The Mystery Of St. Hilda's Lost Anglo-Saxon Monastery | Time Team | Chronicle

this channel is part of the history hit Network [Music] 1200 years ago on this stormy Headland stood a thriving Monastery a community of monks and nuns ruled over by a powerful Anglo-Saxon princess her aim was to spread the word of God and to convert the pagans to Christianity but less than 200 years later the monastery had vanished and it remains lay forgotten for over a thousand years time team have come to Hartley Paul in northumbria to try and find the heart of this mysterious place the site where her followers lie buried and the church where princess Hills presided [Music] foreign [Music] foreign [Music] we've been invited to the Headland at Hartlepool by T's archeology and County archaeologist Robin Daniels who's been working in the area for several years and will be helping us on our dig how do we actually know that there is an Anglo-Saxon Monastery around here somewhere well in 1833 when we're building houses here and they found human bones and Anglo-Saxon artifacts and the Durham Advertiser of Friday July the 12th 1833 records his work when finding the human bones and the name stones that were buried with them where exactly was that just over there we're Phillies that's right yes and there's one of the name stones on display in the church as well the discovery of these main stones or grave markers was the first indication that Hartlepool was the site of the Lost Monastery of heritua where Saint Hilda and her followers helped to reintroduce Christianity to a pagan England Phil's opening a trench in the front garden of number three South Crescent he'll be looking for evidence of anglo-saxon Graves to verify the location of the nuns graveyard first mentioned 170 years ago in those old newspaper reports oh there's a cable what we've done are we up cut through it once Phil sorted his cables out he'll try to establish whether the Victorian Builders have left any Graves intact for us to study and because the headland's now so heavily developed we'll have to carry out Keyhole archeology to establish the size and layout of the site we'll be searching for evidence of The Monastery Church other monastic buildings and the boundary ditch our new information will be used to create a model of this Headland as it would have looked 1300 years ago [Music] Phil's trench is right on the coast but we also need to find the heart of the monastery so we're looking at the area around the present Church which was built several hundred years after the monastery disappeared there are two possible sites on a strip of grass to the north of the church and the other on a traffic Island known locally as Jimmy's green where karenza is about to open trench 2. Jimmy's Green's a rare piece of open ground and we're hoping that it should produce evidence of Saxon buildings right so is that where the Saxon church was um we don't really know uh we suspect there probably was a church there but there's no evidence from that church there's actually Saxon so it may have been a subsidiary Church of the monastery and not but certainly not the principal not the main one so we're looking for sort of settlement remains here that's what we'd hope to find that's right well we're in the core of the Saxon Monastery so perhaps we're hoping to find the boundary of the core area of the monastery um perhaps remains of small churches in that core area that certainly settlement type remains yeah [Music] so their first task is to lift the Roses carefully and get the Digger in to remove the turf and get the trench started [Music] well it's all right for you lot in here what do you go for us what we're trying to do here is get some idea of of what's gone on over the the time since the monastery was established yeah and just trying to get a feel for the whole thing as a peninsula a headland we know there's a cemetery area down here another Cemetery area just south of the church some buildings have been found in excavation up here with alignments for fences or Precinct boundaries how does all this fit together and are there any clues still in the street patterns of the earlier Maps which help us work out what the layout of this monastic establishment would have been like why are we so excited about the prospect of digging up another Monastery I mean we must have dug up an awful lot but this is this is a special one this is why well because it's it's very early it's one of these seventh century ones we know very little about them uh we don't know what the layout was you know how people lived it's a double monaster as well which a lot of them were what does that mean it had monks and nuns in it Under One Roof not quite within the same enclosure ruled over by an abyss and they were very common in the Anglo-Saxon period because I always think of monasteries as Stone buildings and guys with Tom is this is nothing like that you know the idea of something like Tintin or Revo or fountains you have to put right out of your mind this is much more irregular plan scattered buildings mainly of Timber and probably more than one Church a very very different sort of establishment altogether history hit is like Netflix just for history fans with exclusive history documentaries covering some of the most famous people and events in history just for you with familiar faces such as Dan Jones and Dr Eleanor yanega we've got hundreds of documentaries covering the greatest figures and events of medieval history we're committed to Bringing history fans award-winning documentaries and podcasts that you cannot find anywhere else sign up now for a free trial and Chronicle fans get 50 off their first three months just be sure to use the code Chronicle that's we know less about these monasteries than we know about either Roman Villas or even many prehistoric sites that are really unknown area of British archeology well we're underway Now Kevin no