Latest News

• 10 Oct 2016

  Archaeology in Hertfordshire - Conference

  Don't forget to come and see Kris Lockyear's talk this Friday on recent work on the Roman town of Verulamium, in St Albans. (enfarchsoc.org/lectures). Kris will be selling copies of his book "Archaeology in Hertfordshire: Recent Research" as well as tickets to the Welwyn Archaeological Society's upcoming conference of the same name (details below).

  Archaeology in Hertfordshire: Recent Research

  6th November 2016 Hitchin Town Hall, Brand Street, 9.10am–4.45pm

  Tickets are £15 (£12 for WAS members) which includes morning and afternoon tea, but not lunch. Please send a cheque payable to the Welwyn Archaeological Society with a stamped addressed envelope to Kris Lockyear, 3 Lamer Park, Lamer Lane, Wheathampstead, Herts AL4 8RJ. There will be tables available for local archaeological or historical societies to have small displays and/or sell publications. We only ask that those manning the stalls have tickets to the conference.

  Download the flyer with full details (and programme) here

  Kris's blog is well worth a read too!

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• 20 Aug 2016

  20th Century Enfield - The Time of Change

  Day Conference “20th Century Enfield – the time of change”: Saturday 12th November in the Dugdale centre, Enfield.

  To complement the current exhibition at the Dugdale centre the Enfield Society is holding a day conference on Enfield in the last century which will include talks by Monica Smith -author of the fourth book in the Enfield series, and Ian Jones on Enfield in the first world war. Joe Studman and Dave Cockle will lead a walk round Enfield Town looking at the buildings the Society has helped to save over the past eighty years and even the Enfield Beast will be coming! If you are not able to do the walk there will be other activities in the museum so do book your place.

  The cost of the day (to include lunch, coffee and tea) will be £15. To book a ticket please send your name and telephone number to "Day conference", Jubilee Hall, 2 Parsonage Lane, Enfield EN2 0AJ and include a SAE and cheque payable to the Enfield Society. Alternatively, you can book via the website at enfieldsociety.org.uk/conference using a debit card, credit card or PayPal.

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• 18 Jul 2016

  Forty Hall Summer Dig - Day 6

  

  recording the eastern trench extension

  It was a tiring end to the final day of our week-long summer dig in Forty Hall, as we finished recording the interior of our palace building in what turned out to be the hottest day of the dig if not the year so far, but as ever our efforts were rewarded with fascinating finds and more crucial information about the structure of the building.

  We put out a last-minute five-metre extension to the west of the trench in an effort to find some sign of the western end of the building but this drew a blank, confirming our suspicions that the footprint of the structure is much larger than we had imagined.

  Similarly, an extension to the north only revealed more of the pebble and chalk surface we found on the north side of our probable staircase, failing to show any signs of a large exterior wall to parallel the one we found last year and the year before, which held the garderobes.

  

  the eastern wall t-junction

  Meanwhile, the eastern trench extension we opened on Saturday had more success and did eventually find an end if not to the building then at least to the room on the east of the main trench, as it disclosed a T-junction to the small east-west wall which marked the boundary between the pebble and chalk surface and the mortar bedding which held the glazed tile floor. These walls were again quite narrow and relatively insubstantial.

  It’s too early to be sure, but we’re beginning to suspect that this building may not be as solidly constructed as we thought, perhaps even being a half-timbered structure built againt the hefty palace boundary wall. This will be a question for post-excavation analysis and will perhaps lead into next year’s work.

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• 16 Jul 2016

  Forty Hall Summer Dig - Day 5

  

  It was another great day today in what may be one of our most successful ever digs on the site of Elsyng Palace. We’ve now fully excavated and recorded the remains of the mortar surface which once held the glazed floor tiles we have been recovering all week, as well as the other distinctive area of pebbles and chalk.

  Meanwhile, the extension in the north-west corner of the trench was further excavated – this forms a square enclosure and features a small square of bricks in its center – we now think this is a (originally wooden) staircase with a central column.

  

  the staircase

  The construction of the walls of this feature have turned out to be a messy mixture of brick and tile courses, rather than just tiles as we first thought, though it still seems likely that the walls were supporting a timber framed construction – it’s interesting that this is all definately not workmanship of the highest quality despite the fact that it seems to date to the period when the palace had come into royal hands. It may be that these structures were built in something of a hurry in anticipation of the arrival of the royal court.

  

  hammer head

  We’ve continued to make some fascinating finds, most notably today we found a concentration of what looks like a variety of iron tools including a splendid hammer head (pictured) which stil contains the remains of the wooden handle in its socket, as well as what may be a file, possibly a chisel and a small chisel blade that may have been part of the hammer head or possibly a tool in its own right.

