Latest News

docs.google.com/View?docID=ahb468fmksd4_31dmb5vm&revision=_latest

Guardian on-line has details of Carbon Dating of peat at Cut Hill showing the monument was raised around 3,500 BC.

guardian.co.uk/science/2010/apr/19/ancient-stones-devon-dartmoor

Bonorva Chequered Tomb (Sa Pala Larga Tomb no.7)
Article stonepages.com/news/archives/003769.html
and wonderful images of the tomb over on stonepages.com.
stonepages.com/scacchiera/

Thanks to Pete G for highlighting this wonderful find.

Four thousand years after our ancestors built a timber circle on what is now Holme Beach, the final part of the monument was this morning lifted into what should be its final resting place.

A small crowd gathered in King’s Lynn Bus Station in the lazy Sunday morning sunshine as the glass front of Lynn Museum was removed and the giant oak stump was painstakingly manoeuvred into its new home.

Museum officials held their breath as the carefully wrapped one and a half tonne stump was gradually rolled off a special van.

The completed Seahenge display will go on show this summer inside a replica of its original setting.

Controversy surrounded the decision to excavate the 4,000-year-old monument after it was discovered late in 1998.

But while the purpose of Seahenge’s central stump remains unknown, scientists studying its ring of timbers have discovered ancient society in Norfolk was far more advanced than had previously been believed.

More than 20,000 visitors a year have been to see the oak posts since they went on show in a new £1.6m gallery at Lynn Museum two years ago.

Before going on display, the Portsmouth-based Mary Rose Trust spent almost a decade preserving the timbers, using similar techniques to those employed to preserve Henry VIII’s warship the Mary Rose. Due to its size, the 8ft high central stump took a further two years to conserve.

Area museums officer Robin Hanley said like the smaller timbers, the stump displayed marks made by individual axes when it was built on the edge of what was originally forest.

“It’s great to see the stump being reunited with the remainder of the timber circle after all these years they’re been apart and great to see the timbers back together in West Norfolk,” said Dr Hanley

“We’ve been extremely pleased with the response to the displays, a lot of people have been inspired by the preservation of the timbers and have enjoyed being able to see them in such detail.

“To be able to get so close to 4,000-year-old timbers and see individual axe marks left by Bronze Age axes is extraordinary.”

Scientists using carbon and tree ring dating estimate Seahenge was built in the spring of 2049BC. It is believed to be the only example of its kind ever found. Its timbers were preserved by peat which encased them beneath the sands until its outline was revealed by a storm.

Dr Hanley said: “It has been a complex military style operation. It was nice to see people here for what is quite a momentous moment.”

Seahenge enthusiast Christine Von Allwoderden, from North Wootton, came into the town to see the stump arrive.

She said: “How exciting it must have been when it was found. I am very interested in the history of it. I do think it’s fantastic for King’s Lynn and fantastic for the museum”

She added that although she thought it was good for King’s Lynn to have the timber circle in the museum, she thought it should still be at Holme.

EDP24; tinyurl.com/y4swt7q

The Stonehenge Campsite still has a limited number of pitches available for this years Summer Solstice celebration but those who wish to book have been advised to do so before the end of the month.

Site Manager, William Grant, has asked those who hold the Summer Solstice celebration sacred, pagan or not, to book their pitches now in order to avoid disappointment nearer to the June 19th deadline. This years Glastonbury festival has been brought forward to the beginning of June and informed sources believe revellers who usually attend the Somerset event may flood Wiltshire’s traditional pagan meeting spots as a result.

“We will be providing a bus service directly from the campsite to Stonehenge at 1am, and then bringing the campers back to site at 9 am, this year” said Mr. Grant. “Although the campsite is only 2 miles from Stonehenge on the footpaths, it can prove too far for the children to walk both there and back, so we have decided to provide transport as part of our 4 day Summer Solstice camping rally between 19-22 June. The price will be £10 per person per night”. “We have become very popular, very quickly and you must make a £25 deposit if you want us to save you a place” said William.

