For me, a dominant aspect of the first year of each of the last three SMCs at Vindolanda is a jumble of stones everywhere you look. This reflects a combination of at least three different processes.
First, the site was most likely unoccupied for roughly a millennium until farming resumed in the area in the 17th Century, allowing plenty of time for the collapse of most buildings (but not all – the bathhouse roof remained intact into at least the middle of the 18th century). Second, many of the best remaining stones were pilfered by these returning farmers to build houses and field boundaries, leaving behind a scatter of rejects due to either their small size or irregular shape. Third, all remaining stones within reach of the plough blade were knocked about during a couple of hundred years of farming. No wonder then, that once the turf is peeled back a daunting morass of stone greets the eye.
Even after intrepid volunteers and their supervisors have begun to make sense of this jumble, the Romans are wont to make the job more difficult by repeatedly rearranging buildings and erecting new ones.
Another dry, warm day saw Gary and I (later joined by Julian from the eight-strong, Saxion University student crew) take our rectangle down a further six inches or so. In my half this revealed a darker surface of soil but still interspersed with mostly small stones; on Gary’s, larger stones were more in evidence but not yet forming any obvious structure (I forgot to get a full-trench view that includes his side).
I had better luck with further pursuit of the 3rd century barrack wall that forms the eastern boundary of our section, but not in the way I expected. The four new stones I identified yesterday turned out to have no siblings, but the opposite face (ie: on the eastern side) proved to have another, lower course formed by at least three more stones (below). A jumble of larger, closely packed stones appeared at the northern end of this wall; proper understanding of their function will probably require us to go significantly deeper.
Finds were few, perhaps a few dozen pottery sherds, a nice lump of slag and half a dozen nails; but in the same 59 context in an adjacent area Carey had a substantial piece of mortarium that I showed off to several school groups (below). The last day before the welcome weekend break looks to be dry again, so I’m hoping we can finish on a high note and lowering the surface again tomorrow will provide some answers,
Digging Vindolanda 