Glendalough Field School 2014: Post Excavation

The final week of the Glendalough Field School 2014 saw the beginning of the post-excavation process. This edition will include the entire post-excavation week with all the practices which had been carried out.

The first day of post-excavation began with the writing up of the registers for all trenches. Finds, camera, drawing and sample registers were all typed up using Microsoft Excel. This left us with a clean digital format of our current registers which can be stored with little chance of being damaged. The digital registers would also allow for a proper checking of artefacts later in the post-excavation process.

With the help of the students the finds were carefully cleaned to reveal a better surface for storage and allow for further interpretation at a later date. From white ceramics to clay pipes all were delicately washed using a toothbrush and a basin of water. Once washed the bags of each set of finds were checked for accuracy. They were also sorted into material type and all finds per trench were eventually placed into their own bag. At the end of this process we had three large bags full of smaller categorized bags from each trench. 

This was far from the end of the post-excavation process however, with the weather conditions being as poor as they were during the second week it left the trench boxes wet and muddy. All of the trench boxes were cleaned through and dried when necessary. It was also double checked that the trench boxes contained all the necessary equipment for next years excavations. This process of cleaning and checking was also undertaken for each of the drawing boxes. 

Among the larger tasks in post-excavation there were many smaller tasks which needed doing. Cleaning of hard hats as well as scanning of drawings were all carried out throughout the week. While some students had come back on the Wednesday in order to help backfill trench 12 there were still students working in UCD in order to get everything finished to make the rest of the post-excavation process without the students as easy as possible. 

Being able to partake in the post-excavation process one becomes quite aware of all the background work which surrounds an excavation such as that at Glendalough. The immense quantity of work which came both before and after the excavation was quite overwhelming which allows us to now truly appreciate the people behind the excavations from start to finish.

Glendalough Field School 2014: Part 9

The second last day of the Field School was the last day for excavations. All equipment were taken to their respective trenches and work began immediately.

Trench 10 provided the students with a day of quick excavation, cleaning back and a demonstration of photography. Further investigation of the sondage on either sides of trench was carried out. With this being the final day of excavation, a large amount of work was done to try and reveal as much information as possible before all were forced to stop digging. A series of cleaning back allowed for the drawing of the final features. Towards the end of the day backfilling had started for trench 10. With three trenches to backfill, there would be a large rush to get things finished.

Trench 11 was cleaned back and prepared for post-ex photographs at the western end of the trench before the post-holes and stake-holes could be profiled. The eastern end underwent a similar process as larger post-holes were uncovered. Plans were taken of sections throughout the trench in order to give us a better understanding in post excavation of the final stages and development of the trench as time progressed. Similar to days previous, students were taken once again to learn how to fill out a context sheet.

By the morning Trench 12 appeared almost finished, with little information appearing anymore from the surface. The surface inside the trench contains numerous broken plough furrow soils, with some natural appearing running along with them. A section of a furrow has been taken to see how deep it ran. The results were quite fulfilling with a nice dipped feature, with very few changes to the shape throughout. The end of the day had some final plans drawn up for trench 12.

While the entire day was fast paced from start to finish, the main focus was getting plans constructed for all trenches. Final excavations allowed for better drawing and hence a better interpretation of features. 

By Emily Geoghegan

Brandon Walsh

Glendalough Field School 2014: Part 7

The second week has provided students and supervisors alike with a lot of excitement, which has been gradually increasing as we continue day by day. With this we had hopes to kick of Day 7 with a hefty amount of work in order to catch up from the rather disastrous day previous. We begin our daily report in trench 10!

Trench 10:
After a rather disastrous afternoon yesterday we began day 7 with high hopes for a dryer day of archaeology. Trench 10 throughout the day saw a nice amount of activity with the appearance of medieval pottery and flint. With the aims for the day being the identification of the natural these finds were a pleasant surprise. Excavations around the stones also went underway in an attempt to better reveal the possible feature a little bit more. A quick study of a new photo depicting the tea house shows the bank below to be less steep than what is currently present. This could indicate a possible steepening of the bank after the destruction of the tea house.

