Saturday, February 28, 2009

That horse's head again ...

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Another splendid addition to the team photo collection from Marion Barter, to whom thanks are due.  This shows the horse's head that was found in the baulk of F3351 part way through excavation, just before it was extricated from its resting place.  L to R: Phil Dixon adjusting the camera, Crickley Hill Man (still with some hair to my surprise), Mike Webb, ? and Dave Southwood. The later journey to the finds hut I posted here a few weeks ago. The work in progress on the digging of F3351 is here, here and here. The final cleaned up pit is here.  Now that I see Marion's photo, I have a vague recollection that the skull was poised so much on the edge of the baulk that it was in danger of falling out downwards before it had been photographed. I seem to remember briefly packing some stones against the side of the baulk to stop it collapsing, but I may have invented this.

Friday, February 27, 2009

Planning from 1985

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Fine example of a plan, perhaps one drawn by Dr Phillpotts himself, from his 1985 collection.  Features include "excavated trench" and "gully" as well as F5897, F6803, F6804, F6805, and F6869 and one or two others that can't be read even on large magnification.  The rest of the 1985 Phillpotts collection leads me to suspect that this is probably part of Julian Thompson's 'Slot City' cutting.

Thursday, February 26, 2009

Ullenwood: the kitchen sink

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How many cereal bowls, soup bowls, plates, mugs, knives forks and spoons did we all wash up in that sink over the years? And one can't quite see from this Michael Hesketh Roberts 1999 English Heritage NMR Cold War Project photo, but I rather think it may not even have been a double-bowl sink.  Looks as though a batch of pea soup has ended up on the floor ...

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

Planning perspective

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A picture of peaceful concentration, all her requirements within arm's reach, oblivious to the presence of the Chronicler and his camera, Ros quietly works up plans of the 1982 cuttings.  Is that a drum of scrumpy behind her?  Sadly it's probably soil samples ...

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Have Crickley Hill Man's early morning habits been rumbled?

Hula Hoop Woman writes: "Am I alone among the Crickley Hill Reunion blog readers to be concerned about Crickley Hill Man's nocturnal, or more exactly, early morning habits?  CHM's average time of posting appears to be around 6.20am in the morning.  On Saturday, 7th February he brought us news of 'CH85, high level conference' ( a picture of John and Julie Gale, with Julian Thomas on the tower)  at the improbable time of 6.03am. On Sunday, 8th February he appeared to have a bit of a lie in, and the post appeared at 6.32am, but back on Monday, February 9th he was back on the treadmill with a 6.20am blog.  Does Crickley Hill Man leap out of bed at the crack of dawn and dash off a blog while in his pyjamas?  Or does he luxuriate with his laptop in bed? Or perhaps he leads such a glamorous and late night life in Parson's Green that 6.03am in the morning is, in fact, for CHM still the evening before.  A nation needs to know."

CHM replies: alas I am undone! I was wondering how long it would take my readers to spot my apparently astonishing ability to blog at absurdly early hours, first thing in the morning.  Some answers to Joanne's questions: 

I am not an insomniac.  In fact I'm still seriously good at snoozing.

I have a desktop not a laptop, and no 3G card, so I cannot prop myself on the pillows and tap away. 

There are no pyjamas. 

I did stay up all night with some friends the other week for the first time since 1987, after a dinner party I was giving got a little out of hand, and it nearly finished me off.  Also at that point the narrative would have been none too coherent: trust me.

The truth is that I am usually either asleep or in the bath at the moment of posting.  

How is this miracle achieved? I'm going to have to fess up, I fear: the clever people at Google who developed the Blogger software (courtesy of which the blog appears) have cunningly included amongst the posting options the facility for inputting a publication date and time in the future.  So I quite often put together a set of posts for the blog and then set their release dates for the forthcoming week or fortnight and usually for an early hour ... which is why I'm more than likely getting my beauty sleep as this slips out to an unsuspecting world at 22 minutes past 4.  Morning, all. 

Monday, February 23, 2009

The Bandstand in Montpelier Gardens

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I suspect from the style that this postcard of the bandstand in Montpelier Gardens in Cheltenham may be not far off 100 years old. Look at the long skirts of the women to the left. Notice also the archery targets.  Practising for Agincourt the remake ... But the gardens still have the same feel to them now and did when we were digging.  Long lazy Thursdays to contrast with all the hard work the rest of the week.

