Well, what a year 2020 has been, and what a disasterous start to our new season!

The last time we were out was the 27th September so we are hoping that the next opportunity will be 20th December. Even then, we aren't too sure where we'll end up!

Whatever happens, this looks like it will be our worst and shortest season to date. I'm sure we will do our very best to make up for the shortfall.

Look forward to reporting back before Christmas so stay safe!

We ventured out onto a new permission that looked to be great on paper.
The first pass on was on a field that probably dates mid to the late Iron Age.
The only find of note was part of a trumpet brooch that was corroded but identifiable. The plus-side was that the soil was fantasticacally sandy and so easy to dig!

We noted another field nearby that had a Romano-British site on it but again, we didin't find anything...no iron, lead or more importantly... no pottery!

We drove 35 minutes to a site that we'd covered since 2015 and a particular area that has been nighthawked for 20-years.
We still managed to recover at least 32 pieces of Romano-British pottery and at least 32 Roman coins.
A lovely terret ring came up and some pieces of the pottery were great! 

This weekend looks like a wash-out.

​Here's a link to the HD images..... Here

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Well this is a first, we're posting here without replicating the post on any metal-detecting forum.
​We arrived at the campsite with our borrowed caravan in half decent weather.
We met up with a chap that was going to survey one of our sites using a machine which measures resistivity so we may discover the extent of the second Roman villa we located in the area.
​This took the best part of two-days to complete ten-20mtr squares. 
The weather however was going to prove to be challenging at the least with the excavation being called off on two of the six days.

Whilst in the area, we called into a site that we first visited in 2014 and produced some of the best Medieval finds we've seen.
Unfortunately, the site is now waning as we only recovered a few artefacts.
This goes to show that finds will diminish over time to such a degree that unfortunately and sadly negates further visits.

We visited another site that produced a few RB items, but again, this has also seen better days. This site has been well searched by other detectorists and they have done an excellent job of it. So much so, we'll give it a miss in future.

Another site which looked promising appears to have an Iron Age fort there but nothing was found except a modern gold ring.

We also viisted a few areas around our dig site..... with mixed results.
​Denarii, hammered and various artefacts emerged whilst dodging the extremely wet weather which is unusual for this area.

A few weeks ago, we wrote to a landowner that may have a Roman villa on one of his fields. 
We called in on him a couple of weeks later and he said that the field wasn't his to which we said "it was!". We were there on his door-step for 15-minutes chatting about archaeology and trying to obtain a 'phone number!
We said we'd be back in the area in a couple of weeks' time to which he said he'd meet us at the field to see if it was indeed his.

Two-weeks later we arrived at one of his farms and the tenent said he was usually in the area on that day to collect his mail.
Sure enough we caught up with him collecting his post.
At first he was surprised to see us but he asked us to follow him to the field-in-question.
After about 2-miles, we eventually arrived at the field that we thought that there was a Roman villa situated. It was still in crop. The field WAS his!
The landowner invited us to "have a look" but we said we'd have to wait until the crop was harvested. He said he'd be cutting it as soon as it was dry enough.
The research shows that this site has great potential.

Meanwhile, the excavation at our farm site produced several RB walls that have been robbed-out in antiquity as well as other features that may have to be explored next year!

Here's a link to some of the images of the week.
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This is the beginning of our new season and our first venture out was to a brand-new permission.
The field we researched wasn't ready as it still has Spring Barley growing in it so we elected to go with the landowner’s choice of a field that had peas growing there. This is a strategy that we don't normally follow.

The weather was quite cool considering the temps were reaching 30C+ elsewhere. The ground was very hard in parts but there was fairly good surface visibility and the cropped pea foliage didn't give us a problem.

Due to the lack of finds, both metallic and non-metallic, we decided to use our "Zebra" method which would speed up the process and give us a quick and very accurate overview of the field.
Only 2 Roman coins were recovered, one; a mid-third century sestertius and the other; a nummus of Constantine I dating to 313 AD.
Not one sherd of Medieval or Roman pottery was seen even though there is a Saxon village nearby and a very large presence of Iron Age and Roman activity in the area.