Trench 12:
With the general theme of this trench being confusion, it was not quite clear what had to be done in order to further understand what was going on. Possible linear agricultural features which run approximately north-west to south-east were excavated further which revealed the natural soil underneath. While it is unclear as to what these features are the dipped shape of the soil in cross section suggests possible plough furrows.

Trench 11:

The collection of large stones towards the eastern end of Trench 11 were removed today and led to the discovery of two post-holes and a potential pit. During the removal of the soil large pieces of burnt animal bone and charcoal were recovered. Just adjacent to the two post holes, it appears that the ditch highlighted in the geophysical survey has been discovered.  The western edge of the trench was cleaned back after yesterday’s rain and highlighted four possible features. Each feature was half sectioned and it appears that two of the four features are post-holes. In the afternoon trench 11 was visited by …… ? (We're unsure of the name of the company filming today and were hoping you'd be able to give us information on that - Thanks!)

In Focus: Palaeoenvironmental Survey

The Palaeoenvironmental survey takes place throughout the second week with students learning the fundamentals of auguring (coring) and how to assess samples. They began the morning by carrying all supplies to a suitable spot in a boggy area near the lower lake. The environmental survey was carried out to better understand the entire history of the Glendalough valley. With the two lakes having been joined at one period in time it is possible to see this through the changes in soil colour at different depths.

Three types of cores were used:
 - Small bore
 - Large bore
 - Russian corer

In the morning the small and large bore corers were used to demonstrate the different equipment used. However due to the open design it is not possible to take accurate samples from these pieces of equipment. For sampling the Russian corer was used. The design of the auger allows for easy sampling at all depths. Missile in shape, it consists of a body and 'fin' which when rotated in a clockwise or anti-clockwise opens and closes the chamber. Sampling revealed a loss in colour when in deeper depths of soil. The bed of an ice age lake is depicted by a metallic looking grey/silver soil while the upper levels show a dark brown soil with decayed wood or reeds.

The samples of the auguring survey were placed in a drain pipe and covered with cling film. They were labelled and given the top and bottom depth as well as the site code. They can then go back for analysis in the lab.

                                   By Emily Geoghegan

Brandon Walsh

Seminar series, lecture 1: Graffiti recording in the west wing of Kilmainham Gaol. "Reading" the revolutionary period?

Tonight kick started this year’s seminar series. We welcomed as our guest, Dr. Laura McAtackney of the UCD School of Social Justice. Her lecture tonight was based on her work in the West Wing of Dublin’s Kilmainham Gaol titled the ‘Kilmainham Graffiti Project’. The aim of her work was to systematically record and interpret the graffiti inside the West Wing of the prison.

Dr. McAtackney noted in her lecture that graffiti studies tend to borrow heavily from sociology but do not overtly engage with the materiality surrounding it. The views of graffiti, especially in a prison environment, its artist, tend to assume illegal or illicit activity.  

Her work focused on the activities of the women prisoners within the Gaol and the mark that they left (although, some graffiti were not definable by gender). Women during the revolutionary period were often written out of the historical narrative with the exception of Constance Markievicz. Women however, had a much more important role and impact during these times. Dr. McAtackney also acknowledged the post functional life of Kilmainham especially that of the East Wing and the restoration that went with it at the hands of the Restoration Society.

Her work progressed slowly due to numerous periods of white washing and that there could be no physical interaction with the graffiti. She used photography to capture the graffiti and experimented with different light levels to enhance incisions and surface drawing that may not have been visible in normal conditions.

She interpreted and compared her discoveries with numerous other external sources such as memoirs, letters, autographs, etc, to fully understand the history of the walls.
Dr. McAtackney’s lecture was quite captivating and she fully engaged with her audience and ended with a slide show of some her favourite pieces. Both the Department and Society look forward to the eventually publication of her work.

By Cian Corrigan

Our next seminar will take place on Thursday, September 26th and will address Early Mediaeval dress. Check the complete programme here.