The Stonehenge Campsite, one of Wiltshire’s best undiscovered secrets, has enjoyed brilliant reviews since opening a year ago.
Set within a fully landscaped area, the 3 acre campsite has an excellent heated utility block providing piping hot showers together with a hot water dish washing area. Two purpose built fire pits have been carefully placed within the enclosure and firewood is always for sale to those who wish to commune around a traditional camp fire at night.

Lying a stones throw from the centre of Berwick St James, the 9 Acre smallholding is home to a flock of jacob sheep and some very gentle horses. Free range eggs are available from the chickens and the extensively stocked Berwick Farm Shop and villages’ Boot Inn are 10 mins walk away.

For more information and to book a pitch, visit the Stonehenge Campsite website stonehengecampsite.co.uk/

Chance

LITTERED across the hills of Dartmoor in Devon, southern England, around 80 rows and circles of stones stand sentinel in the wild landscape. Now, striking similarities between one of these monuments and Stonehenge, 180 kilometres to the east, suggest they may be the work of the same people.

The row of nine stones on Cut Hill was discovered in 2004 on one of the highest, most remote hills of Dartmoor national park. “It is on easily the most spectacular hill on north Dartmoor,” says Andrew Fleming, president of the Devon Archaeological Society. “If you were looking for a distant shrine in the centre of the north moor, that’s where you would put it.”

Ralph Fyfe of the University of Plymouth and independent archaeologist Tom Greeves have now carbon-dated the peat surrounding the stones. This suggests that at least one of the stones had fallen – or been placed flat on the ground – by between 3600 and 3440 BC, and another by 3350 to 3100 BC (Antiquity, vol 84, p 55).

That comes as a surprise to archaeologists, who, on the strength of artefacts found nearby, had assumed that Dartmoor monuments like Cut Hill and Stall Moor (pictured) dated from the Bronze Age, around 2100 to 1600 BC. Instead, Fyfe suggests that Cut Hill is from the Neolithic period, the same period that Stonehenge was built.

Unlike Stonehenge, the 2-metre-tall Cut Hill stones lie flat on the ground, parallel to each other and between 19 metres and 34.5 metres apart, like the sleepers of a giant railway track. Packing stones discovered at the end of one of the megaliths suggest at least one of them stood erect at some point, but the regularity of their current layout makes it likely they were deliberately placed that way, Greeves says.

What’s more, the stones’ alignment with the summer and winter solstices seems identical to that of Stonehenge, Newgrange in Ireland and Maes Howe in Scotland. “It could be coincidence, but it’s striking,” says archaeologist Mike Pitts.

article in Newscientist by Linda Geddes
tinyurl.com/y788obk

p.s. A longer article in British Archaeology May/June says “that there are similar stone rows in form and scale on Bodmin Moor... a similar orientation appears at another exceptional site at Drizzlecombe, where two or three long rows runs for 75-150 m; one ends with one of Dartmoor’s largest standing stone 4.3m.“....

Approval and funding have been granted for the advanced planning of The Great Stones Way (GSW).

The Great Stones Way proposal envisages a walking route between the present end of the Ridgeway National Trail at Overton Hill near Avebury, southwards along the old Ridgeway track, through the Vale of Pewsey and up onto Salisbury Plain at Broadbury Banks.

A route is then to be agreed with the Ministry of Defence around the edge of the military ranges above the Avon Valley to the Durrington Walls ancient causewayed enclosure, and Woodhenge near to Stonehenge.

An alternative route may need to be adopted along the Avon Valley. After Stonehenge the route will cross Normanton Down to Great Durnford, then above the east bank of the Avon to end at Old Sarum. At a later stage, a link route will be adopted across Cranford Chase to join the Wessex Ridgeway at Win Green on the Dorset border.

The Great Stones Way project was first proposed to the Friends of the Ridgeway Executive Committee in August 2007 and the idea has subsequently developed to the point were detailed planning and funding can be carried out.