Sunday, February 22, 2009

Personality of the Year 1982

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The companion photo to last week's Mr Crickley shows Cecile at her moment of accolade as 'Personality of the Year' in 1982. Looking on, L to R, Carole Anderson, Dan Johnson, John Parry, Rhian Locke, Richard Savage, Cecile, Gail Boyle, Mike Taylor as compere, ?, Ambrosio, ?, and Angie.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

The 1983 to 1985 entry in the Transactions of BGAS

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Thank you to the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society for permission to reproduce extracts from their Transactions.  Here is Richard Savage reporting on three seasons at once. 

"Badgeworth/Coberley, Crickley Hill, Excavations 1983-1985. Work, directed by Dr P.W. Dixon, was concentrated on the western end of the Long Mound, where it was possible tod efine in the neolithic:(phase 1a) three small subcircular buildings without traces of occupation; (phase 1b) the causewayed enclosure, with two successive entrances here, a fenced pathway running in from the second and postholes which may represent buildings; (phase 1d) within new defences, probably of the mid-third millenium BC a platform built of rubble, fenced and approached from the east through a gate. It seems to have had a ritual purpose and to have been destroyed at the time of the attack on the settlement.  In phase 1e a kerb circle was built on the same spot, also having a ritual purpose, perhaps in the second millenium.  In the post-Roman period, phase 4, the area was strongly defended, with buildings perhaps related to those found in 1982 at the south-eastern end of the site."

Friday, February 20, 2009

Jim Irvine's 1979 portrait of Mike Taylor

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Having spotted this photo on the blog the other day, Jim has sent me "a front view of the Whale man", in same regalia, with Mike Webb and, I think, Anna Collinge, in the background. 

Thursday, February 19, 2009

Beautiful view of Crickley

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Another fine prospect from Peter Wakley's 1995 series for Natural England: this time Crickley from, I would imagine, Birdlip.  

Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Savage 1988, 4: The First Farmers




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My thanks to Richard Savage and the Crickley Hill Trust for permission to reproduce these abstracts from his 1988 booklet.  

"Neolithic Villagers c. 4000 to 2500 BC 

The first farming communities, "Neolithic" or "new Stone Age", whose cutting tools were stone and flint, reached Britain from the continent in the centuries about 4000 BC, bringing with them forerunners of plants and animals whose management still supports us now: wheat, barley, cattle, sheep, and pigs.  They also brought the manufacture of pottery, from this time the archaeologists most consistent guide to cultural change and affinity.  They represented a way of life, with origins in the Near East six millennia earlier or more, which totally changed man's relationship with his environment. 

A hunter-gatherer community will probably move with the seasons as its resources change, and over-exploits them at its peril.  Its numbers must always be small.  A farming community on the other hand must be static in the medium term to protect its growing crops and granaries, and well stored grain will remain in good condition for long enough to feed it through the year.  Domestic animals efficiently convert grass, foliage and other rough vegetable matter to human use.  In the longer term, while there is new land to farm, ill-management or even an increase in population can be tolerated. 

The methods of these first farmers, which were efficient, will have been at their most effective of the light well-drained soils, either of the uplands - as at Crickley - or of the parts of the valleys lying on sand or gravel.  In Britain they enjoyed for many centuries a climate warmer and drier than our own. 

[Illustration: Neolithic Axe E. J. P. Wilczynska]

 The earliest farmers left their traces in two parts of Crickley Hill.  On the shelf above the tip of the promontory to the west, they built at least four small insubstantial huts, from 2 m x 1m to 3 m x 2 m in size, with no finds or hearths associated with them at all.  It is possible that they were shelters for hunters or herdsman, but they may even have served a ritual purpose, perhaps as spirit houses or something similar.  Near the highest point of the hill, and overlooking the Vale, they left a series of pits in a long oval surrounding a space about 10 m by 4 m which had probably carried a small mound. The mound was removed and the pits filled in.  This structure, too, may have served some ritual purpose.

 About 3500 BC an area of about four acres at the highest point of the hill was enclosed with a bank built of stone quarried with antler picks from a line of shallow pits immediately outside it.  Along the inside edge of the bank was a wooden palisade, but the bank was less than half a metre high and palisade less than 2 m, so that the physical barrier was not very formidable.  It would have served at best to protect the defenders of the enclosures against arrows and other missile weapons, and to force attackers to break step at the ditch.  It may also have provided a moral or psychological boundary. 

