31 August 2018

Beacon Ring hillfort excavations

We have just finished a season of fieldwork at Beacon Ring, a hillfort which has been owned by the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust since 2008. The hillfort is covered in trees, which were planted in 1953, and the purpose of our excavations - in part at least - was to try and see what (if any) damage the trees had caused to the underlying archaeology.


Trench 1. Overhead view, with Richard adding the final touches for the photograph. The dark layer at the base of the trench is the buried soil horizon.

We excavated six trenches looking at three areas: the rampart on the eastern side of the hillfort (Trench 1, shown above), the area in the unusually wide southern entrance (Trenches 2 and 3, shown below) and three trenches in the woods.

Excavations at Trench 1 began with a sense of anticipation, knowing that colleagues elsewhere had found structures (whether stone walls or timber revetments) in other hillfort ramparts. However the excavation revealed that the structure had been entirely built of material removed from the ditch, tipped in a series of layers and then consolidated. A buried soil layer beneath the rampart seems to represent the ground surface at the time the ditch was cut and the bank built. We have taken some samples from this, so hopefully these can be dated.

Trenches 2 and 3 in the southern entrance explored some features shown up in the geophysical survey, as well as trying to understand the relationship between the entrance and the later (medieval?) parish boundary bank that runs all the way through the hillfort. Apart from a small cut feature beneath the parish boundary these - admittedly very small - trenches were not very informative.



Another view from the 'pole cam', this time looking south-east over the southern entrance and towards Corndon and Stiperstones with Trenches 2 and 3 in the foreground. This time Neil is adjusting the scale.

Excavations in the woods (Trenches 4, 5 and 6) investigated the impact of two phases of forestry on the interior of the monument. The first plantation appears to have been in existence from the late-nineteenth century until the early 1930s. The second is the current one, planted in 1953 (and famously commemorating the coronation with the EIIR monogram picked out in redwoods). In all three trenches we were pleased to see that the roots were generally very shallow, running along the interface between the topsoil and the underlying clay.

The project was very generously funded by Cadw, and we had lots of help from a very merry band of volunteers. These included many 'regulars' and locals, but we were also pleased to have the support of Mark Spanjer and some of his students from Saxion University in the Netherlands.

Hopefully we will be able to secure funding to return next year and answer some of the questions that this year's project has inevitably raised.

More news as soon as we have finished the report!



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