For more information on the current development plans see The Friends of the Ridgeway web site at

ridgewayfriends.org.uk/greatstonesway.html

and for an overview of The Great Stones Way project

ridgewayfriends.org.uk/GSWconcept.html

Chance

I have been asked to point out that the Red Lion no longer offers any bed and breakfast accommodation.

The pub is owned by the Green King group and since 2008, when Kirsty Ayre became the current landlady, bed and breakfast accommodation has ceased.

There was always a problem of access to and from the upstairs bedrooms outside normal opening hours. This resulted in the guests being “locked in” once the bars had closed at night and made walking around the stone circle at night impossible. Numerous attempts were made to exit the building at night via the rear fire escape, resulting in the fire alarms being triggered and the building being evacuated.

An alternative access and refurbishment survey of the accommodation was carried out by the brewery but was found to be prohibitively expensive and also reduced the landlord/landlady’s accommodation by a half. As this problem is unlikely to be resolved in the near future, it would be safe to assume that any bed and breakfast accommodation can be ruled out completely.

Kirsty regrets this but is only the tenant of the establishment and any comments should be directed at Green King who own the property.

All the other eating and drinking facilities are unaffected and the pub continues to be open daily from 11am till 11pm

Chance

From this month’s edition of Nature:
nature.com/news/2010/100407/pdf/464826a.pdf

heritageaction.wordpress.com/2010/04/06/avebury-reburial-issue-decision-announced/

At New Scientist web site:

“Elaborate symbols and ornate depictions of animals carved in stone by an ancient Scottish people have given up their secret – to mathematics. Statistical analysis reveals that the shapes are a forgotten written language. The method could help interpret many other enigmatic scripts – and even analyse animal communication.....”

newscientist.com/article/dn18725-mathematics-of-ancient-carvings-reveals-lost-language.html

Full research article available at:

rspa.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/early/2010/03/26/rspa.2010.0041.full.pdf+html

Archaeologists in the Duddon Valley have uncovered over 3,000 previously unrecorded historic sites after a four-year survey of the area.

The Duddon Valley Local History Group, in partnership with the Lake District National Park Authority, found ring-cairns that could date back to the Bronze Age.

Two of the most exciting finds uncovered in the 90-square mile survey include ring-cairns found at Seathwaite Tarn and Lead Pike. Although excavations of the cairns establish their origins back to the Bronze Age, the purpose of the constructions is still unknown.

One theory is that the cairns, which are ring-shaped banks of stones ranging up to 15 metres in diameter, were held for ceremonial purposes.

At the Seathwaite Tarn Cairn, which took a month to excavate, old copper and iron ore mines were found, as well as evidence that iron smelting works were in the region.

The team also found a series of longhouses, which people would have lived in around the eighth and ninth centuries. Standing stones and burial cysts were found around the valley as well.

“We’ve ended up with more questions than answers,” said John Hoggett, chairman of the DVLHG. “Our survey gives an almost complete history of the Duddon Valley.

“What we’ve recorded shows that over the past four or five thousand years there has been very heavy activity in the Duddon Valley, almost industrial activity. We’ve seen massive coppicing of the woodland and evidence that suggests there were Viking settlements here.

“The magic of this was that people went out with a sense of anticipation that they would find something that was exciting. It wasn’t always necessarily a big find but it was something new.

“The thing that emphasises the success is that we started with 20 volunteers and ended up with 30 people who were still going after four years.”

Mr Hoggett went on to thank farmers and the National Trust for co-operating with their work, and allowing them to use their land.

The DVLHG will now re-survey some of their earlier work to check that nothing was missed, and there are hopes to widen the search to areas such as the Lickle Valley. They are also spending time on areas like the longhouses to better understand how they worked, and to try to specifically date them.

Their current finds will be preserved at the sites where they were found.

The Heritage Lottery-funded project is outlined in a book called ‘Ring Cairns to Reservoirs’, which the DVLHG launched last night (March 24).

