Interpreting and visiting the archaeology of Skomer Island

Louise Barker (pointing) working with the Skomer Visitor Officer and volunteers from the Wildlife Trust for South and West Wales  on a recent visit to Skomer Island.

The archaeology of Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire, is exceptionally well preserved. Across the island remains of boulder-built boundaries, neat stone walls and the footings of round houses can be seen showing how the island was extensively farmed in Iron Age and Romano-British times between 2,000-2,500 years ago. A prominent standing stone, the Harold Stone, and other megaliths on the island suggest far earlier occupation dating back to the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age.

Iron Age or Romano-British round house at the Wick, Skomer Island. A view showing the front door into the house.

Following new archaeological surveys and excavations by the Royal Commission, working with colleagues from Sheffield and Cardiff Universities and Cadw, the Wildlife Trust for South and West Wales who manage Skomer are hoping to improve the signage and information for the island’s archaeology during 2016.

In late May, Royal Commission archaeologists Louise Barker and Toby Driver travelled to Skomer to meet the Skomer Visitor Officer, Leighton Newman, and Hannah, a long term volunteer, to talk over the archaeology of the most visible prehistoric monuments. Leighton and Hannah hope to renew parts of the Skomer History Trail, first established following work in the 1980s by Professor John Evans.

One of the most accessible and impressive prehistoric round houses in Pembrokeshire can be found at The Wick, close to one of the main viewing points for Puffins. This prehistoric house also benefits from a new wooden sign. Visitors can walk into the footings of the round house, through its well-defined doorway, and imagine the domestic scene within its walls two millennia ago.

One of the newly-erected signs inviting visitors to explore the prehistoric round house at the Wick.

The house may originally have been completed with a wattle and timber wall, and conical roof. Although timber suitable for building was rare on Iron Age Skomer, it is possible that posts, poles and other building materials were brought out to the island by boat. The Royal Commission continues to work with the Wildlife Trust to raise awareness of Skomer’s archaeological treasures. Details of visiting Skomer Island can be found at: http://www.welshwildlife.org/skomer-skokholm/skomer/

By Toby Driver, RCAHMW


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Latest News from the Skomer Island Project - The 2016 Fieldwork Season

Last week, the Skomer Island Project team returned to Skomer to undertake the latest phase of archaeological research on the Island. This year archaeologists Louise Barker and Toby Driver (RCAHMW), Bob Johnston (University of Sheffield) and Oliver Davis (Cardiff University) were delighted to be joined by geographer and environmental scientist Sarah Davies of Aberystwyth University.

Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire is famed for its wildlife and for the survival of its ancient field systems which are amongst the best preserved anywhere in Britain. (© Crown Copyright: RCAHMW, AP_2010_3294)

The aims of this year’s work were twofold; to excavate one of the Island’s main archaeological features, a prehistoric field boundary and the continuation of geophysical survey within the improved fields surrounding the old farm in the centre of the Island.

Despite Storm Katie cutting short our planned four days of fieldwork, we managed to achieve our goals in the two sunny and still days we had and were also lucky enough to witness the return of the puffins.

Archaeological fieldwork involves lots of kit. Getting onto Skomer is always an energetic start to the field season. (© Crown Copyright: RCAHMW)

The site of the excavation. (© Crown Copyright: RCAHMW)

The focus of our small evaluation trench was a substantial lynchet, part of the Northern Field Systems on the Island. A lynchet is a bank of earth that builds up on the downslope of a field ploughed over a period of time and the resulting earth or plough soil is important for helping us reconstruct the environmental history of the Island, identify what was being cultivated and possibly at what date. Therefore, the principal focus of the excavation was to recover samples of the soils within the lynchet which will now be carefully analysed over the coming months.

Excavation in progress. A large number of stones, the result of field clearance, were encountered. (© Crown Copyright: RCAHMW)

Preliminary results from the geophysical survey also look positive. Within the improved fields surrounding the farm in the centre of the Island, there is little evidence for surviving archaeology; however geophysics undertaken in 2012 did reveal sub-surface archaeological features and we wanted to see if this was the case elsewhere. This was indeed the case, and in the area surveyed directly to the west of the farm, the gradiometer detected a linear feature, perhaps a ditch cut by later cultivation ridges.

Geophysical survey in progress with some promising preliminary results (© Crown Copyright: RCAHMW)

As ever the Skomer Island Project team would like to thank the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales and the Skomer Wardens for their continued support and help with our work on the Island.

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Excavations on Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire

On Friday, 4 March 2016, Dr Toby Driver FSA of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales will give a talk to the Pembrokeshire Historical Society on the recent excavations on Skomer Island.

