NORFOLK ARCHAEOLOGICAL SERVICES ADVISORY COMMITTEE
13th April 2005
Item No.
HALF-YEAR REPORT OF THE ARCHAEOLOGY DEPARTMENT,
NORWICH CASTLE MUSEUM AND ART GALLERY,
OCTOBER 2004 – MARCH 2005
Report by Head of Museums and Archaeology
This report reviews the work of Norwich Castle Archaeology Department,
which is part of the Curatorial Section of Norfolk Museums and Archaeology
Service
1.
The Archaeology Department, October 2004 – March 2005
1.1
The work of the Department has included preparation for new galleries
and exhibitions, in addition to other commitments.
1.2
Important collections management work continues, including the
arrangement of significant loans both to and from the Department.
1.3
Staff continue to be involved in teaching and outreach projects and in
developing links with the community of Norfolk.
1.4
Increased access to the archaeology collections continues to be
developed through the work of the Access Officer for the Shirehall
Study Centre and by plans for a new archaeology gallery at
Gressenhall.
1.5
Some major archaeology acquisitions have been achieved during the
period.
2.
Staff and volunteers
2.1
The staffing of the Archaeology Department is currently:
 Dr Tim Pestell, Curator, and
 Dr John Davies, the Keeper of Archaeology and also Chief
Curator for NMAS.
2.2
Alan West has temporarily moved to the position of Project Curator for
the development of an archaeology gallery at Gressenhall, for a period
of 18 months. He will return to his half-time post in the Archaeology
Department in 2006.
2.3
Access Officer Ruth Fleming has continued to work towards improved
access to the reserve collections held at the Shirehall within all
Departments.
2.4
Fiona Ford started work on a new documentation project for the
Archaeology and Natural History collections on the 16th August 2004.
This project is funded by the Designation Challenge Fund and runs to
March 2006.
2.5
Opportunities for using volunteers have been limited due to the
pressures on core staff and their restricted availability to provide
supervision. The following contributions from volunteers have been
made during the period.
2.6
Dr Peter Robins, the longest serving volunteer, continues to work on
the Department’s prehistoric flint collections.
2.7
Other volunteer projects in train are being undertaken by Jonathan
Clarke, Fiona Sheales and Tristan Evans.
3.
Collections management and conservation
3.1
Fiona Ford continues her work towards providing Collections Level
Documentation for the Archaeology collections. This new project has
been designed to describe groups of objects rather than individual
items. The CLDs will eventually be available for online searching.
3.2
Fiona Sheales, a student from the School of World Archaeology and
Museology, continues a project on the Department’s Ethnographic
collection. Fiona is systematically photographing, describing and
researching this highly specialist material, currently concentrating on
material on display in the Fitch Room at Norwich Castle.
3.3
Tristan Evans continues a project relating history files to the
archaeology collections.
3.4
Following the opening of the new Anglo-Saxon gallery, a proactive
programme of remedial conservation was established. Selected
collections are now being re-packaged and conserved. It is envisaged
that the collections will become used more frequently at the Study
Centre, as members of the public are encouraged to view them.
4.
Treasure
4.1
The Department continues to fulfil the legal requirement to consider all
cases of Treasure found within the county and reported under the
terms of the 1996 Treasure Act.
4.2
Treasure cases continue to place a considerable burden on the
Department in terms of the sheer number of finds made. Last year 80
cases of Treasure were reported. This represents a fifth of all cases
from England and Norfolk has maintained its position as the county
yielding the most Treasure cases in the British Isles.
4.3
Staff also continue to track objects which fall outside the scope of the
Treasure Act, with a view to acquiring the most significant examples for
the county’s collections.
5.
Significant acquisitions
5.1
The Archaeology Department has maintained a commitment to try and
secure at least a few of the exceptionally important archaeological finds
recorded by the Finds and Identification Service.
5.2
The Department secured major grants totalling £85,000 towards the
purchase of an electrum (gold and silver alloy) Iron Age torc – the first
Norwich has had the opportunity to buy for thirty years. Grants were
made from the Friends of the Norwich Museums, the Heritage Lottery
Fund and the Art Fund. £5,000 of this money has been committed
towards an associated education and outreach programme. The torc is
particularly interesting as it comes from a new findspot away from
north-west Norfolk, where most precious metal torcs have been found.
The site is being kept secret at present to prevent illicit metal-detection.
5.5
Funds were also raised for the acquisition of an exceptionally rare gold
‘lamella’ or amulet, which is a sheet of gold foil with Greek and Latin
words scratched into its surface. This was a form of amulet used in the
Roman world to ward-off evil or bring good luck. Those made in gold
are extremely rare and only 68 examples are known from the whole
Roman Empire. This is only the fourth gold example from the British
Isles. Grants totalling £10,000 were secured from the Friends of the
Norwich Museums, the Victoria and Albert Purchase Grant Fund and
the Headley Trust.
6.
County displays
6.1
Funding has been acquired from the Wolfson Foundation for a new
Norfolk Rural Landscapes Gallery, to be located at Roots of Norfolk at
Gressenhall. Work has subsequently started on the project.
6.2
The new gallery will take the theme of man’s impact on the landscape
and will contain prehistoric material from the county collections,
covering the periods from the Mesolithic (c 8,000 BC) to the end of the
Bronze Age (c 750 BC).
6.3
This will be a new permanent gallery and will occupy the old
Committee Room at Gressenhall Rural Life Museum.
