Championing Historic Places
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Discovery, innovation and science in the historic environment Championing Historic Places Issue 02 | Winter 2015-16 As the new Chief Executive of Historic England I am delighted to introduce this second issue of Historic England Research. In my first few months in the job, I have been greatly impressed by the breadth and quality of the applied research work that Historic England undertakes and sponsors. This research contributes to most aspects of our work as the government’s advisor on the historic environment and also supports the development plans of the newly established English Heritage Trust. Perhaps more importantly, the fascinating stories that spring from the heritage science, discovery and interpretation that we deliver are a major factor in ensuring that members of the public remain informed, captivated and passionate about their heritage. This issue exemplifies the span of our research work, ranging from the drowned prehistoric landscapes of the North Sea to Tintagel Castle and the story of Tristan and Yseult. It illustrates how we are forging closer links with both the UK’s vibrant university sector and also with the private sector, in order to secure maximum value from public investment in heritage research. And, in the case of the Staffordshire Hoard, it demonstrates our important role as the agent of last resort in securing the nation’s most important heritage. I hope you enjoy it. Duncan Wilson Chief Executive, Historic England In this issue... The Staffordshire Hoard .............3 Foresight for the future .............28 Historic graffiti .....................8 Stand by for impact! ...............30 Tintagel and the legend of Tristan Lost landscapes of Palaeolithic Britain ...34 and Yseult ........................12 Historic England’s Informed Earthworm calcite and dating ........16 Conservation series ................39 Patterns under the plough – Historic England publications ........42 recent aerial reconnaissance on the claylands ...................20 Historic England Research Reports ....45 A new resource for studying the Contact Historic England ............47 Romano-British countryside .........24 2 | Historic England Research | Issue 2: Winter 2015-16 The Staffordshire Hoard Uncovering the secrets of this famous discovery of Anglo-Saxon treasure. The hoard at the end of the grouping exercise in February 2014. © Birmingham Museums Trust The Staffordshire Hoard of Anglo-Saxon gold and inlaid with niello, providing a black pattern against the silver objects, found in 2009, has been the subject of shine of the silver; there were many silver sheets with an Historic England funded research project since die-impressed decoration, again frequently gilded. 2012. The work to analyse the c 4,000 fragments is All had been very harshly treated in antiquity. There now halfway complete; this article summarises what is evidence of systematic and very rough stripping we have discovered so far. of the fittings from the objects they decorated, with consequent tearing and bending. The recovery of the hoard at Hammerwich, Staffordshire in 2009 (Dean et al 2010) is well known because of the worldwide media attention it received. It is unique within Britain, where hoards of this date have never been found before. It is a challenge to make sense of the enormous assemblage of objects, ranging from complete items to tiny fragments, that made up the hoard. Though many are sword hilt fittings, it is clear there are a number of items for which there are currently no parallels and whose function is unclear. In addition at least one helmet is represented by no less than c 1,500 separate fragments. When complete the items would have been spectacular. The sort of damage inflicted on the fittings when being stripped The gold objects were covered with filigree and garnet from sword hilts in antiquity (K117). cloisonné decoration. The silver ones were often Guy Evans, © Barbican Research Associates Ltd Issue 2: Winter 2015-16 | Historic England Research | 3 The Staffordshire Hoard The research team was faced with the equivalent that the goldsmith wanted to make use of the colour of multiple jigsaw puzzles whose pieces had been contrasts that would result from the combination of jumbled together and whose boxes had been lost. Our enriched and non-enriched golds. The British Museum aim has been to design a project which would deliver allowed a range of items from its Anglo-Saxon collection a catalogue of the material, including a discussion of to be analysed, so the pattern could be examined what it represented, in a timely manner. We want the across a wide range of types of object from a variety of resulting publication to act as the foundation on which sources. No association of the technique with particular future studies can be based, given the considerable research potential of the hoard. Many of the objects that are