Today saw The PAST team surveying a new permission (codenamed GE) on a section of land that apears to have some form of human habitation there. Academics have checked out the site info and the conclusions vary from pits to a Stone Age settlement site.

The weather was superb with virtually no wind and plenty of spring sunshine. The ground conditions were just as good with the field surface being firm and as smooth as you could imagine and the crop just about germinating.

All three machines were fitted with the 13" x 11"  coils but set up as follows:
Déus #1; Fast standard, GB Tracking
Déus #2; GMP/Fast standard, GB Tracking
Déus #3; GMP/Fast standard, GB Tracking

From the start there was a huge amount of ferrous signals sounding through the wireless headsets. On top of that, there was a profusion of non-ferrous signals that almost amounted to a site contaminated with green waste. The only difference was that the signals resulted in large pieces of twisted foil mixed in with shredded cans and tin.

We used a tight search format to start with which we followed for the first two passes, taking in the entire width of the field. This strategy cut through what we thought may have been a settlement site. No evidence of a post Stone Age settlement was recovered leading the team to believe that it may be in fact prehistoric. This was the opinion of an archaeologist that I forwarded images of the site over two years ago.
Several buttons, pieces of lead, partefacts and coinage spanning the centuries were however successfully recovered reflecting sporadic losses.

Once it was realised that any possible settlement was perhaps prehistoric it was decided to adapt the survey pattern to suit our 'initial site survey plan'.
This usually takes the form of paralllel 15ft wide transects.
The first half of the survey resulted in three hammered coins, one Roman 'grot', a well preserved George III half penny, a spinle whorl and a small amount of pottery.
The second part of the survey saw a lot more modern tin and foil recovered which prompted us to move away from the village end of the field. 
It was basically our final attempt to ascertain the history that may have taken place in this 21 acre field; and in the final moments a signal was received that sounded 'positive' and read 65 on the meter with little fluctuation. The seven inch deep incision was probed with the pro-pointer and the signal was surprisingly in the sidewall of the hole at five inches. The 'signal' was carefully eased out and the subsequently fell into the initial hole. The edge of the object was visible in the small encasement of soil and as soon as it was 'released' it soon became clear that this wasn't another piece of foil.
A quick wipe and the beautiful gold quarter noble of Edward III was as bright as it was when struck in the mid fourteenth century!

We were all stunned by the find that was miraculoulsy found amongst all the modern debris that abounded the site.
We decided that this would a good time to see the landowner and so with that we shut down and headed for the farmhouse. We couldn't see the landowner so a quick 'phone call resulted in speaking to an answer machine! 

The next 'phone call was to a landowner that we have worked with over the past two years and very kindly allowed us to spend a couple of hours on one of our Roman sites ("TS1"). This site has been rolled but not seeded, as of yet. 

It wasn't long before the first Roman coin was recovered. Most coins on this site are usually classed as 'grots' but some of the coins that have been recovered in the past have been of a better quality. This was the case with one of the coins recovered being a follis of Constantine which was in superb condition. 17 Roman coins along with a denarius of ??????, a Roman key crafted in iron (a very rare find indeed), some superb worked flint blades with some very nice Roman rim sherds and a "token" Edward Ist hammered penny ending the day on a good note. Some great recoveries in a very short space of time reflects the quality of this site, affectionately known as "Toy Soldier One" or "TS1".

The images of all the finds from both sites can be seen here & here.

Well, it was the weather that dictated our survey area for today as all our other counties showed signs of rain. This was to avoid the "clagginess" encountered on the newly rolled and seeded fields.

So it was destination Cumbria today and on arrival we were met with the beautiful sight of the snow capped mountains of The English Lake District.

The main survey area today was a 14 acre winter barley field with the crop being quite short at 3". The soil was quite sandy with a few pebbles and some stray boulders every now and again.

The machines were set up as follows:
Déus #1; 13" x 11" coil, "Fast", Full Tones, Disc 1, GB "Tracking", Sens 90, Iron Vol 0, Reactivity 3, Audio 4, Notch 00-00.
Déus #2; 13" x 11" coil, GMP standard, GB "Tracking".
Déus #3; 9" coil (for the first hour) then 13" x 11" coil, "Fast" standard, GB "Tracking".

As per usual, most finds were in the 0" to 5" depth zone with a few coming in at ridiculous depths! 
The first find was a dupondius by Rob and the second find was the first denarius for Steve's brand new Déus. The denarius of Septimius Severus surley was a great coin to christen Steve's new machine.
More dupondius' and sestertius' were to follow.

