When Time Team Found Their First Ever Ancient Roman Mosaic | Time Team | Odyssey

this channel is part of the history hit Network stick around to find out more [Music] welcome to corinium the second largest town in the whole of Roman Britain after londinium in 300 A.D this was a bustling wealthy city with a basilica and a forum over there shops along there and the wealthy people's houses over there but times have changed over the last 1700 years and now this is the gloucestershire Town of cirencester Chester Street to be exact the time team have come to Chester Street and to these Gardens in particular to see how all this fitted into the Roman city plan and to see if it connected in any way with the main Roman Highway of urban street over there and also to see if there's any truth in the rumor that we're on the site of a pagan Roman Temple and as usual we've got just three days to find out foreign [Music] just marchington and her family are regular viewers of time team and they've invited us to Chester Street to find out if there's any Roman archeology under their back Garden but what kind of archeology maybe there are bath houses perhaps High status Villas or even fabulous palaces just below our feet Meg yeah they say everywhere you go in cirencester you find Roman yeah so what are we doing here well these particular Gardens back onto a really important part of the of the Roman city what are we going to do first oh well Jeff is the lawn but but a lot of this stuff the plants the shared the swing that's all got to go for us to be able to work and they don't mind I don't seem to no you're sure about this [Music] the geophysics results aren't conclusive due to the proximity of the garden walls but they do show something at the bottom of the garden karenza and her team decide to make an early start and it's actually quite a small lawn so it's difficult for us to interpret what's going on but we have got some results at this end of the garden I mean they seem to suggest a possible wall cutting across here and then quite a lot of rubble in this area um but we're not sure exactly what it is problem is really we haven't really we're going to have to put our trench here because it's the only space we've closed to the wall so John's result suggests there's something here we don't know if it's Victorian or or Roman but we have got a map that shows a Victorian building and a Roman tessellated pavement on it that's right this is a very nice map from 1875 by the Ordnance survey so this is our house this is the garden and then that's cross which it says tessellated pavement what exactly is a tessellated pavement it's a Roman Mosaic floor you know made up of little bits of Mosaic together fantastic karenza how many series have we done I know seven isn't it how many mosaics have we found about three tiny little bits I know you find us a tessellated pavement I'll buy a bottle of champagne siren says it's the place to find them Jose you've never won two about me you never bear history hitters like Netflix just for history fans with exclusive history documentaries covering some of the most famous people and events in history just for you our extensive catalog of documentaries covers everything from the rise of Hannibal Barker to the illustrious Treasures of King Tut so sign up today for broadcast quality documentaries uncovering the mysteries of the ancient world not only that but we have a huge podcast Network releasing new episodes every day so you'll always have something to listen sign up now for a free trial and odyssey fans get 50 off their first three months just be sure to use the code Odyssey at checkout we also want to survey the Parkland just over our garden wall we're hoping to find evidence of a lost Roman Road which we think may cross the park and the main Roman Highway of urban street although the position of urban street isn't in doubt there's considerable debate as to the position of this lost Road just to make our task that little bit harder we aren't able to excavate in the park as it's scheduled as an ancient Monument which means we can only dig in The Gardens of Chester Street we've got this wonderful sequence of of maps from antiquaries of different dates all of them trying to reconstruct what they thought uh the layout of Roman siren sister must have been over at our incident room Stuart and Robin are trying to find out if any of the antiquarian maps of sire ancestor give some indication as to the location of the missing road but the importance of it for me is if there is a road where does it go and if we do find it and it's course it's going to tell us an awful lot about the layout of this Gridiron system within a Roman town that's crucial in understanding the center of Roman science absolutely I think that's in effect what we ought to do next is to get some more information which is current about the line of that road great well John what we found is the only evidence of the Roman Street was actually found when they were putting in these fence posts for the tennis court and you can see this plan which has got this very edge of the road what we don't know is how wide the road is and we can't pick up the angle on it there we need a fix here for the width of it and then they'll fix over there to get the the line of it so you think it's actually south of the fence on this side yeah it's coming this way this way so we need a fix here another fix over there so then we can find it which guy on the interest rate is going to run into unfortunately the geophysics survey