Exploring the legacy of Ethelburga – a community project focused on the Anglo-Saxon heritage of Lyminge, a village in the Elham Valley in East Kent.
The path to the burial site On a beautiful warm afternoon, with the cow parsley in full flower, the villagers who were disturbed during the archaeological excavation of Queen Ethelburga's church were again laid to rest. Readers of this blog will remember a few encounters with these villagers of the past. We excavated eight graves … Continue reading Laying our ancestors to rest
The trench in the New Churchyard east of the War Memorial continues to reveal new features, so we now have quite an array of pits and postholes. At the eastern end of the trench, we now have the foundation of a significant wall. We don't have anything dating this currently, but this could be associated … Continue reading Day 32 – More activity in the New Churchyard
Because of the bad weather over night, Day 29 was a wash-out so far as digging was concerned. We did however manage to get in our standard half day on Saturday, when we continued with excavating the burials in the chancel of the Anglo-Saxon church. At the moment, we have no reason to think these … Continue reading Day 30 – Round-up on a revelatory 5 weeks of digging
It was a very hot day on site on Tuesday. Progress is now necessarily slower because we are hand-digging everything, but also it is hard work in the heat. We are taking down the ground level east of the apse and have encountered burials that may well be early and associated with the Anglo-Saxon church. … Continue reading Day 14 – Questions around the porch
This is the view we have been waiting for. With the overlying path removed, we can now see the full extent of the chancel with its apsidal (curved) eastern end. The walls are not preserved to a great height, so we are very fortunate that they survive at all. We haven't got down to the … Continue reading Day 10 – The whole chancel apse is revealed
Nice though the brick path revealed yesterday appeared to be, on closer examination it was not in great shape. Many of the bricks were cracked and shattered, and clearly they had not done a good job although a lot of effort had gone into laying them. We believe that the bricks were laid in the … Continue reading Day 8 – The Anglo-Saxon church begins to take shape
At the start of our second week, it was good to see a steady flow of visitors to our viewing platform over the course of the day. We have continued machining off the tarmac paths and this surface has now largely been removed. By the Memorial Garden, there is no make-up under the path and … Continue reading Day 7 – Anglo-Saxon masonry is revealed
