! Here Luke, Martin, Katie and Alex are digging out the sandy mortar make up layer under the opus signinum, no sticky clay but heavy buckets of wet sand.
Luke and Katie digging in front of the bath house
The sandy mortar under the very pink opus signinum
Down in the apsidal room, Harry started to find the ‘Richmond’ wall, the pink concrete Sir Ian Richmond put down where he said walls were, seems to match in this particular place on site. The very pink stone at the base of the wall is from the earlier second century villa that sits under some of the fourth century villa we see today.
- The ‘Richmond’ wall at a right angle to the main wall
- Harry and the wall
Meanwhile in trench three Max and Steve tackled the top layer with mattocks. The finds in this disturbed layer were roman, 19th and 20th century all mixed up together. But the number of finds including an old flash light bulb and tesserae kept them happy, and eager to reach the next level.
Max and Steve merrily mattocking in trench three – the water feature
Once again the very end of the day brought a great find, Alex was working on the opposite end of the area in front of the bath house, to Luke and Katie. Here she uncovered a large roof tile with animal foot prints running across it. We are not sure of the animal but I am sure you can all have a good guess 🙂
The tile broken in half
A closer view
Even closer
Archaeology National Trust SW 