is hampered by modern Landscaping in the park and the resistivity scan is disturbed by the presence of a crazy Golf Course the fragmentary results seem to indicate that the Roman Street is heading towards the garden of number 50 Chester Street only three Gardens away from karenza we come in here you'll be all right and then so that's where Mick and Phil begin planning trench too that's how they built stone ends wouldn't it I didn't think we knew that Phil what I didn't think we knew that of course it is Superman just because you've got a professorship don't mean to say you know everything we know this is how they would have built the pyramids that's telling you a string and nail I don't know why I put up with it I don't know why this is my old mate it's just endless abuse from you ain't it young Arden limited by the size of the garden tree roots and the foundations of nearby outbuildings it's decided to dig a three meter by three meter Trench and with any luck evidence of a Roman Street shouldn't be far below the surface three Gardens away back in number 56 corenza's making good progress in trench one and has already Unearthed some small finds how are you getting on then well I've been working hard we're still going down to the garden soil at the moment Victorian garden soil yeah we haven't hit any Roman structure we have got a few bits of Roman Pottery which is sort of keeping us going there are bit of nice Rim sheds there they fourth Century meal you said yeah they're very typically late Roman Pottery right if this is the latest Pottery we're going to fully find on the site and it's coming out from just down there on the top of the demolition so we can be kind of the very Stony layer now which is the demolition of the last Roman buildings is this typical of what you'd expect then because you seem to have gone through a lot of topsoil yeah it's totally typical of sirens Hester what you see is there's almost like a meter of homogeneous brown black soil not many stones in woof this very hard layer and that is actually the end of the Roman period so there's no sort of intervening medieval no medieval at all that's great for us because it means we can get down onto the Roman layers without having to worry about hitting medieval buildings and having to dig them first yeah so we're gonna have to clear this all to see that and then we have to unpick that aren't we it's Rubble on the top our biggest problem really is going to be what to do with all spoil yeah I've got quite three meter square hole and it's gonna be going down at least a meter that's a it's a large amount of dirt to put in a small it's going to finish filling the garden up we can start filling the kitchen back in the garden of number 50 less than half a meter down Phil's also made some small fines but more importantly he's starting to uncover what appears to be a rock strewn hard surface which could be our missing Roman Street or maybe the wall of a building Phil Tony you found something hey look at this nice little Roman coin oh look at that isn't it a little beauty mid 4th century what's this stuff this is what we're really getting excited about look at this it's very very compacted very very hard listen now what it is like with me trowel it's absolutely solid and you see here this masses and masses of this Little P grit the stuff that passes through the worms and goes right down onto a very very solid surface there's nothing wrong with it it's the sort of surface you basically get on the top of a wall do you think it could be Ramen I got no doubt I think it could I'm sure it is we've got nothing but Roman Pottery coming out there's still some rubbish in amongst the topsoil but yeah great Robin to Tony over Robin this is Tony ever I think it'd be a good idea if you could meet me in the first car park over we'll do see ya right I'll see you in about an hour okay okay Tony excuse me first is the rather impressive house at the bottom of Chester Street what is it that you've turned up well this house The Furs was the home of Thomas bravender and he was a he was a very methodical engineer but he was also an amateur archaeologist he seems to spend most of his spare time digging up this Garden he came up with coins with pottery with sections of column we've even got a catalog of all the things he dug up here a small bronze spoon a spoon with sharp point at the end of the handle for getting out Shellfish a face probably part of a vast fantastic stuff now the only snag is that he dug all this stuff up out of his garden but the garden was much much bigger than it is today I mean if you come over here as far as you can see to that that wall over there that was the extent of the first Garden the area from which he made all these finds and presumably we can't dig out the car park well why not can we Robin's interest in this Victorian archaeologist seems to be well founded as bravanda's most important discoveries now have pride of place in the local Museum sections of Roman column and the inscribed septimius stone named after a 4th Century Governor suggested to bravanda that The Furs was once the size of a pagan Roman Temple if time team can confirm this it would be an important Discovery as no trace of a religious building neither Pagan Temple nor Christian church has ever been found in cirencester but back in the first car park there's some debate as to whether we should open a trench based only on bravanda's evidence well Neil's trying to make a case out for us digging in here and I'm not convinced because it sounds