turning back no no definitely not turning back now in your no sacking thoughts about it no I'm not I'm not sure I mean how long have you been living here just over two years and did you know there were bodies underneath your lawn I did actually know those bodies under there but I don't know there's something going on down there well we ain't got any bodies yet but we do have just a little bit of history of your garden it's Queen Victoria Penny oh one of the old pennies yeah so there you go about 50 years after the houses were put up somebody was sitting out on the lawn and dropped that it's a nice piece of History back at trench two on Jimmy's green the roses have come out and the diggers just starting to expose the foundations of the Victorian school that once stood here I attended that school you attended it yes yes bring back memories now assuming the roof was a bit better when you went there oh yes yes a lot better and there's some fireplaces as well yes open fires great big open fires the milk use the little bottles of milk used to be around the fires warming in the winter you know yeah yeah [Laughter] it's got the biggest Starship again we also need to find the boundaries of the monastery to establish its size so we're widening our search to the largest area of open ground on the Headland Town more to see if the site would have extended this far I can see now what you're doing having to clean the rain off so what have we got then well we've got this area of open ground here it's actually there's showing up on the photograph as well we'll see through their gray see that line showing down through there yeah where's that on the ground that's that bank oh yeah probably see through them it's coming up this way it gets very confused yeah I'd quite like to know what that is but there's all sorts of things going on here we've got 18th century 19th century 20th century military activity that's shown on maps there's been a lot of things going on ideal place looking at Over the Sea that's the problem from our point of view though all this later activity we've scanned over quickly already we're getting lots of noisy results I mean it's obviously this lighter stuff that's going on whether we can see any detail below that I'm not sure but it still represents a really open area next to where we're interested in so you know we're bound to have a look at it aren't we really yeah are you sure yeah yeah I'm not sure it's necessary in this weather well I think we wouldn't put the diggers in yet because he's too wet but that's what I mean I don't see why the Geo fish had been carried on where were you brilliant I'll be having a coffee in the drive so while geophysics Brave the elements on Town more Robin Daniels and I take refuge from the weather in the church of Saint Hilda where one of the anglo-sax name Stones is kept and Robin bush has been trying to find out more about the Saints who has given her name to the church hi Tony there she is in all her glory Sun Hilda is that my princess hild yes one of the most influential women in the whole of England she was the great niece of King Edwin one of the most powerful Kings of northumbria and when he was baptized into the Christian Faith by Saint Paul Linus in 627 she got dunked along with him how do we know about her well fortunately the the venerable bead in his history of the English church and people writes her up at Great length it wasn't for him all she'd be would be a single line in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle he was a great fan of hers he talks about how so great was her Prudence that not only ordinary folk but Kings and princes used to come and ask her advice in their difficulties and take it yeah but presumably that was just propaganda she was probably tetchian bossy for all women but she was still crucial because at her Monastery in 664 at Whitby they held the Synod the Synod of Whitby at which the English church finally made the decision to go along with the Roman Church in terms of calculating Easter and not the old Celtic variety and look what we've got Saxon cross it's the name Stone so it names the person it can remember rated a hilde thrift presumably named after Saint Hilda what does this mean to you well it's lovely to have it here in the church and we're particularly excited at the moment in the Millennium year as we think that it was Hilda at that sinus that gave us A.D and oh dominate back on the seafront in trench one Phil's found some bones this could be our first indication that we're looking in the right place for the nuns burial ground forensic archaeologist Margaret Cox is casting her eye over Phil's fines of that he's in fact sorry I don't like the look of any of these I don't think there's anything there looks very human no I think they're all definitely not human well I mean they are bones aren't they well then stop being so biased Beastie I'm afraid all of them but it is in very very good condition so if we do get a burial yeah it does all grow well for the condition of it yeah we've got every reason to be optimistic we need to extend our search for the boundary ditch that separated the monastery from the outside world so we're going to open a third trench in Lumley Street the area to the north of the church so you didn't actually dig in this area you dug over the back there that's right this was still a road then but now they've LED This Grass down so it's available well that road we can see going back to the Victorian Church came through here that's right yeah well aren't we gonna have a lot of asphalt and concrete and stuff underneath them we are yes we should be able to go through that with the JCB without too much trouble right what would you expect to find here then well what we're hoping to find is the boundary of the Saxon Monastery this ditch here we've just seen a very small part of it but it seems to come through right the way through the