In my previous column (CA 370), I examined Yorkshire’s prehistoric archaeology. This month, I am moving forward chronologically to explore the Roman, Viking and Anglo-Saxon, late medieval, and modern archaeology of this region’s four counties. This is ground that I have covered in part before, in reviews of CA’s coverage of Viking Jorvik (CA 341, August 2018) and medieval Wharram Percy (CA 340, July 2018), but there are many other treasures to be found across the counties too.
Dug in deep in Roman Britain
Examining CA’s coverage of Roman Yorkshire over the years is the simplest of tasks: one begins at the beginning, with CA 1 (March 1967), which featured Rudston Roman Villa in the East Riding, between Driffield and Bridlington.
The villa, noted for its mosaics (now in the Hull and East Riding Museum), was first excavated in 1839, re-excavated in the 1930s, and re-excavated again in the 1960s-1970s, when CA visited. At that time, the focus was on the excavation of a huge well, 99ft deep and varying in width between 9ft at the top and 6ft at the bottom. The health- and-safety implications of excavating such a feature bring me out in a cold sweat, and in the modern day would most likely not be allowed, so this is an early indication of the literal and metaphorical depths that archaeologists in Yorkshire will reach in search of the past.
Archaeology as immersive historical simulation