Presenter Julian Richards, best known for presenting the BBC programme ‘Meet the Ancestors’, spent the day looking over some of the sites, and spoke at the book launch.

The book is available from the Henry Roberts book shop on Stramongate, Kendal.

thewestmorlandgazette.co.uk/news/5080134.Historic_finds_made_by_archaeologists_in_Duddon_Valley/

Lost land under the sea.....

It is just eight inches long, but its discovery changed what we know about prehistoric Europe and our ancestors.

The harpoon, which was found by a Lowestoft fishing trawler in 1931, was yesterday under the lens of a Norwegian television crew, who are making a documentary on the origins of Norway.

It is 14,000 years old, but in perfect condition, the points carved into it still sharp. It would have been used for hunting by modern man in late Paleolithic or early Mesolithic times; a time before written records when people lived in hunter-gatherer communities.

But it is where it was found, 25 miles off the coast of Cromer, that makes it important to history. When it was dredged off the sea bed in 1931, hidden inside a lump of peat, it was taken home by Pilgrim Lockwood, the skipper of the fishing boat Colinda. It later ended up in Norwich’s Castle Museum, where it fascinated archaeologists. They thought it might have been dropped by hunters on a fishing expedition. But later tests showed that the freshwater peat it came from would have been on land thousands of years ago. They realised the existence of land in the North Sea, long since drowned, called Doggerland.

The harpoon is now on display in the Museum of Rural Life in Gressenhall, near Dereham, but was being filmed in the study centre at the Castle Museum yesterday.

Its significance to Norwegian history is that it shows how people from south-west Europe could have got to Norway. The theory is that in the last ice age, people from Iberia moved up into Britain, across Doggerland and into Scandinavia.

Producer Ole Egil Strkson said: “This particular object is the first clue that that happened.”

The producers had been hoping to find relatives of Pilgrim Lockwood to tell the story of how he found the harpoon. What is known is that he returned to the site in 1932 to take the peat samples which were used for testing.

The television crew said they felt moved by the age and significance of the deer antler harpoon, known as the Leman and Ower harpoon after the sandbanks where it was found. Presenter Samina Bruket said: “I was allowed to hold it. To think it is 14,000 years old is just amazing. I had seen pictures of it but it is even more beautiful than I thought, it was so shiny and well preserved.”

Mr Storkson said: “It has been carved, so you can see it really has been used by humans.”

Alan West, a curator of archaeology with Norfolk museum service, said: “It was originally part of a pair. The barbs faced each other with a long shaft used to stab down, like the eel spears you see from the 19th century.”

The programme, which will be called Norwegian Roots, is due to be shown in December on the biggest Norwegian television station in prime-time.

The film crew went on to visit Holme-next-the-sea, near Hunstanton, where they filmed peat and remains of tree roots visible at low tide, showing that there was once land which is now covered by sea.

They are also planning to visit Vince Gaffney, of Birmingham University and an expert in Doggerland. He says that: “a very real, human tragedy lies behind the loss of this immense landscape”, and that with global warming and sea levels rising, it has relevance today.

About Doggerland

Doggerland, named after the Dogger Bank sandbank, is thought to have existed between 12,000 and 8,000 years ago.

During the last ice age, much more water was contained in the polar ice caps, and the North Sea included an area of land larger than England and Wales, linking East Anglia with Holland and Belgium, with a much narrower stretch of water cutting off Britain from Norway.

It is thought to have been a land of rivers and marshes, which offered good hunting grounds for people. As the earth warmed and sea levels rose 8,000 years ago, the land was covered by water. Sea levels rose at one or two metres per century, creating a loss of land which would have been noticeable to the residents but not enough to drown them overnight.

tinyurl.com/yhupq53

Europe’s Lost World – Rediscovery of Doggerland..
britarch.ac.uk/books/Gaffney2009

Lecture. Museum of London, Tuesday, 13 April. 6.30-8pm. Free.