It was at this point that the same team member who "moaned" last week about not finding any Roman coins and then found an Early BA arrowhead straight afterwards, did exactly the same thing this week. Only this time it was a gold nugget in its raw state, still trapped in the quartz from when it was formed.
The signal came in at 62 and sounded to be a "buzzy" mid-tone using the Full Tones setting. A five inch incision was all that was needed to unearth what may prove to be something that ranks as the second rarest find of my detecting life!
At first glance it looked to be a piece of lead of which I thought was slightly odd as the signal should have read higher; in the 70's plus.
As always, lead deserves a closer look as it can sometimes throw up a few surprises, as indeed this "lead" did! A quick brush-off revealed what I thought to be a gold colouring to parts of the "lead". In disbelief I called Steve over to double check so that he could either discount it or confirm that it was a find of a lifetime. Steves analysis was the latter. On reflection, I think Steve and Rob were more excited than I was! Even on the way home on the M6, I was still a little numbed by it all.

A remarkable fact was that Rob managed to recover most of the 10 dupondius/sestertius' found on the day. I think he must have had a large Roman coin magnet attached to his machine!
I managed to redress the balance (slightly) by finding a dupondius and a couple of small Roman to add to the days recoveries.
A small amount of Roman and medieval pottery was recovered too.
Four hammered coins dating from Edward Ist penny to a base penny of Edward VI were also recovered.

The images from todays survey can be seen here.

What a gorgeous day to survey in the beautiful British countryside!

We had a man missing today, along with his brand new Déus! However we promised that we'd do our utmost best to make up the defecit.
On arrival the skylarks, yellowhammers and chaffinches were singing for joy. 

The machines were set as Déus #1: "Fast", Discrim at 1, "Tracking" and Déus #2: GMP, 18 khz, "Tracking". Both machines had the 13" x 11" coils to start with. Déus #2 swithched to the 9" coil after a slight power issue.

Again we trialled the live Twitter feed which our man "at home" enjoyed as he was kept up to date with pictures of the finds as they were recovered.

The ground was very firm with newly seeded winter wheat with a high level of ferrous contamination. The auto GB hovered around the 75 area with the occaisional move to 85 on more mineralised ground.
This section of the field was a lot quieter than the first section with regards to recovered items.

The first item to be recovered was a voided long cross cut-half. Lots of lead and buttons were soon added to the finds pouch punctuated mainly by medieval mounts and strapends. A few Roman items also surfaced with a C1st fibula and a few of Roman "grots".

Back to the medieval period with a three-pence of Elizabeth Ist dated to 1569 that was in quite good condition. A token dating to 1666 was recovered from the field surface that was also in very good condition considering.
By coincidence we mentioned that we'd not found any decorated spindle whorls for a while and that it was strange we hadn't found one on the particular field we were going to survey. Low and behold we recovered TWO!! One in rectangular section and the other was a bi-conical or "UFO" styled whorl.

In the distance I saw what I thought was a hedgehog, on closer inspection it was a rat!! As you can see from the picture it was quite old and not very well at all......

After lunch we moved to the next section of the field but this was even quieter than the previous one with regards to finds and ferrous signals.
The first sections of the field must have been a tipping ground or settlement due to the amount of small ferrous items, medieval artefact fragments and coinage.

We decided to call it a day and go and have a chat with the landowner.
There was no sign of him at the farm but we chatted to his daughter-in-law about their recent holiday. With that, the landowner turned up with his wife and said that they'd gone looking for us to see how we were getting on!!
Previously he told me he'd been ratting on the farm and encountered 90 rats... we showed him our rat photo... :D
He also said that the "Celtic" field and the "Roman/medieval" fields we were interested in had now been rolled and seeded so were nice and flat.

After 15 minutes or so of very pleasant chat we left to go and see another landowner that I tried to contact in January 2014. We met his son who explained that he was out spraying the crop. He very kindly gave me his mobile number and I said I'd ring him soon.
On leaving the farm we had a fantastic view of a barn owl that was hunting along the hedgerow in brilliant sunshine. As most of you may know, seeing a barn owl in an afternoon is quite special. This sometimes happens later on in the breeding season when they have a large brood and the weather has been too bad for successful hunting.

The finds for todays survey can be seen here.

It was a lovely start to the day weatherwise with the sun shining but tempered with a brisk south-westerly breeze.
Today we are heading for our permission codenamed "MC". The codes derive from the name of the field that the archaeology was first discovered.
All the recent outings can be seen here displaying the date and code for each event.

On arrival at "MC" we were met with several "March" hares boxing and frolicking in the fields. There were at least four pairs boxing in the 80 acre field that we'd decided to start our survey in.
We were in this particular field in November last year and again earlier this year which produced some lovely finds which can be seen here.

Today was slightly different to previous outings as there was a new addition to the teams' machine lineup...... a brand new XP Déus V3.2 and 9 inch coil.

The three machines were set up as follows; 
Déus #1: (13" x 11" coil), Fast Mode, Tracking, Full Tones, Discrimination at 1, Déus #2 (13" x 11" coil") & #3 (9" coil): GMP standard, 18khz, Tracking.