At lunchtime we made the decision to cut it short and use the available time to meet up with the tenant farmer and try and get his mobile number.
We arrived at the farmhouse which was a very grand Georgian design and he came out to meet us. 
He was a little bewildered at first as he didn't know who we were, even after sending 2 emails saying we were coming to survey.
I also tried ringing 5-times.
Once he saw that we'd got permission from the landowner he was very amiable and extremely pleasant.
I said the biggest problem we have is finding out which land belongs to who to which he replied "You'll need to know that as we farm 2,000-acres".
He added that the next opportunity would be when the Spring Barley is harvested next month.

With that, he gave us his mobile number and we said we look forward to coming back next month.

On the way home we took a slight detour to call in to a landowner we'd written to recently. We couldn't find a contact number anywhere.
I called a company with the same surname in the same village and asked if they had a number for him. They replied "Good luck with that one, he's a law unto himself".
We pulled up outside a very large detached bungalow which had all the curtains shut. We ventured around the rear of the property to find a Land Rover there and all the curtains closed there too.
I said "does anyone live here?" but Rob gave the door a knock and after a couple of minutes the door opened.
It was the elusive guy we were after and it was almost like the scene from the Detectorists TV series when Lance and Andy knocked on the door of the farmer with the bomb in his field!

We chatted for well over 5-minutes and said we'd be in the area in two-weeks' time. Not bad considering he was making lunch!
He gave us his landline number and said he'd come to the field with us when we returned so as to check that the field we were after was his.
There's crop in there that's ready to harvest soon.

So, we saw 2 deer, found 2 Roman coins, found out that we may have access to two-thousand acres and secured 2 'phone numbers. I'm sure there's a theme here!

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After a very misty journey the day brightened up to become quite warm, a balmy 23C!

We'd visited this field 2 weeks ago and covered 3-acres which produced the expected Medieval coinage and pottery that we'd recovered in past visits.
We were quite excited about searching this field again as it had been ploughed since our last full visit about a year previously.

We had a further 5-acres to survey and we thought that this could be achieved according to the formula we use to estimate field coverage.

Now for the boring technical bit.
Three different coils were used; a 9" HF, a 13" standard coil and the 13" X35 using standard settings.
There appeared to be a problem with the X35 coil as it was difficult to keep it stable and there was a moment in time where a change to the 9" HF coil was contemplated.
A drop in sensitivity from 90 to 78 seemed to calm things down but some small finds may have been missed during the first hour or so trying to get used to the amount of noise coming from the headphones. In hindsight I now realise that "good" signals will have been missed. As an example, the X35 coil only detected 16% of the total hammered coin finds using our usual strict search technique, even after changing the sensitivity back to the factory setting of 90.

Anyway, back to more 'exciting' things such as finding the 16 hammered coins, 1 siliqua of Valentinian II, a Medieval buckle that may have had it's origins in France and lots of C13th to C14th pottery.
If the siliqua is Valentinian II, there's quite an interesting story behind him.

One of the coins was attributed to 'John the Blind' kindly identified by Allectus on the MDF forum.
A lovely Medieval ring came up as well as a couple of worked flints.
I'm sure there'll be a challenge trying to ID the coins recovered!

HD images of all the finds can be seen here.

This is only the 13th trip out since last August!
We decided to finish off a field we looked at a couple of weeks ago.
The field was drilled with oats and another crop to help replenish the soil structure.
Although some great finds have come from this field, we weren't hoping for too much from the northern section compared to the southern half.

Sure enough, it was hard going with virtually no pottery and only a few good signals. There were however lots of green waste signals which made it even harder work along with the warm sun, tempered with a cooling easterly breeze
​The first coin was a bent hammered short-cross penny followed by a denarius of Hadrian a dated to AD 134 - 138 and then a Saxon brooch fragment that may date to the C6th. An Iron Age toggle fastener and a couple of lead spindle whorls were also recovered.
​A surprise find was a 5-day old fawn!