area we're standing which is just here is this the the outer boundary to the monastery uh so if we did find more of it here that might give us a chance to identify whether it really is like to be outside boundary that's right absolutely yeah what happens if we get occupation that way outside as well as inside absolutely all my hypothesis go out the window so we opened another trench but it's not going to be easy we need to get the turf lifted and the top soil removed before the Digger can be brought in to cut through the road surface in trench three whilst in trench one Phil's been kept busy entertaining the local residents Phil hello Tony this lady wants to know if you've got permission to dig in that gun late now if we were young hey come look Yeah by all means can I get in yeah but just get down in here your boots are really really dirty look this beautiful brown level we are actually on to the Saxon levels how'd you know that well you have a look at this won't that excite you it's a bit of cold it is not a bit of cold it is Anglo-Saxon Pottery yeah and what's more look we've got a second piece isn't that a beautiful little Rim now how do you know that that is Pottery well look this is the most obvious one look at that do you see there's that beautiful little outturned Rim Yeah there are probably no more than about half a dozen shirts of sacks and pottery from the whole of the site we've been here digging here for one morning and we got two pieces in spite of my initial skepticism we've managed to reconstruct Phil's pot and this is what it would have looked like 1200 years ago a very rare little piece of anglo-saxon pottery [Music] karenza's down to the Saxon layers too and is still searching for either a boundary ditch which might have enclosed the sacred area of the monastery or if we're lucky a monastic building oh hi there actually this is really time leak I think we've um we think we're down onto the sacks and lairs so that said we haven't had any sacks and pottery to prove it this orange side is certainly Saturn soil and it seems to me that again we're in amongst a Saxon Saxon feature here unless I'm much mistaken we've just found a piece of stone work it's worked really that's that's not what it looks like no that's been Phoenix well I think some of these are natural striations but some of these look as though they've been worked um which if it is the case then we've got worked stonework from a from a building which would be from what sort of building well it could could well be the church it could be the church well you serious about it this is Brookstone from the church it could be I think I'd like to see these pieces out but if if they are it's very exciting we've got very little evidence of the stone building of any storm buildings from Hartford pool this is in the Saxon soil so it it should be right and it looks as some Easterns at least have worked that's amazing I mean I'm I'm done so much Phil's extending his search for the cemetery and is moving a few doors up to number seven South Crescent end of day one and what have we got a skipped load of dirt and another skipload of dirt and a great big hole in the ground where we found two little lumps that look like charcoal yeah sack some pottery that is but have we found any Graves not yet no but they still might be in there so what are we going to do tomorrow well we're starting another one up here you see where Philly is up there yeah well we're taking the topsoil off that Garden we're still looking for the cemetery that produced the inscribed Graves so no front gardening Hartley pool safe from the time team now the weather's improved we can have a better look at the Town more it's covered in the lumps and bumps that Stuart normally gets so excited about but what are the results of the geophysics survey going to show us John how you going on well that's good noisy yes just a bit this is the problem we talked about yesterday and I mean we've got lots of service pipes later military stuff and that's causing all these distortions yeah and I mean it really is confusing so if we ignore that and just look at this plus you can see the lines again so we're ignoring these lots of interest is what do you think or round corner yeah I'm not expecting Roman we're looking at Roman fort with the rounded corn on it if it's an early Monastery it might have been plunked in a Roman Fort that's right I mean a number of them have been placed in Roman force and even if it's not I mean it's always possible you've got something here that may relate to Saxon Monastery perhaps an enclosure for a palace or something like something like a high status of the royal Monastery here Stuart you look a bit skeptical I I I'm not entirely happy with what I'm seeing here as a total package for an Anglo-Saxon Palace or a big monastic Precinct so it might be modern it might be civil war it might be Romans why don't we put a trench at South Crescent our search for the cemetery continues the diggers still taking out the topsoil from trench four at number seven oh Margaret you're up bright and early and in the front garden of number three Margaret Cox thinks she may have found something well it's looking ominously like an East-West linear feature which I guess could be a grave it's right in the corner too of course Andy can I come down and have a look yeah sure go ahead well I'll tell you what to Margaret the natural that is nice natural that's the first time it's very clear we've seen that that nice oh god oh that's beautiful stuff haven't quite got the edge of the cut there I don't think I think that can go back a bit my concern Phil is that if that is actually the end and if there's a coffin in there we might not get any evidence of bone in it so we might not be able to see whether it's a grave or not without taking it further back anyway it'd certainly be better if we could have a little bit more length to it