Castles and Coprolites

The arrival of new thin sections is always exciting, but always daunting at the same time. Sediment micromorphology has to be one of the more challenging geoarchaeological techniques, simply because of the huge variety in the types of material you can encounter, and a deposit from one site never quite looks the same as one from another, even when they are related to similar activities. The samples from Case Bastione were collected to investigate formation processes and activities of a number of features in the Bronze Age settlement, including a large 'burnt' layer, and some strange pit deposits. The most striking thing about all the samples is the ubiquitous presence of these teeny tiny little creatures - my educated guess is that these are tiny foraminifera of some sort , present within limestone/chalk or another carbonate material (I need to do some research on Sicilian geology!). What is slightly confusing is the presence of a spherulite like appearance within the shells in...

If you follow Hidden Worlds on Facebook you may have spotted a set of samples from Sicily have been progressing nicely over the past few weeks. These are samples that we collected last summer during a field school, at a site called Case Bastione . It is a Bronze Age settlement located in central Sicily, and has some really interesting features that we are describing as clay lined pits. The functions of these are unclear. It was initially hypothesized they had something to do with metal working, but chemical analysis has suggested other functions. We have taken a number of samples to try and figure it out. The thin section samples are taken from the pit linings, and a range of 'domestic' deposits. I am hoping we can recruit an enthusiastic student to look at these samples for a dissertation project, though I might not be able to resist having a look at them myself!

I'm missing the Sicilian weather already. As much as I love Newcastle, I'm very much a fan of hot weather, and the 35 degrees in Sicily suited me nicely. Likewise, I don't think I can ever have ice cream in the UK again after 2 weeks of Italian gelato. And oh how I miss the coffee. I feel very invigorated after the fieldwork. Despite the depressing news we received while were away, the excavation reminded me of everything that originally got me interested in archaeology. Travelling, the excitement of discovery , and the satisfaction of successfully completing hard work. This is my first year of involvement in the project, but I hope to dedicate time to it over the next few years (not just because of the gelato and coffee, though that does help). As I am sure you have guessed, my role in the project is to conduct a series of pilot geoarchaeological studies to investigate the formation processes of some of the more unusual deposits and features on site. The first of these is...

Back in the office today after a safe return from Sicily yesterday. I've just about cleared the two week email backlog and am going through all the fieldwork photos. As well as taking lots of photos of the actual excavation , I also took quite a few around the town where we were staying, Villarosa. It's a very small town, with a population of around 6000. A few decades ago it was almost twice this, but the population declined rapidly after the last of the local sulphur mine s was closed in the 1980s. A huge number of people moved to Belgium to take up work in the coal mines, leaving a large number of unoccupied buildings in the town. The photos show an example of an abandoned building overgrown with vegetation, located in between two occupied flats. It is such a strange thing to see; we would never get this in the UK, where property (or land to build new property) is so sought after. It got me thinking about the prehistoric urban landscape of places like Catalhoyuk. The popul...

We have just come to the end of our first week of digging here in Casa Bastione. The excavation is going really well, the students are starting to get the hang of things, and we’ve cleared and sieved most of the topsoil, ready to get started on the archaeological layers next week. The great thing about working in this part of Europe is that even the topsoil is full of archaeological material. We’ve already got bags and bags of pottery and bone, and the occasional lithics and some fragments of Byzantine glass. Even though this material is not in its original context, it’s great for helping the students to learn how to spot things, and the feeling that you are actually finding stuff rather than just sieving sterile soil. Of course, the mood on site has shifted noticeably over the past couple of days. I never get into politics in this blog, but it would be impossible not to mention the fact that we are here in Sicily, working with a British (including English and Scottish students!) and I...

I’m sitting here writing this on my laptop, on the patio of a rustic farm villa, with a lovely view of the mountains and checkerboard fields, sipping an espresso. Actually, I’ll probably be posting it at a later date, given that there is no internet up here in the lovely quiet hills, no sounds apart from the odd bleating goat and chirping swallow. Yes, it’s the best time of the year again; fieldwork time! I’m allowed to gloat at these surroundings, I’ve endured everything from 2 months sleeping on a floor with no mattress to 3 weeks with no electricity or running water. That means getting washed = a bucket of cold water over the head. But not this year! This year I’m working at a site called Case Bastione in central Sicily . I’m here as a geoarchaeology specialist, but also as a supervisor for our students from Newcastle University. The project is run by Italian archaeologist Enrico Giannitrapani, along with Newcastle’s Andrea Dolfini, and dates from the early Copper Age to Bronze Age,...