if this guy recorded a lot but he wasn't very sure about what was going on here well I think we've got a good case because if we look down here you see this crosstalk area it's extensive remains of a Roman Temple question mark well in indeed yeah but this to me shows that we know that we're critical classical columns bits and tablets are bits of sculpture coming up from around here from the old records so is this a temple what is the point in US digging somewhere where someone's already dug when we've got all this Virgin Territory we could go into well there is another Point against it as well and that is because in this paper he says as mentioned before no Roman remains were found in the new Road between the upper school and The Furs well the upper school is beyond the road here's the new road here's the first it does sound as though you're clutching at straws I don't think so because we could very close to the temple we may not be actually on it but by being very close to it we can hope to find bits of in tablature cornice sculpture fines you know lead tablets which people can vote you know to Jupiter you know please buy me a new cloak Clues are gonna say yeah this there really is a Roman Temple here and I'm pretty firm that if we dig here we're going to get that evidence you're gonna have to be careful though because you're also going to get pipes everywhere aren't they so are you saying that you don't want to dig here at all or that no you're just gonna be careful I think the only area that's free of services is in the corner you can come a bit in this direction but we still need to do a quick scan because there's one lost cable Stuart you haven't said anything are you skeptical no I'm I'm with him because because whatever whatever we find here will tell us more about this insulin we know very little about this insular it's a block of buildings surrounded by an island apart this Gridiron Patna streets and blocks of buildings and we know very little about this side so whatever we find here will tell us more about what Roman siren sister was like in 30 years of digging Tony we've never not found something in Roman siren never not found something yeah does that convince you I think so yeah after a quick CAT scan of the car park geophysics are happy that trench 3 will be clear of any hidden underground cables and pipes but the digging will have to wait until tomorrow it's almost the end of day one and karenza's uncovered what looks like the corner of a wall and the fines from trench one are indicating it's not just a common or Garden Wall we've got a really nice bit here Neil that George is cleaning there it's a hypercourse flu tiler it's box tile and this is a square hollow tile that will take another hot airs up the wall out through the chimney in the roof so what this says is about very small it's evidence that there's a hyper course so this means wealth you know only the rich people had hypercourse and Sir ancestor so it does point that this is not an Artisans house this is someone who's got a few Bob in their pocket I'll tell you what else we've got that bears that out is this painted wall plaster you see here that it's clearly been sort of had red underneath and then with blue paint over the top where he's coming from in the train well that's the slight problem is that they're coming from down here and all this Rubble here is we think the foundation layer for that Victorian building I mean it doesn't really surprise me this is actually coming out of the Victorian backfill because you know in in those times they're just interested in very big things you know mosaic's complete pots I mean it's amazing what they actually threw back in their trenches and so yeah look at the size of some of these pieces I mean these would just have been of no interest to them so we can fully imagine that the plenty of fines actually in the Victorian backfill but it does suggest it's coming out from further down and we are in the area of a highest plate as house Over the Garden Wall at number 50 filled so-called wall is now taking on Epic Roman proportions I mean this really is getting quite extensive now in it look it's gone at least from there and what we're going to right the way back here that's no wall is it no it's too big what do you reckon we're looking at like a courtyard or a road that could be like yeah who says we never find anything on our first day of time too no never never we've got Roman coins we've got a hyper course tile we've got Roman glass we've got this lovely piece of high status late Roman Pottery we've got roof tiles and that piece of blue painted plaster we've got a mixing bowl and look what's just come out of the trench just about two minutes ago this lovely little Roman gaming counter and we've got the corner of a late high status Roman building here and Niels just told me that he reckons about that much below that Earth is a Roman floor and it may be made of Earth it may be made of plaster but it could be Mosaic join us after the break foreign beginning of day two and as you can see we've turned Joss's Back Garden into an open cast mine and to add insult to injury she and the family are washing our fines for us over there Three Doors Down we're extending trench two because we think we might have found some sort of Roman Courtyard or even a Roman Road and over there we're putting a trench into the car park of The Furs because there may be a Roman Temple there geophys are working next door there to see if there's any extension in this Garden of the Roman