We paid a second visit of the new season to permission 'MC'.
This is the site where we found numerous brooches and parts thereof last week along with 10 Roman coins.
'MC' is a permission we acquired earlier this year at the back end of last season. 

Due to the inclement weather we decided to survey a large stubble field that has two Roman roads and two Roman tracks running adjacent to it and through it.
It was raining when we got there and that continued for the next two hours. 
We didn't know what to expect as we'd never surveyed this bit before so fingers were tightly crossed.
The two hours spent here saw lots of .303 cases and shotties surfacing. However, a nice Celtic or Roman artefact came to light, but no lead and not many small ferrous items for that matter were detected. There was no pottery either so the prospect of finding much more in the way of Roman or even medieval items was quite low.

Seeing that the rain had eased we decided to look at the field we were in last week. On the way there we bumped into the landowner and he said the photographs from last week were great.
We started off from where we left off last week with lots of small ferrous signals registering on the machines from the off.
The Déus' were set up in the usual standard GMP mode, 13" x 11" coils and 'Tracking' for one machine and manual GB for the other.

The field surface wasn't too bad although a little claggy with frequent stops to clear the Muck Boots of the excess mud accumulated. Lots of pottery was again retrieved and Roman coins came up along the way. Altogether, 18 coins were found, all within 4 inches of the field surface. Two of these are denarii. Some of the lead items came up at 12 inches in depth. 
Near to the end of the survey the light levels were quite low and so the Déus backlight was switched to "On". This was the signal to return to the support vehicle.

Under torchlight we removed the outer gear with what seemed half the field attached to the boots! We set off down the track alongside the field and the headlights picked out a sharp left turn. We rolled downhill to the gap in the hedgerow. The expected continuation of the track didn't materialise..... so we came to a stop and thought we'd turn around... WRONG! There was nowhere to turn so we thought we'd just reverse the vehicle exactly the way we'd come...wrong again. In 4 wheel drive and Lo-gear it still wouldn't move!! Steve and I got out and decided we'd push the two and a half tonnes of vehicle mass up the gradient that we'd come down.
By some miracle, it started to reverse with all wheels slipping and sliding! We must have gained super human strength due to the embarrassing thought of having to ring the landowner to tow us out!
Eventually we got to where we turned and left the field the way we came in.
We managed to catch a fox crossing our path and trotting off over the field we'd just surveyed.

The pictures, as usual, can be seen here.

After the excitement of the last two weeks recovering medieval items it was the turn of the Romans this weekend!

After leaving it for as long as possible due to the inclement weather, a call was made to the landowner of permission 'MC' to get his verdict on the field conditions.
Mrs Landowner answered the 'phone and said that they'd had torrential rain the day before. She said that it should be ok to survey the field in question.

This field is quite a large one and it's one we haven't had many dealings with. The first time was a 10 minute reccy before the rain won. The second time was when it was still in stubble so we thought it a good time to have a proper go. Wrong!!!...... I could see the top of a tractor that was in the same field but in a dip and it was moving. Minutes later it appeared with a huge plough set-up following it!!! We bravely moved along ahead of the machine in the hope we could beat it but we couldn't. We decided to leave before we were ploughed in with the history there.

Here's a picture of the field at 'MC' with Steve modelling for us.
This time, there are 4 gold staters hidden in the image :)
For a larger picture to make it easier click here.

We got there and it looked ok from the support vehicle. On closer inspection it didn't look quite as salubrious as we first thought. It was quite rough with tracks of smoother areas about 3 to 4ft wide. It had NOT been seeded!

The first signal was a superb Roman Umbonate type brooch complete with its pin.
Moments later the second signal was a Roman nail cleaner. 
Although the signs were good we decided to postpone the survey of this field due to the conditions.

We drove to the farm and explained the situation to the landowner and asked if we could survey the field next door to the one we came out of? "No problem.... help yourselves". Back into the 4x4 and back down the hugely pitted (and flooded) track to the newly seeded field next door.
This again is a very large field and one we surveyed in March this year, again when it was seeded.

The first pass down the field resulted in all sorts of items being recovered with a "Roman" feel to them. The second pass saw more of the same being recovered.
It was the third pass that things started hotting up. A superb trumpet fibula complete with pin was recovered from 3 inches. Literally 3ft further along was a second fantastic trumpet fibula, again complete with its pin! It was also at this position that a piece of pottery was seen on the surface. We'd already found small pieces of samian ware in both fields and this was a much larger piece. On closer inspection the awesomeness of it became clear..... it was a section of a high status dish with superb detail still visible. This could be the site of a shrine or even part of a villa as a denarius was recovered from here last March. 
We were all gobsmacked at all three finds coming up from such a small area. Further along the field yet another Umbonate brooch was recovered!
Three more runs and the light began to fade......it's the nearest we've ever been to nighthawking!!!