[Illustration: The Neolithic ditch was quarried with antler picks R. Bryant] 

It seems likely - not yet quite certain - that this enclosure defended a settlement on the highest part of the hill, for the Neolithic finds of flint and pottery are most due densely clustered there.  A second bank and palisade, quarried from deeper ditches, was later added about 30 m inside it, to defend the same central area.  The original outer defence had at least five entrances, three to the east to the west where the tip of the promontory runs down to the Vale, and four of these were now matched by entrances through the inner defences.  Post holes suggest that all the entrances had wooden gates, and in through the southeastern entrants led a straight, fenced roadway with at least one rectangular wooden house beside it.  This was at the edge of the settlement, in the natural hollows some 50 m from the dense finds scatter which marks the centre of Neolithic occupation.  We can recognize this as a house because it stands in bedrock eroded to small particles in which large post holes were easily dug, and preserved by silt washing down into the hollow.  The bedrock at the centre of occupation is stone, and the soil deposits are very thin; the shapes of individual houses are here much harder to make out. 

[Illustration: Conjectural reconstruction of the first Neolithic village. The positions of the central houses are not yet known. C. Clark] 

The inner and outer defences were demolished, with deliberate burning, and their stone was used to refill the quarry pits.  The stone was later in part extracted and the banks were rebuilt.  This process was repeated a number of times, and finds of arrowheads suggest that several times the defences were attacked by bowmen.  The sequence of methodical destruction and rebuilding is hard to account for on strictly practical grounds, though it is common among sites of this kind, the "causewayed" or "interrupted-ditch" enclosures, of which over 40 are known in the Neolithic of south Britain.  It may have had a religious purpose.  We are dealing with people who invested in ritual structures and effort comparable with that which the Iron Age was to spend on fortifications, and were unlikely to have seen them as less practical.  For them the symbol and ritual provided indispensable indispensable part of the mechanism of everyday reality.  But there is no reason to believe that the arrow-attacks at Crickley were anything but serious and effective. 

[Illustration: Flint brought from 50km away was worked on the hill. P. Saxby]

 A kilometre to the north of Crickley Hill (on private ground) stands the Crippets long barrow.  It is the nearest of these Neolithic burial mounds, and although no certain evidence links it to the Crickley community, we may wonder whether some of their dead lie beneath it.  It is placed near the edge of the scarp and would be visible from the Vale for many miles, but for a modern planting of trees.  A kilometre to the south, at the Peak, Birdlip, trial excavation has shown another causewayed enclosure, and there are at least two scatters of Neolithic flint near the scarp edge between Crickley and Birdlip.  It is likely that Crickley forms part of a well-developed Neolithic landscape, whose long-distance trading links are made clear by its abundance of good flint, imported from no nearer than 50 km away to the east and southeast, and by its finds of polished stone axe-heads from much further afield. 

Before 2500 BC the site was abandoned.  The pits of the outer defence had been refilled, and not re-dug, sometime before; now the inner one, too, was left filled, and silted up.

 [Photograph: The Crippets long barrow. This stands on private ground]"

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

The bailing gang 1980

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The Phillpotts version of that very wet day in 1980 which seems to have captured more than one person's eye for posterity.  Last August I posted Bernie Dawson's shot of the same morning. The only person in this one that I can actually recognise is Arwel Barrett on the left side of the picture in the light blue sweatshirt.  Weather really looks miserable.

Monday, February 16, 2009

Captain Lash - instalment 2

"Think o' Babe; fer the land's sake, think o' Babe!" pleaded Cocky. It was an argument that had succeeded when others had failed; for of them all there was just one girl in the wide Pacific who had the power to leash the giant's reckless soul. Let him stray from the fold as he might, he hived back to Babe sooner or later; and there, after arguments, his welcome was assured.

"I'm always thinkin of her," grinned Lash. "You mightn't believe it, Cocky, but it's because I'm trying to find her equal I goes huntin' the way I do. Come along, then." Cocky was happy enough where he was. Put him in front of a frothing schooner or a newly-opened bottle and he wouldn't have owned the Empress of China as his aunt.  This was the atmosphere he loved; an atmosphere compounded of choking tobacco-smoke and liquor-fumes and exotic scents that dropped from the easy-mannered dancing girls.  There was the music of the raw jungle type that inflames men's passions; and presently Cocky would be mellowed and made massive by beer to the extent of performing a solo on his concertina and, perhaps, giving an exhibition dance, which would result in much free refreshment.  Furthermore the spotlight of public favour would be trained on Cocky; and his unfortunate inferiority complex would be lulled to rest.  Sheltered under the compelling shadow of Lash, Cocky seldom had a look-in: he was one of the crowd ambitioning to be a star.