activity that we've got in this trench and corenza's just come up with a top find a first bit of his egg so it looks as though we could be on course for our Mosaic floor quite a lot happening today I think with karenza hard at work in the garden of number 56 and filled three houses away in number 50. it's time to open up trench three where just over 100 meters away in the first car park the jcb's arrived judging by the thickness of the tarmac is going to be some time before we find out if there's a pagan Roman Temple here but works well advanced in the garden of number 50 in our quest for a Roman Street by extending trench 2 towards the house we're hoping to find an edge to the stone surface uncovered yesterday which should prove whether the surface is our missing Road or merely the rubble of a Roman Courtyard over in the Park Stone Mason Giles McDonald is making his own pile of rubble and with the arrival of members of the ermine Street guard the place is beginning to look like a Roman building site [Music] Charles your task over the next couple of days is to make us a Roman column isn't it not quite a whole Roman column uh a bit of one though is this it no this is part of it we've got a base over here uh-huh so the the two together I mean they'll stand about four or five feet high when you've finished will you carve it on the outside or will you leave it smooth like that well actually what he's going to do is carve some overlapping leaves on the outside because there's a particular sort of column some which was found in this part of the town and this column was made to stand out in the open and carry a statue of Jupiter or sometimes of a rider God so they're usually call Jupiter columns so presumably it would have stood higher than this oh absolutely yes uh it would have looked in fact more or less like that so beautiful well I mean it's wonderful it'd be nice to make one of those but rather too much work having made it we then got to lift it up and get it on top of the base who's gonna do that not me another one great hello how are you gonna get that cylindrical column on top of that base well hopefully we're going to reproduce a Roman crane an A-frame crane and uh if we've done all our calculations correctly we've worked it out that we'll be able to lift that onto the column base for many things but I'm not sure calculation or carpentry were among them tattoo after earlier problems with crazy golf courses and modern Landscaping in the park geophysics are now scanning the rest of Michael's field where John hopes the underlying archeology can be more easily surveyed in the garden of number 56 we've had to enlist more people to help process the amount of fines coming out of trench one and the spoil Heap that's nice isn't it we haven't got that late before this is handsome Theodosia right in the 380s it's the last sort of coin that you'd actually find in the town it's so small isn't it finds the recording and the removal of loose Victorian backfill are all making for slow progress in the digging of trench one and despite loads of pottery and coins no more pieces of Mosaic have been found since this morning I think my favorite bit we've had from this trench is um this little gaming counter look it's glass and they've actually inset um different pieces different colors of glass into the into the liquid blob they've got a liquid blob and then they press you get it wet it's beautiful so you need a set of 12. this Roman board game is similar to chess but instead of a king our piece is a centurion in charge of 11 troops whose aim is to defeat the opposition in a miniature battle time team artist Victor Ambrose has been given the task of trying to depict how Chester Street may have looked in Roman times complete with high status houses shops and maybe a Roman Temple [Music] over to trench 3 in the first car park where the JCB has come straight down onto some archeology so it's it's still running along that edge well yeah but it could look there it goes not still coming Phil hello what are you gonna trench well we got this enormous wall uh nail I mean look we got a one nice Edge coming along there and look the other side's coming across here it's a massive wall I mean it's bigger than the walls in karenza's trenches which will put part of the house this looks like a much bigger structure it doesn't align with what I'd what I'd visit I would envisage the whole thing would be I mean that kind of width of wool suggested me we could be dealing with public building problems with the house what what my feeling is that you know we're just looking at a very much of a keyhole we've got to get bigger sure I mean if we can bring it perhaps this way we're gonna go I wanna I wanna go that way yeah and I would also like to ease that way a bit sure excellent excellent come back a bit later on okay then Ben let's do it we've had a really lovely little piece of glass which is actually part of a well I assume it's past the drinking vessel and it's actually got applied decoration oh yeah it's like a trail on the outside and a little sort of a little Rosetta yeah it's just turning around it's very thin I mean this is one of the ways I think you'd be fairly sure it was Roman if it's not Roman there's nothing until the 17th century which would come anyway we're not getting any of materials no I mean it's incredibly thin and the decoration's so fine and it's turning out on itself isn't it it's coming up and turning over as if it's got a large Rim so that's the sort of wine glass or something is