6.4
Alan West has been appointed as the full-time curator for the gallery.
7.
Future exhibitions and galleries
7.1
Work continues towards the British Museum partnership exhibition
entitled ‘Treasure: Finding Our Past’.
7.2
The exhibition will contain material from the very greatest treasure finds
from this country, such as the Hoxne Treasure, the Mildenhall, Cunetio
and Cuerdale hoards and the recently discovered Amesbury Archer
burial.
7.3
The exhibition has now completed its runs in London, Cardiff and
Manchester. It is currently on show at the Hancock Museum,
Newcastle-upon-Tyne. The exhibition will open at Norwich Castle on
22nd July 2005, where it will run until January 2006.
8.
Loans
8.1
The Department continues to help other museums and organisations
by loaning material for temporary exhibitions and displays.
8.2
Objects of all archaeological periods are currently on tour as part of the
exhibition, ‘Treasure: Finding Our Past’.
8.3
Objects have been loaned to the National Trust Sutton Hoo Visitor
Centre for a new 6 month exhibition on ‘Hanging bowls’.
8.4
A newly acquired Iron Age torc has been loaned to the Hancock
Museum, Newcastle, to supplement the ‘Treasure’ exhibition.
9.
Norwich Castle Study Centre
9.1
24 researchers have visited Norwich Castle Study Centre to study
parts of the archaeology collections.
9.2
Groups of students from the University of East Anglia School of World
Art and Archaeology, the Department of extra-mural Studies and
Norwich School of Art and Design have had teaching sessions in the
Archaeology Study Room.
9.3
In addition to independent researchers, students have come from the
Universities of Oxford, Cambridge, London, North Lincolnshire, Wales
and East Anglia, the British Museum and the BBC.
9.4
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Specific researchers include:
Carenza Lewis of ‘Time Team’
Roger Jacobi, prominent Mesolithic specialist
Kevin Leahy, prominent Anglo-Saxon and Viking specialist
Miranda Aldhouse-Green, President of the Prehistoric Society
The BBC
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Collections studied during the six months include:
Palaeolithic and Mesolithicic flints
Mesolithic harpoon
Iron Age coinage
the Bawsey site archive
Roman amphorae
Roman artefacts
Photos of Norwich Castle
Norfolk maps
Anglo-Saxon pottery from Spong Hill
Iron Age artefacts
The Library
9.5
10.
Education and Outreach
10.1
Adult Education in Archaeology continues at the Norwich Castle Study
Centre, in association with the University of East Anglia Centre for
Continuing Education.
10.2
A ten-week course entitled ‘Beginners Guide to Identifying &
Interpreting Archaeological Artefacts’ was run for the third time,
from October until December 2004. This course provided a practical
‘hands-on’ guide to archaeological artefacts and an insight into the
range of the archaeology collections, used in the teaching.
Teaching was undertaken by Norwich Castle staff, together with Alice
Lyons from the Norfolk Archaeological Unit.
10.3
A new ‘Advanced Guide to the Identification and Interpretation of
Archaeological Artefacts’ course was started in January and ran
through to March 2005.
10.4
Preparations are being made for a more diverse range of courses for
later in 2005, to be taught at Norwich Castle Study Centre.
10.5
Staff have given the following presentations members of the public and
to specialist academic audiences:
9 October
Silver in East Anglia symposium at Norwich Castle Silver
and Silver-working in Anglo-Saxon East Anglia Tim Pestell
November
Alan West
Great Yarmouth Historical Society Bronze Age Norfolk
December
At Hellesdon Library Bronze Age Norfolk Alan West
21 January Norwich Castle Study Centre Jewellery in Archaeology
John Davies and Alan West
January
The Oddfellows, Norwich The Roman Town of Caistor St
Edmund John Davies
10.6
Staff have continued the Sue Margeson Memorial. The 7th annual
Memorial Lecture was held on 9th April 2005, in the Town Close
Auditorium at Norwich Castle. Professor Else Roesdahl of the
University of Aarhus, Denmark delivered a lecture entitled: EnglandDenmark in the Eleventh Century – the Growing Archaeological
Evidence from Denmark.
10.7
Staff are continuing work towards the publication of Sue Margeson’s
PhD thesis.
11.
Publications
11.1
Staff continue to disseminate the results of their work and research
through publications.
11.2
Tim Pestell’s new book Landscapes of Monastic Foundation was
published in October by academic press Boydell and Brewer.
11.3
Tim Pestell is writing a guidebook to St Benet’s Abbey for the Norfolk
Archaeological Trust.
12.
Media
12.1
Members of the Department continue to actively help the media in
putting together news features. Recently, members have helped with
stories in the Eastern Daily Press, Eastern Evening News, Daily
Telegraph, British Archaeology and Radio Broadland.
13.
Metal-detecting liaison
13.1
Although the identification and recording of archaeological artefacts
from the county is performed by the Finds Indentification and
Recording Service, staff from the Department continue to have an
active relationship with metal-detecting in the county. Staff contribute
specialist reports on objects for finders and for the HER. Staff expertise
on artefacts is also being recognised and their opinions sought by other
professionals across Britain, in relation to new discoveries elsewhere.
Recommendation: that the report be noted
Originator
Dr John A. Davies
Chief Curator and Keeper of Archaeology
Norfolk Museums & Archaeology Service
01603 493630
john.davies@norfolk.gov.uk