wouldn't it oh yeah because then we could say definitively whether it's a grave or not before we think about whether or not to extend the trench this way that sounds like the best policy so that's great news 10 o'clock on day two and we may have found our first evidence of the name Stone Cemetery but what about the worst Stones they found on Jimmy's Green in trench two you found Robin's Church well we've certainly been doing some more looking at it um you're being diplomatic already I'm trying to be yeah um this this spread of rubble here was what we were looking at yesterday and it was these parallel markings on the stones here that Robin was thinking might might mean they were carved but quite honestly Robin nearly all the stones in here have those parallel marks and we're thinking now probably it looks more like that's just natural weathering and this is just Rubble spread in a yard or something yes I think I'm back peddling like man on this one we've set up a workshop to recreate a book in the style of one that might have been produced by the northumbrian monks of Hartlepool Owens using a technique known as not work to produce a raised border that'll provide a frame for the Celtic Design he's going to Tool into the leather and Jim's using this original Anglo-Saxon mold found on an earlier dig to make a silver medallion for the book cover books were very precious in the 7th century and the monasteries needed to produce their own scriptures by hand yep I'm rediscovering the finer art Maya's Going Back to Basics to recreate and Hilda's family tree in the style of an Anglo-Saxon illuminated manuscript well what about around the is that even Mick seems to be getting in on the ACT not the whole of it aren't you supposed to be in the trenches no no I'm an artist as well you see a man of many parts oh I see I'm doing very well well I don't know we haven't done you know it's a bit wobbly that bit and this is actually how people would have done illuminated manuscripts yeah I mean what we've actually got here yeah is is a little microcosm of you know what went on in many of these monasteries and who were the pinned on by the monks and the nuns depending on what skill they've got and would these have been relatively wealthy people or just people off the land no no the most the monks are nuns certainly the nuns were aristocratic ladies what were they doing it before well ultimately it's for the greater glory of God just as the services were in the church so every work they produced whether it was metal working or book production whatever was you know to give their best and it's actually incredible stuff if you look at something like one of these carpet pages from the lindisfine gospels we can see how elaborate it is how the elaborate patterns and coloring in it geraldus cambrensis who was a a 12th century monk when he saw the Book of Kells in Ireland which is similar work to this of the same sort of date said this wasn't the work of men this must be the work of angels and that sums it up really it really is a peninsula from up here isn't it it is although it's it's masked by all this later Shipyard and harbor development all these cars and everything is all in Phil yesterday all this has been built up since the 19th century if it wasn't connected to the mainland it would it would be remarkably like the site at lindisfarne further up where Bishop Hayden established the monastery which influenced this one right it's almost as if they've got a mirror image that might fit well with an isolated Monastery but it doesn't fit very well with his Roman fault I'm afraid stuck right out in the middle there's an island see where the Sandy Bay is next to the pier yeah yeah that actually would fit perfectly with the sheltered landing spot yeah that's actually quite close just below it isn't it that's where we seem to be getting real evidence right just off the east end of the church she's really where you and I were expected yeah [Music] Victor's on the sea wall sketching the Headland as it would have looked when the Anglo-Saxon Monastery stood here 1300 years ago on Town more trench 5 is proving to be a bit of a disappointment there are no Roman fines or any other archaeological features just modern service ditches so although we haven't found a Saxon palace here we do know that the monastery didn't extend this far onto the town more which should mean that our other trenches are in the right location to find evidence of buildings from the core area of the monastery and in trench 3 the diggers making light work of the old road surface meanwhile Phil's been wrestling with the archeology in trench one I mean we've been looking for edges and saying ah let's chase that one so you discover or try to find out where the edge is I heard on the commons you even thought you had a grave we did indeed yeah look this was where our grave was going to be and we thought it was cut through this really solid Limestone natural and they would nicely be in there but look what's happened to the film it's actually running underneath this is just an isolated island a pocket of limestone gravel and it it's just all Disturbed it is it is just glacial so you've had a good time but we haven't found anything we've had an amazingly challenging time we've had a lot of fun but no we haven't found anything but ladies and gentlemen we're closing down this trench but if you want to stay with us we're going to dig up another front garden further along the street so we closed down trench one and Phil moves four doors up the Crescent where he'll continue to search for the name Stone Cemetery in trench four on Jim is green corenza is still trying to unravel the archeology in this complicated Trench and five skips of soil later we've got masses coming out now we're starting to get into the Saxon archeology we've got the um where that slots strung out there we've that's clearly a cut down into the natural