Realizing the futility of argument, he followed his captain out into the boiling streets.  "There'll be trouble come of it; mark my words, there'll be trouble," he bewailed.

"If I can find it, yes," growled Lash. "How you does it, I can't tell - women fair go crazy if you so much as give 'em a once-over!" "It's a gift," said Lash simply; "same as music or po'try. First the wenches, then the likker, then the scrappin' - then I'm happy. Hi, pipe the lass across the street."

She was a handsome girl enough, with a winning smile. Her summer frock was dainty and to the eyes of Lash she showed a tempting morsel."

It's so bad.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Mr Crickley 1982 ...

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Richard Savage looks on bemused as Steve Vaughan presents Ambrosio with the inscribed limestone slab for 'Mr Crickley' 1982. Dr Ferris, I know, is rather startled to discover that the competition and vote was ever held again after the first time he suggested it (after a few too many slurps of GL cider and one ghost story too many on the barrow). L to R: Richard Savage, Rhian Locke, Ros Cleal, Cecile, Gail Boyle, Ambrosio, ?, Mike Taylor, Steve Vaughan, ?, Angie, Chris Phillpotts. Now what were the holes in the ceiling above the stage?

V A Wright: The Cotswolds, Crickley Hill, Birdlip, Gloucestershire

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Time for another of V A Wright's watercolours of Gloucestershire, this time of Crickley itself. Clearly one of the same series the first of which I posted here a few weeks ago. I think they're rather pretty and peaceful.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Going, going, nearly gone ...

Today's the last day of the eBay auction of a copy of "Crickley Hill: the Hillfort Defences" should you wish to acquire a copy for £20.00. So far no one has taken the bait ... and now the auction's ended and nobody did. But if you find this post and still want a copy let me know and I'll let Phil know as he has a secret squirrel store ...

Welcome to Kate Cole, Bess and Daisy

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A warm hello to Kate Cole (now Dumycz) who sends this picture of herself on the Hill.  "The dogs were my mother's - muts called Bess and Daisy."  She also writes: 

"I lived in Stroud - Richard [Savage] had put up posters for the dig in my local library where I saw one.  My first stint at Crickley was my school's work experience (and what an experience - don't think it'd be allowed these 'elf-and-safety conscious days!).  

If this was in 1980 (rather then the 1979 you have), then I rather fear that the 17 year old was me. I do recall Richard being there to greet myself and my parents and I was deposited in the very far end female dorm. [Dorm 4. Ed.] I was actually only 16 and very scared and nervous about what I'd let myself in for!  The next day the very first person I met was JP... I'm pretty sure that I must have been the person that Richard hid you all from.  I do remember shortly after being left in the dorm by my parents that Ros [Cleal] turned up and was in a very giggly mood and was looking at me in a strange way.  Now, 28 years later, I know why!!!  [So that I don't hear from Dr Cleal's solicitors, I'd like to make clear that she was not part of the collection of wet diggers in the back of the Land Rover. I expect she gave me a strange look too, doubtless well-merited! Ed.]

The regulars seemed to be so sophisticated to my 16 year old mind!  They all seemed to know what they were doing and were smooth operators with it!  I was terrified of some of the more seasoned regulars and the caustic remarks and nicknames!  I remember Training and I also remember the lad nicknamed Leatherhead (because that's where he came from).  But I loved it enough to do 3 seasons - the 1980 season I was only supposed to do one week but came back for the final two weeks.  I did the entire 1981 season and 2 weeks in 1982.  

I remember you dashing around on the dumper trucks. And weren't you the Elsan king too? [Yes, indeed - I held that honourable office, Kate: someone had to do it &  my mother was an operating theatre nurse during the war, so she brought me up to have a strong stomach! Ed.]  The Elsans were still there and in use in 1980 (and possibly 1981?).  I was working on the section that was the furthest away from anything. I recall that there was a choice of a 10-15 min there-and-back walk to the toilet block or a quick couple of minutes dash to the Elsans. I remember the supervisor's glares as I choose the former option... The smell of that wretched chemical - I can still recall it nearly 30 years later!  