it on further reflection it was decided that the glass fragment would probably have come from a jug or pitcher like this [Music] with most of the Victorian backfill cleared from trench one the Roman floor level can only be inches below the Digger's feet and still no sign of our tessellated pavement they are Tony try some of our Roman army stew what's in this then John well it's basically Venison and onions and garlic carrots then pearl barley and lentils no one get a spoon as well that's it the spoon's interesting by the way you've got the all the spoon end at the other end if you turn it around that's a spike you can use to pick your meat up um and to wash it down there's some wine but we put water in it oh yeah let me taste the water it's almost lunch time for everyone else and in the garden of number 50 the extension of trench 2 is now complete and it yielded the desired result along the edge of the hard surface they've uncovered a ditch this ditch is proof positive that what we have here is our missing Roman Road and not a courtyard constructed of compacted clay and gravel under a layer of cobbles Roman Rhodes had Stone gutters or ditches running along the sides so now we can plot exactly where this road passed through the Garden Wall through the park and joined Urban Street with nothing more to be gained from further excavation it's decided to close down trench too thanks man listening karenza what's going on [Applause] [Music] yeah he's next to me I'll bring him with me oh that sounds good doesn't it just before lunch something going on in the next guard see you later Tony it's krenza can you hear me sorry I'm eating Roman venison stew exciting grenza come and have a look at this where'd you go I'll tell you can have a look at this look ah yes yes yes yes oh it must be good oh right here look at that whoa almost there and no one was here oh we're here now oh my God look at that oh it's fantastic isn't it it's definitely Roman it's definitely a mosaic so we're the first people to see this since the Romans 1700 years ago so this is a fantastic Discovery first one in 25 years in Siren systems first one in 50 programs for us it's white and there's a little bit of gray there and so normally you just get plain red or plain white around the side we've had some red but it's just loose so we're actually more in the middle of the Mosaic I think so it could be going that way and that way so we clean it up and do a lot of careful recording very carefully I mean we really got to tease it off the top of it and it's going that way it's going that way that was my feeling that I mean it sort of raises the question about if we want to find if there is a design maybe we're going to need to think about extending the trench that way we're getting rather close to the edge of your garden but that's something we'll have to think about over lunch I think I need lunch to think about that [Music] over in the first car park Phil's trench 3 has now been extended to find out whether our Victorian archaeologist was also right about the Pagan Temple Meg yeah you lots seem as excited about this tangle of masonry down here yeah as everyone else's about the Mosaic no more so why what can you see that icon because of the alignment of this big wall here which still show you on the map look the axis of the Town layout is like that our ball line here is completely different to that put the compass over the top of it and just let it settle a bit East West right what do we get the t-swiss it's not related to absolutely the church late Roman churches are rare aren't they they're true how many do we know of for certain yeah or even um one percent what would indicate that it's a church I mean we're not going to find a font or anything are we no it's going to be the sort of shape really and plan isn't it yeah one of the ends the East end or the West End so if it looks like a church then it probably is a church yeah it could be a church yeah so the real debate now is do we take all this lot away in case there's a parallel wall to this should be nice or I mean Suds law would have it but of course it's that way isn't it you know under the wall can I put my five penneth in as soon as I'm the bloke who's gonna have to dig the hole we can dig it as big as you like but there's a big problem where are we going to put the spoil yeah we've only got enough room here we're going to be very very important presumably we can get some skips in or something can't we a new game to see if we can find the other wall oh I want to do it if you get me the skips I'll dig you as big a hole as you like Tony how's that doing trust me if I ever let you down frequently so it looks like Neil was right to persuade us to dig up the car park though it remains to be seen whether we're on the site of a pagan Temple or a Christian Church with just over a day left to dig it's decided to open up a new trench in what was once another part of the first Garden where bravender our Victorian archaeologist had located a tessellated Pavement the search for bravanda's site was proving to be a test of Stewart's surveying skills ready yeah didn't come in yeah can you can you race the polo in the absence of time team's usual high-tech surveying equipment Stuart and Mick resort to a method that any Victorian archaeologist would recognize a system of ranging poles dead reckoning tape measures and pure luck [Music] 23 how about that yeah can you uh race something up make a cat see you from here I've left my power behind I tell you what I've got a mark in