so that looks like that's some sort of Saxon ditch you're building and then over here we've done a couple of sections into that long beam slot we had the beam slots used in these Anglo-Saxon buildings would have been hollowed into the ground and then the wooden posts slowered into them and secured into position with rubble and soil so when the wood rots all the remains of the building is the beam slot and some Rubble korenza's priority now is to find the corner of the building to establish how big it would have been and what it might have been used for it's been quite interesting looking at the Topography of this particular Peninsula because there are a number of factors here which make it very similar to to lindisfall yeah if you're looking for a safe Anchorage a safe place to birth to establish a monastery the first opportunity you get in the Rock pattern is just round this corner here you're sheltered it's safe that's actually on the slope immediately below Western Hilda's church is now yeah if you look on this other air photograph you can see this is the Safe Harbor area here around the edge of the rock so you get shelter St Hilda's is here and we've got no evidence from anywhere else North or east of that of any Saxon fines whatsoever despite all the development all the expansion nothing at all all the distribution is down here so it does point so the monastic core being tight down on this corner here yeah well this is some Hilda's Street yeah and in front of assistant held a chair Mick's been doing is a bit of field work and he's been knocking on doors and he'd give me to believe if we come up here by these garages he said come on up here it's number six he said well I don't know mid-afternoon on day two and we still haven't found any evidence of the Anglo-Saxon name Stone Cemetery to support the Victorian newspaper reports so Phil and I set out to locate a third garden to excavate I think her name's Barbara right hello are you Barbara yes oh that's a relief we got in the right place this is Phil uh is it all right if we excavate in your garden fine go ahead just like that yeah absolutely how much can we do tell us what we can do it hard whatever you like you're sure take the garage that would be great Phil if you get a JCB in ah but hang on though Tony I mean we're dismantling the guys yeah we're a bit short on time I rang a hand dug trench to start they go big to start with we can always negotiate down thank you very much Owens copying the cover of an original Saxon manuscript that still survives today and is the sort of book that Saint Hilda would have known we're also casting The Medallion in Silver from the moles that Jim made yesterday the image of a calf the emblem of Saint Luke and it'll take pride of place on the front of our book [Music] in trench 3 corenza's just found a small piece of metalwork but they can't decide what it is that might be a late Pagan early Christian Anglo-Saxon object that was that was my first thought when I when I saw it but that's the material I'm most familiar with what I had thought initially was that maybe something like a gato hook is but again it's it's that different shape I mean this might be our only agnostic and it's come right off the top of that ditch hasn't it so it's absolutely crucially important we try and get a definite date John on the geophysics team have finally finished their survey of the Town more and are now turning their attention to the graveyard of Saint Hilda's Church where Stewart thinks he may have found something quite significant but he isn't telling us what so we've driven a few miles up the coast to bead's world to take a look at a full-scale reconstruction of an Anglo-Saxon Village the site situated next to the remains of the monastery at jarrow where beads spent his adult life it's an exact replica of one of the buildings we excavated at church class in Hartlepool it's fantastic it's a much bigger volume than I thought it was going to be it's wonderful isn't it and it's all based on the post holes you found that's right yeah and it would have been what one monk in the thing one monkey yes prayer and study fantastic in it and what about the wall in you've put split planks in this so what sort of things would they have done in here Mick well it's it's a little house it's a living house so that they would have slept in here probably ET in here some of the times that's right certainly worked in here so they might have done the illuminated and of course they might actually have stayed as a Hermit and worshiped in here as well so it's a bit of a punishment really no no no this is a this is a top grade building this is so what would this have been used for this is a hall a family would have lived here would have worked here would have slept here hey hey Sue [Applause] so is this the kind of thing that anglo-sax is going to be thank you well I've been checking up on that Tony according to the rule of Saint columbanus which we think since Hilda followed the food of the monks should be poor and confined to the evening let it be such as to avoid gorging and their drink such as to avoid drunkenness so that it may sustain them but do them no harm and here we get to it vegetables beans flour mixed with water along with a small loaf of bread lest the stomach be strained and the mind stifle well why are you scuffing your soup I'm going to phone corenza on my Anglo-Saxon cell phone to see how things have been going at the main site hello hello corenza no it's going really really well actually since you've gone we've gone on brilliantly we've finally definitely got buildings in trenched too yeah and in trenched three we're pretty sure we've got the ditch we were looking for and even better than that we've got a metal object from off the top of the ditch Phil which just might be an Anglo-Saxon nuns suspend about fastening on the other hand it might be later medieval but we're desperately