Our second field is one where a local detectorist has spent hundreds of hours detecting there.
This field has almost certainly been a market site due to the many hammered coins that the local chap had found.
Our first-ever survey there resulted in 22 hammered coins and lots of Medieval pottery.
The conditions were perfect with only a small amount of what looked to be grass showing.

The latest 2-hour visit produced 5 hammered coins, a Saxon brooch fragment, a denarius of Antoninus Pius under Marcus Aurelius dated to AD 162 and some Medieval pottery. One of the pieces of pottery had finger impressions that were quite small. Perhaps a female or indeed, a child perhaps?
​The plough had certainly stirred things up as a clack valve was found. This shows that something that size can be missed!

Both 13" coils and 9" coils were used with standard settings except for the 9" coil using a mixture of 14kHz and 31kHz frequencies.
Again, most finds were located within the first 5 inches of the field surface.

High Definition images of the finds can be seen here.

Who'd have thought that something that was happening thousands of miles away in December/January would have such an effect on the rest of the world within 2 months.
The concern is that it's nowhere near over.

​Now that the lockdown has been eased slightly gave us the chance to visit one of our favourite permissions this  being our 12th outing since last August.
​We targetted 3 different fields with differing history and the weather was dry, cool and a little breezy.

The first field has just been drilled so was flat as a pancake with no crop showing.
This particular field has produced mainly Medieval artefacts with a small amount of Roman items.
We recovered lots of Medieval pottery including many jug handles, lots of Medieval buckle parts and 7 hammered coins. 2 Roman coins were also found. A lovely chalk spindle whorl was a superb and rare surface find, something you don't see often.

The next field has what we think is either a Roman shrine or some other religious feature. In the past we've recovered lots of bronze coinage and pottery from a very compact area. Today was no exception with 18 Roman coins and several sherds of Roman pottery, some being Samian Ware,  being found including the base of a Roman cheese press. The field was drilled with Spring wheat.

The third field is also mainly a Roman site with a disproportionate amount of denarii being recovered there including a hoard of denarii.
Oddly enough, and within seconds of entering the field, a Roman bronze coin emerged! A trumpet brooch and a denarius of Caracalla were found with a small amount of Samian Ware which is a feature of this field.
The Caracalla denarius was found to have a large and thick amount of corrosion which was successfully removed after careful cleaning.
A further 3 denarii were recovered in the same spot where the hoard of denarii was discovered. 2 of the denarii were legionaire coinage of Mark Anthony dating to 31-30 BC with the third denarius being that of Titus under Vespasian.
These will be added to the Treasure Case that is already running.
This field was seeded with oats.

In all, we recovered 147 fragments of Roman and Medieval pottery weighing in at 4227 grams!

As always, the settings were standard factory settings using 9 inch coils and virtually all of the finds were within 5-inches of the field surface. 

Of course, our search regime automatically results in the suggested social distancing advice.

​Images of the days finds can be seen here.
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We managed an 11th outing since last August with a visit to an old favourite which is mainly a Roman site.
There was plenty of rain and water about en-route to the site so had our fingers tightly crossed that the field wouldn't be claggy as it is impossible to detect if so.
This was the field we were on February 1st before we got kicked off due to a shoot going on later in the day.

The surface was a little damp when we got there but the wind and sun started drying it off quite well.
A slow start saw a few Roman coins emerging along with some Roman pottery.
In all, we recovered 38 Roman coins, a Celtic silver unit, a fragment of a Roman bangle, lots of Roman pottery, Medieval strapend fragments, part of a Roman fibula, a couple of Saxon-looking partifacts and a nice decorated spindle whorl.

One of the team had a coil voltage deficit so borrowed one of my coils.
Apart from having a well-maintained (tongue-in-cheek), highly efficient 11" X35 coil, he managed to up his Roman coin count by 5!

For a change, two of us used the 28khz setting on the HF coils specifically to winkle out any Celtic silver units.

HD images can be viewed here.

This will be our first time out this year and only the 10th time out this season.
We'd driven past this field last December to find it was drilled but a call to the landowner came with a warning from him that it would be "sticky". We know what this field is like when "sticky" and believe you me, it's murder as the soil sticks to everything. I said I'd call him when there'd been a dryer period.