Now, it's a case of surveying the rest of the field next week and perhaps having a look at another huge field that is in stubble at the moment. There's a scheduled monument in the corner of this one but we've never been in this field before.

As usual, you can see the photos of the finds here.

Well, at least the weather started off better than last week at the same site!
We arrived at permission 'BH' for the third instalment of surveys at this brand new farm.

The stubble field in the foreground is the one we were going to survey first.
There are three staters hidden in this picture . You may have to enlarge it to cheat :) A link to the bigger picture can be seen here.

The field to the left is the one where the 6 hammered were recovered last week. The field in front of the trees belongs to another landowner and this may have an unofficial market site there as trade weights and early hammered coinage have been recovered here.

Anyway, we began the survey with the Deus' set up with the large coils and GMP mode in standard. Rob had GB set on 'Tracking' whilst I set it to 'Manual'.
The only diffrence is that I tried the 5 Tone setting. This was really weird compared to the 3 Tone I'm used to. I alternated between the 3 & 5 tone settings.

The first artifact to be recovered appears to be a Viking or Saxon wrist clasp fragment. A few Georgian coins were also found with a pipe tamper emerging too. In all, a very quiet field with no "background" noise or pottery showing except for one piece of C14th pot shard.

We then moved on to field No.2 which was seeded with winter wheat. This was covered in Victorian night soil tippings and was almost as noisy as a green waste field! We surveyed it for half an hour or so and then gave up as there were too many modern items coming up.

We decided to finish off in the stubble field we part-surveyed last week.
The first signal was a cracking early C17th (1611 AD) lead document seal in superb condition. The next signal was a lovely hammered halfgroat of James 1st with another small unidentified hammered to follow.
Eight hammered coins dating between Elizabeth 1st and Charles 1st have now been recovered here.
This field is still in stubble at the moment and will be ploughed just after Christmas which will give us chance to have a look at other permissions that are still awaiting survey.

The link to all the pictures from Sundays dig can be found here.

Next week we are off to a RB settlement that has been deep ploughed for the potato crop that was in there this season. The landowner has said that the field is now flat and will be seeded by the time we get there. 
Lets hope that the weather is dry!

We headed off towards our permission codenamed 'BH' to finish off the survey we started last week after our very first visit there. The hope was that it would be dry enough to venture onto the 40 acre OSR field and start where we left off to cover the remaining 23 acres or so.

On arrival it was raining so we decided to swap to a 27 acre field that is in wheat stubble at the moment as a damage limitation exercise.
We sat in the support vehicle for 30 minutes before we decided to brave it.
When we got out It actually rained harder as we tried to adorn the Gore Tex gear!

The Déus' were set up in the usual GMP 'standard' modes using "Tracking" and the big coils to enable maximum coverage. This was going to be a "speed reccy" to cover the 27 acres in the day.
We decided to use transects 15ft apart to ensure that we covered most, if not all of the field. This would of course mean that a large percentage of the survey area would be missed.

Within 10 minutes we had the first two hammered coins. A third hammered soon followed as we moved north. These coins were within 2 inches of the surface. In contrast, the medieval trade weights were at a depth of 12 inches and gave out deafening signals!
In all, six hammered coins and quite a few pre-decimal coins were recovered. A large quantity of C14th pottery was also recovered with a mix of post medieval pottery too.
A lot of unidentified metallic objects emerged as well the two trade weights with one showing some form of design. Medieval floor tiles were also amongst the fabric recovered.

Considering that the field was an unknown quantity, it revealed that there was quite a lot of human activity there, covering a period of medieval and post medieval presence.
Initial thoughts are that a Tudor building stood near there of some form. 
No evidence of the Roman period was seen, although the Romans were in the field next door!

The stall has now been set for a return visit when the field is ploughed and rolled either later this year or in early 2015.

Now, the question is where to survey next week?
I emailed a landowner I hadn't contacted in 18 months as we've been so busy with the current projects. This farm has a Roman villa in situ hence the interest in this permission. The landowner said she'd love to speak to me about the prospect of a future survey there.

For the link to the images of Sundays outing please click here.