waiting to get it firmly dated so keep your fingers crossed okay excellent thanks a lot looks like we might have our first Anglo-Saxon 5. beginning of day three and Stuart thinks that there's evidence that there might have been an early church building here which is why John's doing some more exploration but if there is a church building here then presumably something associated with it or to stretch in this direction which is why we've been given permission to dig in the grounds of this very elegant looking building which happens to be Hartlepool conservative Club morning Tony Good morning Tony so where are we going to dig probably up this corner here near the wall you see I mean over there were these new developments are there was an excavation there and what about 20 years ago and they actually did find a cemetery what we don't know is how far it extends this way or how it relates to the churches and we are getting very very close to the edge of the Hill that has actually got the site of the monastery on it but we've got an awful lot of trenches open all the ones over by the Sea World we've been digging in the front Gardens how are we going to get the resources with one day left yeah to dig a trench here well we've talked about that overnight and we're going to shop most those down because the there isn't any evidence of symmetry down there so we've got all those people we can bring up here so we haven't got enough labor don't we no problem so how long but we're reckon about three but two we'll we'll make sure we come well clear of the war we don't want that coming down so we'll be in this corner here somewhere you ready to start yeah yeah uh we do have to give you temporary membership at the conservative party in order to allow you to dig here ah we've currently got six trenches open so the two remaining Garden trenches will have to be closed we hadn't found any signs of The elusive nuns burial ground yet and we're beginning to doubt whether we have a will corenza's still supervising the working trench too where they found signs of a building and trench three where she's found a small piece of metalwork corenza any news on the nun suspender actually it's got even better I mean yesterday we were thinking it was attached a bit of clothing but in fact we've now had sent it off to experts at Durham who have said one yes it is Saxon could either be late Saxon or mid sacks and either would be fine which is brilliant because it's dating the ditch that we've got in the trench so it's our monastic boundary the best guess for what it is at the moment is a hasp from a book it's a sort of lock bit if you like like on a child's diary where you have a little lock round it would have been riveted onto the book here and then the lock would have would have gone through there to keep it shut speed talks about people studying the scriptures here but we've had never had any direct evidence that actually had books here or scriptures of any kind so that's that's great I would say it's the next best thing to a stylist and it shows literacy it shows presumably book production or they've got a collection of books they're using books it's fantastic it's what you'd expect of a high status Monastery and what are we going to do with this trench now well we're trying to do we've got the far edge of the ditch we're in and the red hat there is what we're trying to do is find the other side of it and then of course start going in and taking the fill out because if this is what we've had from just at the top what might else might we find going down into it in trench 7 back at conservative party headquarters were looking for remains of the Saxon church or anything associated with it Phil's left the Digger to get on with it while he's gone round the corner back to Barbara's Garden to check on the progress of trench six where he's found some Victorian foundations still digging Phil oh God ah yeah yeah it's a bit of a problem here Mick come on in oh it looks recently well that's it I mean it is a marvelously solid wall you see it's through this soil again and this is the step we've got Elsewhere on the site with a medieval Pottery so they've actually dug a foundation trenched through it put all this foundation stone in to make a real good solid base for the war yeah and this right at the bottom of this soil is where our saxon's going to be now can you imagine trying to open out this area of a trench right the way down through there we're going to create so much spoil yeah even if there is anything Saxon down here I don't think we're going to reach it it's hardly worth it is it really it's going to be very very impractical to get there yeah so we're moving towards the idea of shutting this one down then you think yeah I mean it's it's good A little bit of archeology yeah yeah but it's it's so difficult yeah okay yep you're absolutely definite now that this is Anglo-Saxon yep definitely and that's our building look you can see the foundation trench coming along like that then there's the break in it where the doorway was then it goes up there turns around into the other side of the building so if you say that this is cobbling in the yard outside the building do we know what this area would have been used for well there were sort of three possibilities really at the moment one is that it's something small like a monk cell one is that it's a workshop which is sort of what the fines in as much as we've got any are suggesting at the moment there's three bits of this sort of copper bronze alloy which they all look a bit Tatty and broken up and we're they feel as if they may just be broken bits from something being made rather than broken finished items we're not even certain about that and the third possibility is it might be really quite big and something like a church could it actually be the size of the big building that we were in last night it's always possible yeah yeah