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Day 2 began with a down pour and an ominous forecast, but steadily improved throughout the day to end in glorious sunshine.

After an introduction for our new volunteers and an update for those returning from last season progress continues in Trench A, where Liz and Linda continued cleaning operations ably assisted by the return of Simon from Season 1. The team have now exposed the enclosure wall in plan and defined the south-western end wall of the longhouse and as expected it does appear to abut the enclosure. A spread of rubble to its north-east suggests the south-western corner of the longhouse collapsed down slope and into the interior of the building. It was from amongst this rubble that yesterdays pottery was retrieved and it holds promise that a floor surface might be preserved beneath this spread. Hopefully we will begin recording in this trench tomorrow before we remove this rubble.

Trench A showing the crosswall and spread of rubble
 

In Trench B de-turfing was completed at the close of play yesterday and cleaning could now begin in here too with Perry, Roger, Jane and Keith, all veterans of last year’s campaign, working the trench together. The terminal end of the buildings crosswall has now been exposed but as yet the jury is still out on whether we have actually identified the doorway, perhaps tomorrow will reveal more?

Cleaning underway in Trench B
 
With Trenches A and B progressing well the decision was taken to open up a third trench towards the northern end of the building. Trench C was positioned to examine the interior of the northern cell, the most likely position of the byre, but also examined an additional section of the north-western wall. Having made short work of the deturfing Richard, Simon and Bob were in the process of cleaning up when Bob found a small piece of flint in the north-western end of the trench, possibly waste from flint tool production and likely to be of prehistoric date. Although still in its initial stages the depth of soils is so far promising, and hope remains for the preservation of internal surfaces.
Trench C 

Lets see what tomorrow holds!

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