commonplace within it would, if found as a single item elsewhere, be regarded as an important discovery, worthy of detailed study in its own right. One of the emerging stories resulting from the research is a much-improved understanding of the working practices of the 7th-century goldsmith. Gold contains silver and copper naturally, and can be deliberately alloyed in the workshop. Gold fineness is the measure that describes how much actual gold is in the resulting piece of metal. Gold fineness during the Anglo-Saxon period is a matter of considerable scholarly interest, and one aim of our work was to provide a body of data detailing the composition of the gold. Normally this material is only analysed by non-destructive study of its surface, but a small pilot study analysed items at the surface (by X-ray fluorescence) and sub-surface (by scanning electron microscopy with dispersive X-ray analysis: SEM-EDX); the latter process requires a microscopic scrape of the surface to be made so as to reveal its core composition. We wanted to know if surface enrichment was a result of the conditions in which the object had been buried (in some soils the silver can be depleted through natural processes, leaving the surface with an artificially enriched gold content). Instead we discovered there was regular and deliberate surface enrichment of the gold, the silver and copper having been depleted while the objects were being made (Blakelock, in press). The aim, presumably, was to make the objects look as golden in colour as possible. The pilot became a larger study, covering 114 items with between them a total of 222 components. This revealed that enrichment was being used differently between components of the same item. For example, the fronts of sheets that had filigree or incised decoration were Zoomorphic mount K1497. Gold content: surface front of sheet often enriched ‘while the filigree was not, making the c 85 per cent, wires and core of sheet 77-78 per cent. sheet appear a more golden colour. It is thus clear Guy Evans, © Barbican Research Associates Ltd 4 | Historic England Research | Issue 2: Winter 2015-16 The Staffordshire Hoard Part of the ‘beaked’ quadruped frieze. Giovanna Fregni and Kayleigh Fuller, © Birmingham Museums Trust areas, workshops or sub-periods was found, so this A range of organic materials have been discovered in the use of enrichment, hitherto unsuspected, appears to construction and decoration of the items in the hoard. be widespread. Currently the phenomenon is being Beeswax, a protein-based glue, horn, bone, amber explored by metallographic techniques, studying and wood have been identified using a combination of polished cross-sections so as to understand the physical optical microscopy, infrared spectroscopy, SEM-EDX, structure of the gold. Preliminary results have shown the and X-ray micro-computed tomography. The glue is depleted layer where some of the copper and silver has almost always found in association with beeswax inside been removed is approximately 7μm thick with most of the cloisonné cells, and there is some evidence that it the depletion in the upper 5μm. Work to try to establish may be derived from a fibrous protein such as hoof or what techniques were used to achieve this unexpected horn. Also of special interest is the lime mortar used as a and sophisticated craft practice is ongoing. filler inside several pommel caps. Silver sheets from the helmet(s) found in the hoard presented special problems because of their very fragmentary nature. Progress has been made in re-joining these tiny pieces, a process which allows the original working practices to be established. A frieze of ‘beaked’ quadrupeds possibly from the helmet, for example, was made using a die depicting the five creatures. The die had a beaded border, and the pellets at the end of this border were made slightly larger than the others so as to act as a key when the craftsman was lining up the design with the metal that was to be embossed. The metalsmith could have slid the strip This gold and garnet pommel (K1195) used lime mortar in its core. Guy Evans, © Barbican Research Associates Ltd of metal from left to right while working, using the beads to help line up the last creature that had been embossed quite closely to the first creature on the die, Whilst there is more organic material in the hoard than before embossing the next set. Using this insight and the initially anticipated, it is not suitable to form the basis of slight differences that can be seen on each of the five a radiocarbon dating programme. The material is either animals, the fragments can be lain out in the order they contaminated, or available in too small a quantity to must have occupied in the original frieze, even when provide samples. The dating of the hoard thus continues no joining fragments have been found. By doing this we to rely on conventional stylistic analysis (Fern and now know this frieze was at least 55cm long.