“John Clark has recently retired from a long and distinguished career as Senior Curator (Medieval) at the Museum of London. In this talk he investigates the strange history of London Stone, the mysterious block of limestone that currently sits, ignored by passers-by, in an alcove in the wall of a building opposite Cannon Street Station.”

More here – heritageaction.wordpress.com/2010/03/17/london-stone-making-a-myth-3/

Vote for your favourite museum or gallery

artfundprize.org.uk/2010/vote/

My vote is going to the Ashmolean in Oxford.

ashmolean.org/

A Rock Art Field-School will be organised from 19 July – 9 August 2010, in Paspardo near Valcaminica in Lombardy (Italy).
More info is here:
rockartuk.wordpress.com/2010/03/09/valcamonica-fieldschool/

Orkneyjar’s report here ow.ly/1eGbP – much clearer pics than “The Orcadian”.
As the only other NMRS for Damsay is a site the excavator thought to be a Norse castle but is now believed to have been a broch it is probable that the orthostats in one photo could relate to this. Though a short talk was given on preliminary Rising Tide findings beside these nowt has appeared in print or in the report, so from memory the Bay of Firth has in it likely chambered mounds and (one or more) stone circles

THE cyber age’s bid to spread its message into a pristine landscape has perished between a rock and a hard place in a Bronze Age valley.

Age-old archaeological remains are standing in the way of plans to bring modern internet communications to a scenic area of Kerry.

A telecommunications mast which would provide broadband to the mid-Kerry area would be a “new alien intrusion” on a very beautiful and almost pristine landscape.

That’s according to senior An Bord Pleanála inspector, Robert Ryan.

The area around the proposed location for a 12-metre mast at Coomasaharn, Glenbeigh, is “one of the most significant Bronze Age landscapes in the country,” Kerry County Council also conceded.

The local authority noted the Glenbeigh area has the greatest concentration of ancient “rock art” in Ireland, with more than 100 recorded examples.

The Bronze Age dated from around 2200 BC to 500 BC.

Mr Ryan supported the council and upheld a decision to refuse Hutchinson 3G Ireland planning permission for the mast on archaeological grounds.

He also said the mast would damage the visual amenities of the area which is close to the popular Ring of Kerry tourist route.

Hutchinson 3G has the Government’s national contract to roll out broadband to previously unserviced rural areas.

The company claims there is a strong demand for broadband in the Glenbeigh area and no other site options were available.

Glenbeigh is a hotbed of opposition to masts, with objections to five such proposals in the general area.

Hutchinson 3G said that, given there were 67 objections to the current proposal, the possibility of finding another site was limited.

Company spokesman Brian Phelan said they would continue to try to bring broadband to such areas.

“Broadband has the potential to create hundreds of jobs, especially in small to medium-sized businesses, and is probably the most important thing for rural Ireland since rural electrification,” he added.

Normally, An Bord Pleanála overturns Kerry County Council’s decisions in relation to masts because it does not agree with a controversial rule by the council which bans such masts on sites which are within a kilometre of houses, schools and other residential buildings.

On this occasion, however, Bord Pleanála – while still disagreeing with the one-kilometre rule – granted the appeal on grounds of protecting the sensitive landscape and local archaeology.

This story appeared in the printed version of the Irish Examiner Monday, March 08, 2010

Read more:
irishexaminer.com/ireland/bronze-age-remains-block-broadband-plan-113928.html

Experts say survey of Site at Burghead has proved ‘very promising’.

by Donna MacAllister. Published 6/3/2010.

Yesterday the National Museums of Scotland curator Dr. Fraser Hunter said investigations at a field a Burghead have possibly revealed a “high status site”.

More info:

pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1634292

There certainly seems to be something happening in Moray. This is the third site to be announced. All the more to look at!

Thousands of years ago our Neolithic forebears were hunting for wild game with flint arrows overlooking what is now Ballymena.

by Linda Stewart 3/3/2010.

