Saturday, June 23, 2012

Day 2: Sunday 17th

Sunday was not a rest day for the archaeology team! We were all up bright and early with our trowels in hand and eager to start the quest to discover the remains of Kildonan’s original monastery. 

The team was divided into four groups, each with a different task. Team one was tasked with establishing test trenches against the north wall of the existing monastery to investigate the foundations. Team two was in charge of putting in test trenches at various points of interest around the site based on geophysical data. The third team was in charge of investigating the boundary wall to understand the phases of construction and started several test trenches against the wall to examine it in more depth. Finally, the last team had the exceptionally important job of drawing up a scaled plan of the whole sight for the records, a mammoth job using just tape measures!

We had our very first local visitors including several interested sheep and cows and Diesel the dog who quickly became a team mascot. Two volunteers from the heritage volunteer internship who were a great helping hand also joined us!

The results of the initial investigation proved very exciting; the test trenches around the monastery recovered pieces of glass and small fragments of redistributed human bones (pictured left). The various test trenches around the sight found some pictish pottery and prehistoric debitage (waste material flakes from flint knapping). The investigation into the wall helped us understand the boundaries and the whole sight was neatly drawn up on the plan. 

Spirits were high with everyone enjoying the sunshine and the breathtaking views over the bay. 

Great work today team!

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