On the poster you have of the sponsors is the name Major Birchall.  That must be the same major who (rather foolishly I always thought) invited the diggers to a summer party at his pad, which was an amazing Cotswold (manor?) house with extensive gardens.  He let us roam freely throughout his house and grounds - I can't remember if the food was up to much but the setting was amazing.  I remember trying to desperately scrub up and get myself clean and reasonably presentable for his party - not easy with those terrible showers! 

Amazing memories - some of the happiest times of my life." 

Welcome to the blog, Kate.

A charming portrait from the Barter studio ...

 
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Marion Barter has kindly sent me this rather fine picture of Frank Green and Chris Phillpotts during the 1979 season.  The flowers are an appropriate Valentine's Day touch. 

Friday, February 13, 2009

Dr Ferris has some questions ...

"Like Crickley Hill Man I was fascinated to see the latest C14 dates for various phases of the Hill's archaeological sequence. Where has Crickley Hill Man been all these years not to be intimately acquainted with the banana barrow? Leaving that aside, the long mound date is indeed very interesting. Am I right in thinking that there is a similar long mound at Maiden Castle? If so, and being a Romanist I am probably wrong about this anyway, is this of a broadly-similar date to the Crickley long mound? Perhaps Phil might be able to let us know.
 
Rather than Parry denims, legend and rumour has it that a pair of discarded green grollies in a soil sample might have been resposible for skewing previous carbon dates, as well as causing virulent panic in the lab during sample processing-whose could these have been?"

I'm not sure where I've been all these years, Iain.  But would someone please enlighten me about the banana barrow?  And what precisely are 'grollies'?  

Dr Ferris rejoins "In reply to Crickley Hill Man's query, 'grollies' are rather unsavoury underpants. It must be a midlands word I have picked up - heaven knows how. While I'd like to think that it was derived from 'Grolier' - 'relating to or denoting a decorative style of bookbinding using interlaced leather straps ... named after Jean Grolier de Servieres' - I rather doubt it." [I fear your doubts are well-founded - C-H-M.  And I still want to know about the banana barrow.]

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Mercy mission ...

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I think Dr Ferris has been overcome upon his return to Birmingham: 

"What with the present cold-snap and the icy fingers of the credit crunch around Britain's throat, I am growing increasingly nostalgic for the bygone scorchingly-hot summers on the hill routinely depicted in photos on Crickley Hill Man's blog. Sometimes, I recall, it was so hot out in the open at Crickley that the only way to cool down was to resort to being sprayed with water from the killasprays more usually utilised to enhance the colour of areas of burnt limestone for planning or photography. I wonder if by any chance Crickley Hill Man has a picture of one of these life-saving machines in action, preferably operated by one of the brothers or sisters of mercy who so regularly brought comfort to the dehydrated diggers wilting under the harsh Gloucestershire sun?"

Well, Iain, I'm happy to oblige ...

Ferris, I.M. reflects upon life and flint ...

"Even after two days of intensive regressive hypno-therapy I am unable to confirm that the photograph recently posted on Crickley Hill Man's blog is of Cutting N7. The N and O series of cuttings had quite complex geology/subsoil and there were many gulls cutting across them, as in your photograph, but whether your photo is of one of the cuttings I supervised I cannot say for certain, though I suspect it is. Speaking of the N and O series, I do recall cutting O1 extremely well, on which there was a leaf-shaped arrowhead chipping floor. We made every effort to recover even the tiniest trimming flakes and I remember Corky's determination in the finds hut that no flint debitage, however small, would escape proper washing, drying and marking. Dedication indeed. I wonder if the flint scatters plotted for O1 were ever drawn up ready for publication-perhaps Phil might be able to let us know.
 
The regressive hypno-therapy has, though, got me wondering why my mother locked me in that cupboard for so long, but I don't expect this will be of much interest to Crickley Hill Man and his dedicated readers."

Wednesday, February 11, 2009

Look behind you, Ros!