After what we thought was a dry period, I messaged the landowner and he said he wasn't sure about the field conditions as he was skiing in France.
We took the chance and decided to give it a go.
​This would be our 16th visit over the years to this particular field which has produced several Roman coins of various denominations and dates, fibulae and lots of Roman pottery. We're certain that this was an important manufacturing site especially for brooches and jewellery. 
It has also given up a few hammered coins as well as Medieval partifacts too.

The ground conditions were perfect, rolled and drilled and we couldn't wait to find out if one of our best fields was going to come up trumps after 15 previous visits.
Sadly we could see that another person had been over the site but not many signs of digging. 

The first signal was a Roman minim with the second signal being half a  lovely Roman rope/cable type bracelet.
One of the pinpointers started playing up which held up the progress along the track allowing the the rest of the the team to get ahead by around 100 metres!
It wasn't long before 19 more Roman coins and Roman pottery were recovered. 

We managed 4 runs along the area of the field we'd targeted before having an early break for a bite to eat and a drink.
A truck passed us with what looked like a tally of shooters in the rear.
10 minutes later a 4-wheel drive buggy pulled up with the driver being a farmer we know. He asked what we were doing and if the landowner knew we were there. When I said we'd interrupted his skiing holiday he knew we had permission to be there. He said he must have forgotten that there was shoot on his land!
He asked if there was any other land we could look at so I asked if he had any? He said no. I said we knew landowners nearby and would try there.
He thanked us for our understanding and said we were more than welcome to return next week as the shooting season was at an end.

A quick "WhatsApp" to the landowner at permission number 2 and he said yes. This was a site where we'd found quite a few Roman coins and other bits. The field was drilled, however, the wind was now horrendous so we decided to have a try at another permission, site number 3.

We pulled up outside the Manor House and the landowner came out to see who it was. She recognised us, just as it was April 2016 since we were there last. Once she realised who we were she eagerly invited in for a cup of tea. We could see she had company so we said we'd pop back when we'd had a couple of hours on her field.

Again, the field was drilled and the soil was quite sandy, so perfect.
a couple of hammered coins emerged along with a few other artefacts.

We called in and enjoyed a great catch-up with our tea and biscuits.

HD images of the days' finds can be seen here.

Our last outing of the decade saw us visit two permissions in the same day.

The weather was good for a change although overcast and we were excited to venture on to a new field.
The start was very quiet except for iron signals and we surprised that the first find was a bronze South Ferriby stater. Of course, we thought that this was going to be a good field only to find that there were hardly any non-ferrous signals whatsoever. 
There can only two answers to this conundrum; there's either nothing there because of the lack human activity, or the field has been "battered to death" by detectorists previously.
After a couple of hours we decided to give up the ghost as this was certainly a barren area. It was ironic that the only half-decent find we recovered was the single stater.
We met the landowner on our way out and he confirmed that, indeed, the field had been "battered to death" by detectorists for years. Our suspicions were bang on.

We next visited a farm nearby that we ourselves had "battered" certain small areas. Sure enough, we almost suffered the same fate as the first farm that we had just left. 
​Because the area at the second farm has had so much ancient activity upon it, we  expected to find something, if not a lot.

The field was in stubble and we did manage to find a few artefacts which, on reflection, was very lucky as, again, as there were only a small amount of signals. The landowner advised us that the drilled fields were "sticky" and he was of course right!
We could see that the field had already been searched by relatives of the landowner and we know that they have had some fantastic finds that they have found here over the years.
We MUST organise a viewing of their finds as I know they will be superb!

We collected quite a few pieces of Roman pottery including Samian Ware.
Oddly, we also found 2 Medieval hammered coins on what is predominantly a Roman site, even more so when you consider that we only found 3 Roman coins! This particular area has produced several Roman coins, usually in double figures. Again, it just shows that eventually, the finds will dwindle to virtually nothing.

The finds that we did recover were quite nice, especially 3 knapped flint tools, 2 of them look like that they could be leaf blade arrowheads.

HD images of the days finds can be seen here.


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