  In light of this, second, third and even fourth opinions have been circulating about the three-pronged iron object we found on day three, which may turn out to be some sort of tool after all.

  We have still not seen the ends of our building so we still don’t have a clear idea of its overall size, so further extensions have been opened to the north and west of the trench. Tomorrow is the last day of the dig and so our last chance to answer this question, although in light of the successes of the week it’s unlikely any of our diggers will complain if we have to come back to the same spot next year!

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• 15 Jul 2016

  Forty Hall Summer Dig - Day 4

  

  Another great day’s progress investigating the interior of our palace building – we’ve nearly finished revealing and recording the floor levels in the main trench, and have found two distinct areas – the first at the north end (left and rear of picture) is made from a compact cobble surface including a large amount of chalk, while the second (right and rear of picture) is the remains of a mortar bedding, which must be the surface in which the glazed tiles we have found would have been set (we continued to find several more of these today).

  What this difference in surface signifies, and how (if at all) the two were separated (maybe as two rooms inside the building) we can’t tell yet.

  As expected, we extended the trench at its north-west end (foreground of picture) to follow the first of the two dwarf-wall lines. Although as we hoped, we did find another return on this wall, it is still only a small foundation for a wood-framed internal partition and not an external building wall. The three sides we have found probably enclose what was a cupboard or small storage room inside the main building, which is now looking much larger than we had imagined.

  

  purple stained glass

  The trench continued to produce a variety of interesting and unusual finds including some shaped bricks that we think may have been the base of a column or even possibly a mantelpiece, and several pieces of window glass – including one particularly nice piece of purple-stained glass – something we very rarely find at Elsyng, even though we know from household accounts there were many windows with decoration including the royal arms and those of Sir Thomas Lovell, who owned the palace in the early 16th century.

  Tomorrow we may extend the trench again, in the hope of eventually finding an end wall of the building, and will probably open another extension on the dwarf wall on the other side of the trench (mid-background of picture) in the hope of finding the end of the building in that direction.

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• 14 Jul 2016

  Forty Hall Summer Dig - Day 3

  

  the latest tile-built wall base

  It was another great day’s digging on the site of Elsyng Palace in Forty Hall today as we continue to reveal the layout of our (probably mid sixteenth century) building.

  The line of tiles we revealed yesterday has resolved into a definate wall line, but like the wall it runs parallel with, it is just a thin tile construction that probably supported a timber framed internal partition. The narrow (about 2 metres wide) strip these two wall lines define along the center of the trench may represent a corridor inside the palace building.

  By mid aftertoon we’d found this new wall line turns a 90-degree angle, just like the first and although at this point the wall is also quite narrow it is of a much more substantial brick-built construction.

  The reason for the two walls turning a corner and becoming more substantial is not yet clear, and since only a short stretch of each is inside the trench, it may well call for some small trench extensions tomorrow or at the weekend.

  

  bone hair pin

  Today was also an excellent day for finds, which came thick and fast and in a great variety. We have now recovered a considerable number of glazed floor tile fragments leaving little doubt as to what the floors of our building were made of – we have also revealed the remains of the mortar bedding they would have been laid in (as expected, the floor has been entirely robbed out).

  Interestingly, all of the fragments we recovered showed considerable signs of wear, so much so that at the time of demolition many of the tiles would have had no glaze left on their upper surfaces at all – testiment both to how long they were in place and to the lack of maintenence that ultimately led to the palace falling into disrepair and out of royal favour.

  One of the nicer small finds we made today was the end of a bone hair pin (pictured) – with carved decoration and even signs of colouring (it was probably green).

  

  the window spike

  Perhaps the oddest find of the day, though, was a large lump of ironwork in a remarkably good state of preservation, which at first glance may look like an offensive weapon but is in fact a window fixture.

  The lower end would have been set in brickwork probably outside a window, and the semi-ornamental spikes would have provided protection against intruders and would also have deterred the local bird population from perching on and defacing the palace facade.

  It’s a great (and very unusual) find that adds a little detail to the practicalities of running a palace, but also adds to a sense that the seventeenth century demolition crew weren’t perhaps being as picky as they might have about salvaging resalable material.

  We’ve now found a few items like this, such as the large amounts of window glass last year that would have been worth a reasonable amount of money at the time the palace was demolished, making it all the more surprising to find them. Whether the demolition crew were sloppy or had simply saturated the local market by the time they got to this part of the palace, it has provided us with a wealth of unusual and highly dateable finds, for which we’re grateful, no doubt with more to come tomorrow!

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