the grass yeah please all right so we're there we have the technology now then just hold that tape for 23. right here we are then how about that that's the right line okay we got it pull it tight okay sitting that's where it is not wanting to destroy yet another lawn it's decided to open a one meter test pit to see if we're in the general vicinity of bravanda's mosaic back in trench one The Works painstaking and laborious but the mosaics definitely getting bigger though it looks like it's going to be some time before we can fully make sense of the pattern oh hi there can I come in yes do yeah come on come and admire wow that's amazing I mean what do you have for lunch we just got that tiny little bit in the corner there I suppose it just kept on going and going and going but then we've got to repair look at this that is a Roman repair as my sort of repair though it's terrible isn't it because they've obviously not tried to break you know make little tesseri to repair it properly but they have made a sort of token effort at reproducing the pattern because where we've got bits of red coming in here they've put red tile in and this mortar floor here is sitting on top of the Mosaic so they've decided oh but it can't be bothered with the Mosaic floor any longer it's getting far too Tatty we'll just layer more to floor over it so what does this tell us about the story of this floor well it's it's the last hundred years of Roman Britain I think Tony they they lay down the floor in 300 they've got plenty of money by 350 they the money's going a bit thinner either can't be bothered or they haven't got the money to repair it properly so really this floor is the fall of the Roman Empire foreign I can really see why they say Rome wasn't built in a day but that's all that's left for the Urban Street guard to master the finer points of crane building [Music] end of day two and it's been one of the most fantastic time team days ever Phil tomorrow what's gonna happen we're gonna find the other wall of the church if we get the skips I've been busy yeah yeah karenza what about in your train well we don't need any skips we're going to take the Mortal air off the Mosaic in our trench expose the rest of it and then we can reconstruct the whole pattern hopefully Mick first tessera to trench four so hopefully another Mosaic tomorrow I did promise you a small drink didn't you dude [Applause] and karenza and who knows tomorrow maybe another Mosaic floor join us after the break it's the beginning of day three and in trench three Phil's trying to find a second wall in his search for an early Christian Church on the other side of the Furs in what used to be part of our Victorian archaeologist's Garden the diggers in trench four are still taking off the top soil in their search for another mosaic in the garden of number 56 the slow process of scraping away a layer of Rome and mortar has begun though it remains to be seen whether there's more Mosaic underneath the firmly glued mortar at the other end of the garden our team of pot washers and sivers are trying to keep Pace with the backlog of hundreds of small fines that are still coming out of trench one the full extent of our mosaics revealed as the last remnants of mortar are removed so pointingly it doesn't seem to have a picture at its Center but it does appear to have a complicated design David now we've got the mortar off the rest of the Mosaic here I mean in the whole trench can you work out what the patterns we've got are well I think I think so the giosh pattern that you see here with this is a figure of eighty times yes this this cable pattern which we call geosh it's like a rope pattern coming around here it has Central eyes this and and there's a white tessery which we call the eyes and there's another band of gyosh running through in this direction and going on behind you yes I see yeah and here you can see a triangle here a large white triangle with a smaller triangle in there can you see that one yeah there's possibly another one here the triangle can you see that one there row yes and a band running down here I imagine that this is a much larger scheme larger pattern going off behind running along and Paving a corridor and I wouldn't be a tour surprise if it's 30 and 40 meters well it was going off into Infinity 30 40 meters clearly we can't chase it but we won't need to because this is a fairly standard pattern so we should we can estimate fairly certainly that the pattern repeats itself along the corridor to make the pattern more apparent the mosaic has to be cleaned so as not to disturb any of the Fragile tesseri the remaining dirts carefully sponged off the surface within seconds the colors are brought to life finally we're revealing how it must have looked to the Romans 1700 years ago we haven't got the time or the manpower to extend the trench any further but using our Graphics computers we can virtually excavate to remove the soil and garden walls foreign how the Mosaic looked to the Romans living in a high status house in Chester Street at the end of the 4th century [Music] now we know what the houses of Roman Chester Street may have looked like Victor can put the finishing touches to his sketch though craftily he's hedged his bets as to whether the building in trench 3 is a pagan Temple or a Christian Church [Music] so where's this wall then Phil tell me about it yesterday Phil found traces of a substantial wall thought to be part of an early Christian church since then he's excavated another 50 tons of Earth trying to