and have you had anything that big here before no never no so how do we ascertain that we extend the trench underneath the spoiling we'll have to move the spoil Heap uh disturb Victor unfortunately of course he's standing on top of it Laurel Victor you're gonna have to move right my strategic and I think he's gonna have to alter his drawings just a little I think and having removed the spoil Heap corenza then found that the building extended straight down the middle of the original trench still she's also managed to establish that it is a substantial structure and according to Robin it's larger than any building found so far on the headland so although we still don't know how large this building was we do know that it's a significant Discovery and must be included on Victor's drawing of Hartlepool monastery Phil's back in South Crescent and he's thinking about closing down trench four that's a big old piece it is yeah looks like it's going going right back into the section it is a big old bit of bone don't think it is maybe we can get Margaret to have a look at it up here with her opinion on it our books nearly finished now and Owens preparing to bind Maya's drawing of Saint Hilda's family tree [Music] what have you got there then Phil oh Margaret got some bone you know you have a look at oh God I don't know but I'm thinking it might be looking very much human yeah yeah I think I might agree with that yeah I mean certainly this is this loose yeah yes yeah this this is a distal radius so it's the sort of inside of the wrist and that's definitely human um what's that way wasn't it yeah that's right yeah this little one here might be human though I'm not 100 sure but unfortunately it's quite badly damaged how about this big one here well it looks my instant reaction is that it's the the tibia they're not 100 certain it seems a bit strange on this end so I mean it really looks then as we as though we've actually got our seafront Cemetery at last 11 30 on day three just as we're about to close down trench four we seem to have found signs of a burial let's see what I've got to trust my trusty box but in Lumley Street in trench 3 where we found the hasp there haven't been any more finds and we've now established that the dish is far too small to be the monastic boundary so we now think it was more likely to have been an internal boundary fence that would have enclosed the Monk's cells so we're going to record it shut it down and concentrate on Trench 4. can I come in yeah yeah we've actually got the whole lower part of the skeleton and covered it up oh wow look there's one leg there's the other leg there's one kneecap there there's one there and underneath these slabs we've got both the thighs and the pelvis and the whole thing is disappearing underneath this book and what can we tell about it so far Margaret well it's quite a small individual quite grass saw we don't know yet whether it's a male or a female but it's definitely orientated if sort of north south and have we got any clues as to whether it actually is Anglo-Saxons well all the dirt that you see there that dark material has got medieval Pottery in it so these this body is underneath the medieval layers it must be Anglo-Saxon so what do we do now well we're gonna cover up that bit to protect it put the plastic back on and we're going to bash out an area there in the boat without bringing the house down without bringing the house down yeah that's all the exact spot on the edge of this building here yeah in 1921 skeletons were found let me see exact spot the two skeletons 1921 1921 to a gas trench yeah down here and they give you a firm measurement out from that corner of the house so this is this is a very firm find of skeletons here so our skeleton in there and those found there are really suggesting it's all that way up up towards the the Lighthouse Way Stewart's documentary evidence combined with the location of our burial proves definitively that we've at last found the name Stone Cemetery but there's still one big question that needs to be answered getting any nearer deciding whether it's male or female I think it's a female cell if you look at the Sky Technologies it's very wide and very male it'll be much tighter so it looks female from that as far as which is what we were hoping oh yeah well you were hoping Robert sorry those we've been here before but all hell's broken loose down the other end of town oh this is a good looking trench isn't it it is some nice archeology it's not Anglo-Saxon but it's very nice can I come in certainly yeah what is it then it's a medieval building it runs this way from the frontage we've got a boundary wall here a half over there and another half here all the fines from trench seven are high status medieval goods and the buildings are too important to disturb there's no chance of getting down to the Saxon Levels by the end of the day so we'll record it and close it down top to the left a bit you're going off at a kilter no to the way don't need your lefts and your rights in the early days of Christianity some Pagan practices lingered on and churches and burials were often aligned north south and not East West as they were later this means that our skeleton was probably buried when the monastery was first established Southeast exactly it looks like the lower end of the humerus that's right there she goes and that'll run on up through so I can get I'll get rid of that with a better look that arm will be outside the ribs so that'll be our furthest extent really on it yeah do you think she'd have been likely to have been sort of bound up in any way I mean she does seem to be quite tightly kinched in here she does I wouldn't be a bit surprised if she wasn't in the Shroud I mean look at how close together her ankles yeah and that wouldn't happen if she was in a coffin that just wouldn't happen like that so either she was sort of in a shroud and sort of