Another difference today was that we began trials of tweeting our progress live! We had two Twitter feeds on the go with live updates and photos of the finds in situ.
Our second phase of live feeds will continue on our next outing on Tuesday 10th March. You can follow the finds as they appear by following and using these two links:  @Britains_PAST and @Find_the_PAST. 

The first signal, and tweet of the day, was a superb example of a denarius of Septimius Severus that was sitting on the field surface. This was photographed as it was found and was the first of many surface finds to be recovered on the day.



After the lunch break we returned to the machines that were standing there on guard duty at the start point of the next transect. One of the team members at this point let his disappoinment be known of the fact that he'd not found a Roman coin yet! Two seconds later his voice of discontent turned to a voice of utter amazement..... a barbed and tanged Early Bronze Age arrowhead was sat there on the field surface in front of the standing detector! This is the second BA arrowhead to be recovered from this field.

What a start to the second half of the day! 
After the recovery of more Roman artefacts and coins and the surprise of three hammered coins we decided to have a look at a newly seeded field nearby. 
We were taken aback to see that it had been re-ploughed! The surface was ridged but fairly level. A Roman 'grot' and the foot of a medieval skillet leg were recovered but we elected to return when it had been rolled and seeded so the team left after half an hour and headed for our final section of the day.

The last hour was spent on a newly seeded winter wheat field that we visited on the 15th Feb (Images) and recovered a mix of Roman and medieval items, one being a sceat dating to c.710 AD.
A Roman fibula attachment and more medieval artefacts were uncovered including a tiny superb farthing of Henry VI.

We could see that the landowner was busy rolling and seeding the field across from us. We called at the farmhouse but everyone must have been busy so we left and I promised the team I would ring asap to let them know we were returning on Tuesday.
Whilst on the 'phone I asked what was being seeded? "Spring barley" was the answer. The next question was could we survey that area? "No problem whatsoever" was the reply. This gives us some great options as the area with the newly seeded spring barley has produced Celtic artefacts, a Scottish hammered coin and a Saxon zoomorphic buckle last March (images)

The images of all the recovered finds will be linked in the next few days as there may be more images to add as we are revisiting tomorrow. These will be uploaded to Flickr as normal, probably on Wednesday or Thursday this week.

After a day on pasture last weekend at our latest permission in The English Lake District, it was back to the more familiar territory of surveying rolled and seeded arable land.

We arrived at the newly seeded 160 acre field of which had a much smoother texture to the terrain than when we encountered it last November. 
The sun was shining but the wind was very strong. The plus point with the breeze was that it dried out the newly drilled surface brilliantly!
We layered up and tuned the machines to the sound of the Yellowhammer, my first heard this year, and the territorial song of the Skylark.
The machines were set up as last week with the 13" x 11" coils being fitted.
This permission has a very wide range of history and the area we were going to survey has predominantly Celtic and Roman history there. A Roman trackway runs through a number of fields here.
The actual Roman road could be quite easily seen as a dark band running across the field.
We'd just started the survey when the landowner pulled up alongside us in the next field and asked how we were. After a brief exchange we carried on with the task in hand. 
It was quite a while before anything of note was recovered which was in contrast to the last visit with a stunning Roman umbonate brooch complete with pin being the very first signal!
One of the first "good" signals on this day however was a small Roman bronze unit in a fairly good condition. This was quite shallow (as usual) at three inches and gave a crisp signal with a reading of 68 on the readout.

A few more Roman bronzes and a small headstud type fibula, complete with pin, came to the surface.
We were surprised at the low level of non-ferrous signals so we decided to have an early lunch and decide our next course of action.

Having refuelled we drove to a neighbouring field which has 80 acres of winter wheat growing there and was still quite short.
The first signal at this location was a nice annular brooch with its fragile pin still attached! 
The ferrous signals were very high with "hot rocks" dotted around the landscape. A couple more Roman grots were found and more Roman pottery with a few sherds of C12th to C14th pottery also making a show.
With the field being quite large we decided to have a look at some areas we had never surveyed. A lovely barbed and tanged flint arrowhead dating to the Early Bronze Age period was recovered from the field surface.

An incomplete early La Téne II type brooch was recovered dating between the C2nd - C1st BC. Some medieval artefacts were also located including two dress fasteners.
In all we recovered 12 Roman coins, 3 brooches, a Roman needle, a fragment of a Celtic button and loop fastener, 2 medieval dress hooks and 4 other unidentified Celtic/RB artefacts. Several pieces of pottery dating from Romano-British to medieval were also recovered along with worked flint pieces including the fabulous arrowhead!

We could see in the distance that the rain was well on its way and it finally arrived so we made the descision to quit while we were relatively dry.

Images of the finds recovered can be seen here.