More at:

belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/neolithic-man-puts-bypass-on-hold-14705308.html

Cheers Stevie!

BBC web site reports findings of 60,000 year old egg shells with clear circular markings.

Finds come from Western Cape area of South Africa.

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8544332.stm

Wiltshire is now on the virtual map, as Heritage Key have just unveiled a 3D virtual Stonehenge web experience.

Heritage Key is an online community aimed at those with an interest in history and culture.

The site combines content such as podcasts, YouTube videos and news articles with an online 3D virtual experience.

This virtual environment is used to recreate worldwide archaeological sites.

Visitors to the site can now explore a highly detailed virtual recreation of the ancient site from the comfort of their own living room.

Key features of the virtual experience include the chance to explore Stonehenge as it once stood over four thousand years ago in a dynamic living environment filled with wildlife and where the sun rises and sets.

You can also visit the nearby Neolithic settlement of Durrington Walls and interact with the people of the time, as well as take part in an ancient sunset ritual.

Continuing the interactive experience, you will also be able to discuss your experience with other visitors in Heritage Key’s virtual visitor centre.

Jonathan Himoff, CEO of online virtual environment company Rezzable, says: “Stonehenge raises just as many questions as it answers about life in prehistoric times, but if those stones could talk they would tell us the story of the last 5,000 years of British history.

“Heritage Key is bringing this story to life through our virtual experience, as well as the varied media resources available online to complement it.

“In reality, Stonehenge is now fenced off from the public to protect the site from over-tourism.

“Not only can Heritage Key’s virtual experience allow you to wander amongst the stones, we can also take visitors back in time to when the site was first built.

Heritage Key allows visitors to learn about the origins of the site, as well as the life and customs of the indigenous people, so that their experience of Stonehenge in the flesh can be even more magical

Jonathan Himoff, Rezzable
“Heritage Key allows visitors to learn about the origins of the site, as well as the life and customs of the indigenous people, so that their experience of Stonehenge in the flesh can be even more magical.”

This immersive adventure is complimented with a media-rich website. So, whether you want to step back in time and see Stonehenge, watch YouTube videos on your iPhone or post comments on the latest expert articles, Heritage Key lets you discover history the way you want to.

As an interactive community, Heritage Key also allows visitors to join lectures and meet with people from around the world to share and discuss their experiences.

The Stonehenge virtual experience is being launched as part of Heritage Key’s Ancient World in London festival, a series of online and real-world events celebrating the ancient world that is just underneath the skin of modern Britain.

To find out more information, and to sample the Stonehenge 3D experience, visit the Heritage Key website.
news.bbc.co.uk/local/wiltshire/hi/people_and_places/history/newsid_8534000/8534029.stm

The exciting new find by ‘amateur’ archaeologists of the long barrow under The Cove, at Stanton Drew.

Ask anyone in Bristol to name an ancient stone circle, and 90 per cent of people will probably say Stonehenge. A few of the wider-read sorts might mention Avebury. But remarkably, few will say the words Stanton Drew.

While Wiltshire’s two landmark sites are known worldwide, Bristol’s own major neolithic stone circle goes largely unnoticed.

But all that might be about to change, thanks to a team of enthusiastic amateur archaeologists who have discovered some intriguing new evidence that suggests the Stanton Drew site, near Chew Magna, may actually be 1,000 years older than historians had previously thought.

The discovery has been made by geophysics enthusiast John Oswin and amateur archaeologist John Richards, both from the Bath and Camerton archaeological society, who have been working with a team of volunteers under the guidance of Richard Sermon, Bath and North-East Somerset Archaeological Officer.

The two Johns have spent the last six months studying the results of their survey of the site in the summer, and they believe that long before the mystical stone circles were erected on the site around 2,500BC, there was an impressive “long barrow” burial chamber on the land.

I find a windswept John Oswin wandering thoughtfully around the area of the ancient monument known as The Cove. Separated from the main circles by the village church, this set of three ancient standing stones is nestled at the back of a pub car park.