swaddled almost and they did used to use a linen wrap around bodies in the very early period so that's quite possible and we've certainly got no evidence of coffin nails either so I'm fairly convinced that we can rule that one out why are we walking through the churchyard then Stewart well I've never been attracted by this idea of the focus around this side of the headline well one we've been going all around the edge of this great big church yard and the the 12th century Church yeah and when I looked from down there and looked up this way I could see that it flattened off across here well it's very noticeable isn't it so it slopes up and then flattens off completely that's very distinct and very flat that struck me that there might be earlier buildings here perhaps a monastic core so yeah that's Johnny feed have a look and see what he could find on the ground come back down [Laughter] yeah but I mean you usually tell me that it's difficult to do Jeff it is great it's always difficult disturbance from the graves and so on but we're usually have to look for Graves ah right here Stuart's asked us to look for something different yeah here you can see all the individual Graves yeah but what we've got is this mass of high resistance this black suggests to me building rubble stone masonry so in fact that belt is all across the bank it doesn't extend the length of the graveyard is there any structure showing through it well we've tried to look more deeply into the ground um and the suggestion of structures I can't actually see clear wall lines though but it's going quite deep so we might be in the middle of a whole set of buildings that predate the laying out of the 12th century Church in the churchyard it all seems to be coming together now and looks as if we might have found one more vital piece of the jigsaw to add to our reconstruction and it's been under our noses all along here in the graveyard [Music] okay so it's done is it yes that's it just finished it's really cleaned up nicely Jim since I last saw it and there's the 7th Century original mold yeah what's it like inside well we've got Maya's piece of artwork there oh yeah look at that it really finishes it off doesn't it can we have a look inside this is the family tree that's right cover's fantastic with the tooling on isn't it the the raised bits and now of course from the excavations we've got one of these book clasps that had a piece of leather in it and that would have gone one at the top and one at the bottom to hold a book together our book's finished and the find from trench 3 has provided a direct link with some Hilda's Monastery got it look at that oh yes look at that yeah they're they're the teeth look right in situ right and I'm just coming around onto the chin that's smashing it's good set of teeth actually in it I mean they're they're they're quite they're going right the way down so what are the key bits that we're really looking for now then well it'd be nice to get a handle on a rage to see whether she was a young woman or an older woman when she died and now that you've exposed the teeth that's going to be a great help in that but I mean you know is there any part of this skeleton that we're missing that was crucial I don't think so I mean she strikes me as being remarkably complete I think she's in very good condition yeah it's I think we're just so lucky that it's so deep and so tacky and everything that she's in such good condition we can now show that the name Stone Cemetery was cited on the cliffs as the Victorian stated but it lay further east than had been previously thought we've built up a much better picture of the Headland in Saxon times visitors to this isolated Monastery would have approached by sea and birthed their boats in the safe harbor from there they would have walked up to the Sacred Heart of the site passing through the monastic boundary fence where ahead of them lay two or more churches that served the community of monks and nuns to the north there would have been a small enclosure of Monk's cells where they'd have worked on some of the earliest gospels to be written in England finally they'd have passed a much larger wooden building as they walked East towards the name Stone cemetery on the cliff [Music] I was here last yeah it's quite incredible wasn't it Tony I mean not only have we got virtually an intact skeleton but she's in such incredible condition and what can we tell about a Margaret we notice about five feet tall over 30 and seems to be in reasonably good health and what happens to her now well we really must lift her because I think it's going to rain so we need to get this lifted as soon as possible this really has been the most incredible three days we've had our Anglo-Saxon finds we've had our Anglo-Saxon building we've had the medieval part of the story and of course our lovely skeleton everything that we've looked for in fact has come to light Margaret yeah if we're going to date her which bit will we use for David we use this piece of of radius so this will go away for dating now and hopefully if we get a date on her we'll be able to tell whether or not she was a contemporary of the great Abyss hild who presided over the monastery at Hartlepool over 1300 years ago carbon dating tests have established that she was indeed a contemporary of Saint Hilda and lived sometime between 6 30 and 7 70. she was probably one of her nuns and would have lived here in Hartlepool when Christianity was being reintroduced to England in the 7th Century once the tests have been completed she'll be given a Christian Burial at Saint Hilda's church and were once again nine consecrated ground [Music]

Channel: Chronicle - Medieval History Documentaries

Views: 74,970

Keywords: history documentary, medieval history documentary, middle ages, medieval history, the middle ages

Id: AlF-fxMQcxQ

Length: 49min 52sec (2992 seconds)

Published: Wed May 17 2023