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Dr Ferris is staying at the Albergo Parker tonight and he spotted this rather fetching cameo in the Phillpotts archive.  We wonder why Dr Cleal is protectively clutching a full large jar of Nescafe in the middle of the night?  Why, too, does she appear utterly unaware that Crickley Hill Man is draped around her?  Crickley Hill Man, on the other hand, seems quite pleased with the state of affairs, as evidenced by the dreamy far-away look in his eyes.  Were it not for the fact that this is a 1980-effort from the Chronicler's camera one might be forgiven for thinking that someone had done a clever Photoshop job with two completely different pictures ... and then again, maybe it's a still from a rehearsal of 'Captain Lash'?

Phillpotts on Lash ...

Dr Phillpotts writes "I still have my copy of Captain Lash, which I think may have been the original one purchased from a Cheltenham bookstall. I also have another Frank Shaw, which I think I may have borrowed from Iain and never returned. Whoops! I did begin adapting Captain Lash for the stage, but only did part of it as a pilot. I have several hand-written copies of the script, which begins "Narrator: Chapter Eleven. Eruption!" I think we may have rehearsed it once, but it was never performed. As I recall you were to play Lash, and Ros was to play Cora."  The nation may be grateful that our plans were never carried out ...

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Dr Phillpotts's earliest published work ...



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Dr Phillpotts sends me a interesting note: "It is an account of my experiences of the 1972 season which I wrote for the newsletter of the Bristol Archaeological Research Group to which I belonged whilst still at school, and which met at Bristol Museum under the leadership of the renowned veteran archaeologist Leslie Grinsell. I suppose it might count as my first published piece about twelve years before my first serious piece on Agincourt."

Chris is referring to his 1984 piece in the English Historical Review "The French plan of battle during the Agincourt campaign" a copy which may be downloaded here.  Well worth a read.   But here's Dr Phillpotts on CH72:

"This summer I assisted in the fourth season of excavation at Crickley Hill, near Cheltenham.  This is an Iron Age promontory fort on the edge of the Cotswolds, containing a Neolithic causewayed camp.  In the first three seasons the Iron Age entrance had been excavated, revealing two periods of building, the second much more sophisticated, and an intermediate repair job built after the burning of the first entrance.  Excavation of the Neolithic area had uncovered causewayed ditches comparable to those at the Windmill Hill site.

At the peak period there were about 70 volunteers working on the site, though this dwindled to about 40 in the last days.  When I arrived I was dismayed to find that the accommodation was a disused civil defence barracks.  Even this was overcrowded, with one unfortunate sleeping under the sink.  Every morning we were taken to the site in a decrepit coach driven by the caretaker, a giant of Eastern European extraction, known as 'Lofty'.  It was difficult to grasp the significance of the work we were doing as we seemed so isolated.  Contacts with the outside world were restricted to Thursdays.  

It was, however, an important site.  We stripped nearly an acre of ground down to bedrock, making three vast cuttings.  This revealed the potholes of a street of Iron Age longhouses, tailing down to a small ones straddling a Neolithic ditch - nicknamed 'Fred's Place' and a later Iron Age roundhouse along with some smaller buildings.  These two sets of buildings were almost certainly associated with the two building periods of the entrance.  All this showed up extremely well on the air-photographs.  In the Neolithic area  we uncovered the longest piece of uninterrupted Neolithic ditch in Britain, and Neolithic house and several less readily identifiable features.  Finds were unspectacular but extremely plentiful.  A couple of flint axe heads and lots of arrowheads came up, but most of the finds were animal bones and fragments of daub and pot, some of a revolting coarse-gritted variety that crumbled when you tried to wash it.  it is planned to open up an even larger area next year, and several more seasons are planned.  This is an extremely interesting site which should continue to produce good results.  Chris Phillpotts"

Well, the Chronicler got over his first impressions of Ullenwood: I wonder who was sleeping under the sink?

Monday, February 9, 2009

Hula Hoop woman writes ...

Joanne Milroy writes: "A footnote on Hula Hoop frenzy - Crickley Hill Man asserts "no alcohol in evidence" in the picture.  The problem with Crickley Hill Man is that he has spent far too long in recent years living a gentrified life making mango clafoutis and enjoying the West London dinner party scene, quaffing from Habitat glasses.  [Well, fair enough, but North London and I get my glasses from Divertimenti - C-H-M.]   'Naughty' Nicky does have a drink in her hand, it just happens to be in a very serviceable plastic mug. I seem to recall Bacardi was her drink of choice.   
 