find an opposing wall that would confirm the building as a church unfortunately there's no war but what we do have is a very very nice mortared surface running right the way across that so I mean that looks very much like a just a big yard service a lot of reuse material isn't it that's right I mean the main thing is I think we now know where we are in relation to a building we know that that is outside the building yeah and we're literally where we are now is going to be inside the buildings nothing to stop the wall actually being that side that we can't get at it that's right so we're we're not going to be able to say any more than possibly a church are we I mean we we can't go beyond that it's indisputable it is on an east-western woman but it's been worth it really I don't know how frequently you get a hole this size in cirencester this is probably the biggest hole has been dug in Sirens system about 20 years so it's a great opportunity again just to see you know I mean it just get your hands on it the other good thing is you know bavender did all this recording around here and he seemed to be a bit sort of iffy about this area but we can now add well there's tons of good archeology here as well as all the other places he looked that's got to be useful and when I say Everywhere You Dig in something you find something yeah there it is I don't think we want to dig anymore I think that's we called it great so with trench 3 closed down and our Mosaic entrench one being cleaned and recorded it's decided to concentrate all our efforts into trench four with good reason only half a meter under the lawn are walls been found and the soil around it teeming with fines it's almost five o'clock and we've only got a couple of hours left to see if there's a mosaic here as well what do you make of that Richard oh yeah that's nice approach because you've got the bit of the pin and the catch plate right and it looks pretty Tatty to us but you've actually still got traces of gilding on it oh fantastic it wouldn't have been seen as bronze it would have been seen as a gold brooch yeah and then in that Central panel you'd probably set a big glass bead of some salt like a ruby red ruby bead or something like that [Music] over instant Michael's field geophysics have spent the last two days conducting a massive survey to see if they can find any link between the archeology we've found in the gardens and what lies under the park back in the incident room John seems less than happy with the results did you get the road then well not really no oh we've got Urban Street quite clearly coming through the middle of the Park yeah with the ditches on each side yeah I mean there's hints of things but it's not as clear as we'd have hoped right there is a series of rectangular buildings in this area here fronting onto ermine Street and then there appears to be another boundary and then a range of bits of buildings um adjacent to the gardens here's 56 and then trench four down here a nice wall showing there well that's good isn't it if we're getting something on the geophysics that relates to the buildings we've been digging up but I mean that's really good I don't think you should be too depressed about that at all I mean we've got the we've got the road ditch in the excavation so we know it's there and to get that row of shops is great you know we'd just like a bit more of the plan you know but I think that's good the geophysics results will now be collated with Stuart's survey to complete the picture of how The Gardens of Chester Street fitted into Roman siren sister over in the park the Crowds Are Gathering the Urban Street guard appear to have finished the crane all very well lifting a centurion but will it be strong enough to lift over half a ton of solid Stone hey Jaws is going really well and I see you press Victor into Service as well another trade he's doing a great job though he's a natural crash I mean this is amazing I mean I think when I saw this before all I saw was oh you hadn't started we had a square block of stone and now you've got this beautifully ornamented cylinder of stone and it's got to go on there ain't it the base of that column so we got the cylinder I know we're going to use a crane but how the hell do you attach the crane to the cylinder very clever little device yeah that sits in the top called a Lewis pin a Lewis pen a Lewis pin and that goes in the top of the Stone instant tells me that if that goes in there like that that's it yeah and then as you as that tautens up that's it oh I see the scissor effect that goes in the hole and as you take up the tension those ends pull apart and actually pinch in the hole it's very simple technology but it it works now I'll never give it a go what's up [Music] despite the creaking Timbers and creaking joints the crane performs perfectly amazing considering it was crafted using only original materials and hand tools foreign [Music] [Music] [Applause] before the column can be left in the park as a permanent reminder of our visit Giles inscribes it in the best Latin translation of time team yeah you're coming in Josh you're like this right then Stu what have you got for us well I've been trying to use what information we've got from excavations in your garden to tell us something about the bigger picture of Roman siren sister this is your garden here on on this section of air photograph there's Chester Street and if we see a photograph of modern sire ancestor the gardens there this is the whole built up area we have to go back to the