“This is where we believe the long barrow would have been,” says John, a former defence industry sonar expert at Filton who has taken a fancy for geophysical archaeology as a retirement hobby.

“I use a machine called a resistance meter,” he explains. “It looks like a walking frame with a small computer attached. But actually, it is using scanning technology to create a picture of any archaeology that might be beneath the surface. Unlike traditional digging, this allows us to see what’s below the surface in a non-invasive manner. Most people know about geophysics these days from watching Time Team on the television.

“Many neolithic stone circles are built on or near the site of an even more ancient long barrow – a large burial chamber. There is one, for example, at Stonehenge.

“But nobody had realised there was one here before because, although geophysicists had used this kind of equipment to scan the ground beneath the main stone circles, nobody had ever thought to come and scan this area known as The Cove.

“I first discovered there was a very large structure buried beneath the ground here back in the summer,” John recalls. “I had been scanning all day, and then moved next door into the Druid’s Arms to download my material on to a computer over a pint.

“When I saw the shape of a long barrow appearing on the screen my mouth just dropped open. It was one of those eyes-on-stalks moments, because I knew the civilisation that built stone circles came a thousand years after the civilisation that built long barrows.

“This would probably mean the stone circles had been specially built on a site that was already of sacred significance – a resting place of their distant ancestors.

“The neolithic – stone age – people who would have built the long barrow would have left the bodies of their dead to decay on the surface, before moving the bones down into the chamber – but only when they had been picked clean by birds or the flesh had rotted away.

“We believe they would then have brought the bones of their forefathers out for sacred rituals on special occasions. It’s not that different to modern day Catholics parading the bodies of saints through towns for feast days.

“But by the time people came to build the stone circles here a thousand years later, this would all have been distant folklore – as distant to them as the Norman Conquest is to us.”

To find out more about the significance of the find, I meet up with the project leader, John Richards, at his office at Bristol University – where he works as an IT manager.
“For me, archaeology is a hobby, but it’s something I’m passionate about,” he says, as he brings up the scan images on his computer screen.

“We were lucky to be given the chance to scan the ground at Stanton Drew, because access is often restricted by English Heritage, which maintains the monument.
“But we were approached as a society last year by Richard Sermon, the archaeological officer for the council. He wondered if we could give a demonstration of our geo-phys equipment to the public as part of a Festival of British Archaeology event.

“We said, yes we’d love to do it, but if we do, perhaps you could arrange something for us? Within a few weeks Richard had managed to get permission for us to survey the Stanton Drew site.
“It was exciting to get the chance to do the survey, so you can imagine how thrilled we were to find something as significant as a long barrow.”

Since unveiling their find in archaeological publications recently, the two Johns have received congratulations from professional archaeologists all over the country, many of whom were keen to find out more about their data.
“We’re hoping that this will be just the start of the story,” John Richards says.
“We’re hoping to get permission to go back on the site to do some more survey work this summer, and if we can get permission from the church and the pub landlord, we would like to scan the churchyard and the pub garden too, because we suspect the long barrow might extend on to their land – which would make this more than 20 metres in length.

“In other words, this would have been a very distinctive sacred landmark in the area 5,000 years ago.”

thisisbristol.co.uk/news/Finding-stones-near-Bristol-place-history/article-1871522-detail/article.html

Investigation hopes to find the site of an ancient settlement. (Similar to the finds at Birnie)

by Donna MacAllister. Published 27/02/2010.

More at:

pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1625172

Various finds are on display in Elgin Museum.

Experts Predict Boom After Finding Archaeology Swallowed By Rising Tides

by Ryan Crighton Published 26/02/2010.

Ancient structures submerged by the tides thousands of years ago could bring a fresh tourism boom to Orkney, experts predicted last night.

More at:

pressandjournal.co.uk/Article.aspx/1623445

As with all of this type of thing it will bring some good and probably some not so good if it isn’t looked after properly.