I happened to drive down the Leckhampton Road a couple of weeks ago.  I noticed that Threshers - scene of many a Crickley Hill booze run - is still going strong.  There has also been a new addition to the road - a rather insalubrious establishment called "Bargain Booze" - which presumably, if it had been there c.1980, would have been the off-licence of choice for hard up diggers. 
 
I was in Cheltenham for the funeral of my aunt, who was the reason why I came to Crickley in the first place.  I figured that I could always disappear off to her flat for a bath and a decent meal on a Thursday - if conditions proved primitive (which indeed they did). A disproportionate number of Crickely-ites seemed to have relatives in Cheltenham for the same reason."

From a freezing garret in Shrewsbury ...

... the Chronicler, Dr Phillpotts, his mittened fingers almost paralysed with cold, taps out a message on the keyboard: "I am glad to see that the Crickley blog continues to attract attention. Amongst the things I have noticed recently is your query about the Yellow Bus and the Hula Hoop Frenzy. You may not be aware that after the Yellow Bus became redundant in 1989(?), being not so much a white elephant as a yellow elephant, it was adopted by the supervisors' circle as a semi-illicit after-hours drinking den called the Yellow Elephant Club. In this it was the successor to Naughty Nicky's (a caravan in the car park) 1983-1985, and the Boudoir (a room filled with mattresses at the end of the Brick House) 1986-1988(?). Despite our efforts to promote the sleazy aspects of these establishments, proceedings were usually quite sedate, lapsing only occasionally into the orgiastic. The Hula Hoop Frenzy refers to one night in the Yellow Elephant Club when Joanne consumed a bottle of white wine and several packets of Hula Hoops in pretty short order before retiring. When Steve followed her a little while afterwards he found her lying on her back with her head poking out of the downhill end of their tent,  at which point Steve decided that what she really needed was a walk round the car park and a cup of strong black coffee. Of course it was the Hula Hoops that did it, hence the name. Why Jock should be putting his finger in Nicky's ear I don't know. It joins other such notably named events as the Dance of the One Cagoul and the Night of the Exploding Schoolgirl. "

I think I want to hear more about the Night of the Exploding Schoolgirl, please ...  did we ever tell her parents?

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Return of the Below Average White Band?

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From inspecting other contemporaneous photos in the Phillpotts collection, this picture of him and John Boden on the bridge at Shipton-on-Cherwell in 1984 was probably taken either by me or Penny Hart (then Griffiths).  Doubtless there was a gathering at Lower Farm Cottages in Thrupp, Oxon., where, in those days, lived Iain Ferris, Guy Grainger and John Boden.  Whether the photographer was me or Penny matters not: what we did not spot is that this would have been the perfect album cover - just the right atmosphere - for the latest chart-toppers from the Below Average White Band ... 

Experimental archaeology 5

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Back to the Phillpotts 1988 or 1989 experimental sequence.  Here, L to R, Terry Courtney, Nick Snashall, Ros Cleal, Arwel Barrett, ? and Phil Dixon watch intently to see whether the pots, which appear to have attained their finished state, are going to move of their own accord ...

Saturday, February 7, 2009

CH85: high level conference

 
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Sometimes it just helps to rise above it all and get a perspective from above.  Doing precisely that during the 1985 season, John and Julie Gale flanking Julian Thomas.  Fiona Wilkes recently drew my attention to the John Gale Appreciation Society. Is he, I wonder, the only former Crickley person to be so honoured on Facebook? For the benefit of those of my readers, such as Dr Ferris, of Amish tendency, Facebook is a social networking site ...  What on earth is going on in Bournemouth, I can hear him say?

Friday, February 6, 2009

All pretty laid back during CH 1981

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It all looks very relaxed in this picture from the 1981 Phillpotts collection: L to R, Katy, Maryam Ghaffari and John Boden.  What I can't work out is the purpose of the rows of white pegs stuck in the ground behind them.  On the left, the end view of the 'Yellow Peril', the exhibition hut sponsored by Westbury Homes. Front view posted here. The viewing platform in the background is no more.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

Taking a breather ...

 
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During a break by the huts and the barrow park, L to R: Mike Taylor, Bernie Dawson and Robert Roberts.  Mike and Robert are presumably wondering why, when they are wrapped up in hats, greatcoat and donkey jacket, Bernie opts for shorts and a t-shirt.  From the Phillpotts archive 1979.