first century to get some idea of what's actually going on Garden here major Roman Road coming through here the Urban Street and the fort was established on ermine Street and a small settlement grows outside its weakest things that's right just scrappy little settlement nothing particularly organized by the second century ad they completely got rid of that and laid out this big Gridiron pattern of streets blocks houses buildings Etc but still based on Urban Street and your garden is south of the most important Town Center blocks by the end of the second century they'd added a walled area around later or the after the Roman period all this end of town completely disappears from the map and the medieval Town moves northwards with its Center up there so your garden now is in an area of what were Open Fields Market Gardens Orchards that sort of thing which explains why there's nothing between the Roman level and the surface of God and it's all the soil that's built up as it's been a Farmland really and to see that now against the the detail back in the gardens one of the questions we were asking we came was how accurate bravanda's map was he's recording of archeology and what the excavations in Garden 50 and garden 56 have allowed us to see is that there was a Roman Road across there that is one of the divisions of these blocks it was a bit south of where ravender had it and it was a bit north of where the Cotswold archaeological trust had it it was bang in the middle but nevertheless what it actually shows is this was a division between this important town center block and this block that your Garden's in here which was probably an area of Posh housing still is you wouldn't expect anything less would you not at all back in trench four there's still no sign of a mosaic but the quality and number of the fines more than compensates oh look what I've got what have you got I've got a dice oh what look at that I don't know whether I can better it I've got a spoon hey hang on we can't cope with all this sort of stuff oh look at oh that's beautiful Barney this spoon's got a silvering on it does that make it a rich person I don't know I'm just wondering if there's anything on the bowl oh well look here on Mac I mean these things have inscriptions on and um good that look I mean a wood piece of wood like this that won't do it any arm away well I wouldn't have thought so no this looks like congealed sugar um that's just gonna whatever my glasses filled hey it's just gonna work with myself oh filled ah it's got silvering on the bowl as well there's certainly has yeah what sort of handle do you reckon that would have had me oh it has a long a very long pointed one long thing pointed so what's it for well um they were used in in you know Christian ceremonies as well as ordinary domestic stuff which is why I wanted to see what if there's anything on the bowl so I mean we're not that far away from our potential church no no I mean it's uh oh we've got a dice as well this is presumably bone isn't it yeah what it goes with them and we've already had the nice wooden plaque out yeah they've drilled a sort of that's what I did that dot and that ring is beautiful that's fantastic isn't it it's uh 20 to six yeah I think you know just keep going in the time we've got Barney I will this is amazing as everyone packs up and prepares to go home Barney makes one final Discovery we've got the floor good Lord yep so it is it's not a tessellated one I'm afraid I don't care what it is it is the floor that's what we wanted yeah well it's a great trench but where's bravanda's Mosaic well it must be somewhere in this area the problem is that his recording of where it was plus the drawing of the 19th century map depicting his information means that we're in the right area but obviously not bang on the spot probably two or three meters away somewhere but there could be an extension of the Mosaic under that trench anyway oh I think so because that's undisturbed archeology that we've got there so we've no idea what's underneath it but bravanda's Mosaic is just in this surrounding area I think it's two or three meters away from where we are there and given time team I know exactly where it'll be absolutely it's under here isn't it do you want to go no no no no you carry on I think we'll leave it to somebody else so our picture of Roman Chester Street is complete with the missing Road found in the garden of number 50 evidence of shops and buildings under Saint Michael's field a possible early Christian Church in The Furs and best of all a high status house in number 56 complete with time team's first ever mosaic it's the end of a fantastic three days at Chester Street we've found over 70 Roman coins in this Garden Alone plus hundreds and hundreds of pieces of pottery and a wealth of beautiful small finds including the brooch and the spoon and the dice but anyone who really loves archeology is going to be envious of our time team family who've got a mosaic at the bottom of their Garden

Channel: Odyssey - Ancient History Documentaries

Views: 418,759

Keywords: Roman Britain exploration, Roman Empire, Roman discoveries, Time Team discoveries, ancient past, ancient relics, ancient world, archaeological expedition, archaeological exploration, educational documentaries, historical discovery, historical investigation, historical preservation, historical society, history buffs, history documentaries, lost worlds exploration, roman history

Id: 3KZOZM3kGuI

Length: 50min 4sec (3004 seconds)

Published: Fri Feb 03 2023