Skomer is a highly protected landscape famous for its puffins and other breeding seabirds, but it is also home to some of the best preserved prehistoric field systems and hut settlements anywhere in Britain. In April 2014 a small team of archaeologists was permitted to open the very first modern excavation trench in the island’s history, to retrieve dating and environmental samples to better understand the long and complex history of prehistoric settlement and farming on Skomer. This followed three years of collaborative, non-invasive research between staff of the Royal Commission, The University of Sheffield and Cardiff University, working closely with the Wildlife Trust of South and West Wales and CADW.

Excavations in 2014 at a prehistoric mound of burnt and fire-cracked stones on north Skomer, once used to boil water for cooking, have produced the first calibrated radiocarbon dates for farming settlement. The mound sealed a land surface dated by charcoal to between 751-408 BC, the early Iron Age. A cattle tooth deposited in the cooking mound was dated to around 85 BC, the late Iron Age.

The talk will look at the special landscape and archaeology of Skomer, and touch upon the other Pembrokeshire Islands. It will take the audience through the challenges and excitement of opening an excavation trench on a windswept island, and what new information this long running project has told us about the history and people of ancient Skomer.

Venue: The Picton Rooms, The County Hall car park, Haverfordwest.
Date: Friday 4 March 2016 at 7.30 p.m.
For further information : ann.sayer@btinternet.com
Members free, Non-members welcome £3 at the door.

Note to editor: The photographs show prehistoric field systems and settlements on Skomer Island. If they are used, please use the following credit: ‘Crown Copyright RCAHNW’

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Sir John Rhŷs and the Royal Commission (1840—1915): the “greatest Welsh scholar of our time”

Detail of Sir John Rhŷs from Commissioners group, 1913. NPRN: 54624.

Today, 17 December, 2015, marks the centenary of the death of Syr John Rhŷs, the great Celtic scholar and philologist. He was born on 21 June 1840 at Aberceiro-fach Cottage, Ponterwyd, the son of a farmer and lead miner. This cottage was later converted into a farm building but became derelict after the Second World War, despite pleas for preservation.

Having studied at Bangor Normal College (1860—61), John Rhŷs became a student at Jesus College, Oxford, in October 1865. Thereafter followed research trips to Paris, Heidelberg, Leipzig and Gӧttingen. It was here that his interest in philology and linguistics developed. In 1874, he delivered a series of lectures in Aberystwyth later published as Lectures on Welsh Philology (1877), where he states the philological law, that the Celtic consonant i becomes dd in Welsh, and is known still as Rhŷs’s Law. He quickly established a reputation as a leading Celtic scholar specialising not only in philology, but also archaeology, folklore and ethnology. He was appointed the first professor of Celtic at Oxford in 1877. He became a prominent figure in public life, serving on numerous committees, councils and Commissions, and he was a popular public speaker, especially in eisteddfodau.

Title page of the first Inventory:The County of Montgomery (1911) now available as a free  e-book.

Sir John Rhŷs was appointed first Chairman of the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historic Monuments of Wales on 10 August 1908. The Royal Commission started work immediately on a series of county inventories: The County of Montgomery was the first to appear (1911). He remained as Chairman until his death on 17 December, 1915, when he was described by the newspaper Llais Llafur as the “greatest Welsh scholar of our time”.

Aberceiro-fach Cottage, Ponterwyd 1952; Aberceiro-fach ruins, Ponterwyd 2015, NPRN: 420775.

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Two Unique Anglesey Anniversaries

2015 marks a unique event for a celebrated village on Anglesey – a centenary and a bi-centenary.

On the 16 September 1915, the first meeting of the Women’s Institute in Britain took place in an unassuming building in Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch (or Llanfair PG). The movement was formed in Canada in 1897. Their aim was to revitalise rural communities and encourage the local country-women to help increase supplies of domestic food supplies during the Great War. The original meeting hall still stands, beside the old A5 trunk road through the village.

There are over 200,000 members of the WI in the UK, and the movement has evolved to become the largest women’s voluntary organisation in the country.

For the second anniversary, you only have to travel a short distance to the east of the hall, to Craig y Dinas, and the striking column that was erected in 1817 as a tribute and to Henry William Paget, the first Marquis of Anglesey. The title was awarded to him in July 1815 - in recognition of his bravery and leadership at the Battle of Waterloo, where the French army, commanded by Napoleon, was defeated by the Anglo-allied army, commanded by the Duke of Wellington and the Prussian army, led by Gebhard von Blucher, on the 18 June 1815.

Paget was the cavalry commander on that day. He and Wellington were on their horses and observing the scene before them. Grape shot from one of the very last French cannon volleys of the battle hit Paget’s right knee. He looked down and said “By God, sir, I’ve lost my leg!” Wellington instantly replied “By God, sir, so you have!”

The bronze statue was a later addition to the column. It was placed there in 1860 after Paget died, at a grand old age of 85.

By Medwyn Parry

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