Coldbrook: All Will Be Revealed

Moulded timberwork in the hall at Coldbrook,
NPRN:36359, DS2011_129_006

BBC2’s popular television programme, Restoration Home, has recently been filming at Coldbrook, near Raglan, one of Monmouthshire’s most intriguing vernacular houses. Coldrook was discovered by Sir Cyril Fox and Lord Raglan in December 1941 and was surveyed by Mr Leonard Monroe, a staff member of the Royal Commission then engaged in recording important houses in Wales as some insurance against loss by indiscriminate bombing during the War. It was immediately noted for “the enrichment of the massive woodwork” and the survey appeared in Volume 2 of Monmouthshire Houses (pages 48-50). Its enriched style includes elaborate mouldings and deep chamfers; even the reveals of the window are built of solid timber.

Richly moulded rear window at Coldbrook, 
DS2010_746_004

The house is currently being restored by its new owners and will feature in the forthcoming second series of Restoration Home. The makers of the programme have been working with Richard Suggett of the Royal Commission and Dr Dan Miles of the Oxford Dendrochronology Laboratory on the dating and interpretation of the house. Sir Cyril Fox and Lord Raglan believe it to date from the mid-sixteenth century. The style of the woodwork and the plan of the house has led Royal Commission expert, Richard Suggett, to suggest that it may indeed prove to be one of the earliest storeyed houses in Wales. Dan Miles will analyse the tree-ring data using the Royal Commission’s all-Wales dendro data and if complete sap-wood survives, is hopeful that an exact felling date will soon be established. The real questions are: When was the house built and Who built it? Perhaps, the answers will soon be revealed!

Coflein - Discovering Our Past Online

Coflein is the online database for the National Monuments Record of Wales (NMRW), the national collection of information about the historic environment of Wales.

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Swydd Wag - Arweinydd Tîm Gweithgarwch Prydain oddi Fry

Dyddiad Ago: 5 Ebrill 2012
Dyddiad Cau: 24 Ebrill 2012
Cyflog: £29,651 i £33,500 y flwyddyn.
Lleoliad: Swindon neu Gaeredin
Hyd y cytundeb: 30 misCysylltwch ag: Angharad Williams


Disgrifiad o'r Swydd:
Mae’r rôl hon yn gyfle cyffrous i weithiwr proffesiynol a phrofiadol ym maes ymgysylltu â’r gymuned weithio mewn ffyrdd arloesol gyda chynulleidfaoedd newydd i ddod â’r casgliad rhyfeddol hwn o luniau yn fyw drwy gyfrwng prosiect Prydain oddi Fry.

Mae Casgliad Aerofilms yn cynnwys dros filiwn o awyrluniau sy’n dyddio o 1919 tan 2006. Fe’i crëwyd gan y cwmni arloesol Aerofilms Cyf, a dyma’r casgliad archifol pwysicaf o’i fath. Ceir ynddo luniau unigryw sy’n dangos sut y newidiodd pryd a gwedd Prydain yn ystod yr 20fed ganrif. Prynwyd y Casgliad gan English Heritage a’i bartneriaid, Comisiynau Brenhinol Henebion Cymru a’r Alban, yn 2007.

Bydd yr Arweinydd Tîm Gweithgarwch yn gyfrifol am reoli a chyflawni llinyn gweithgarwch y prosiect, sy’n cynnwys 16 o brosiectau cymunedol, i ategu rhaglen o wirfoddoli rhithiwr, creu ac ymgorffori adnoddau addysgol o amgylch y Casgliad, a chyflawni rhaglen o gynnal arddangosfeydd.

Cefnogir prosiect Prydain oddi Uchod gan y Loteri Genedlaethol drwy Gronfa Dreftadaeth y Loteri a bydd yn trefnu i ryw 95,000 o luniau o’r Casgliad, sy’n dyddio o 1919 tan 1953, fod yn hygyrch.

I gael holl fanylion y swydd hon, ewch i: http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/about/jobs/job/?ref=3315 Y dyddiad cau i geisiadau: 24/04/2012.



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Job Vacancy - Britain from Above Activity Team Leader

Opening Date: 5 April 2012
Closing Date: 24 April 2012
Pay: £29,651 to £33,500 per annum.
Location: Swindon or Edinburgh
Contract: 30 month
Contact: Angharad Williams

Job Desription:
This role is an exciting opportunity for an experienced community engagement professional to work with new audiences in innovative ways to bring this amazing photographic collection to life through the Britain from Above project.

The Aerofilms Collection contains over 1 million aerial photographs dating from 1919 to 2006. Created by the pioneering firm Aerofilms Ltd, it is the most important archive collection of its type and includes unique images showing the changing face of Britain throughout the 20th century. The Collection was acquired by English Heritage and its partners, the Royal Commissions on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales and Scotland in 2007.

The Activity Team Leader will be responsible for the effective management and delivery of the Activity strand of the project which includes 16 community projects, supporting a programme of virtual volunteering, creation and embedding of education resources around the Collection, and delivery of the exhibitions programme.

The Britain from Above project is supported by the National Lottery through the Heritage Lottery Fund and will make accessible approximately 95,000 images from the Collection dating from 1919 to 1953.

For complete details of this pos, please visit: http://www.english-heritage.org.uk/about/jobs/job/?ref=3315 Application closing date for post: 24/04/2012.


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Geophysical Survey On Skomer Reveals Buried Archaeology

Olly and Louise carefully survey Skomer’s heavily burrowed landscape

Skomer Island, located off the south-western coast of Pembrokeshire, is famed for its bird life and puffins, but its relict archaeological landscape of prehistoric houses and fields is among the best preserved anywhere in the British Isles. Arriving on the island in beautiful, still, sunny conditions, a small team from the Royal Commission and Sheffield University have been embarking on a second season of fieldwork to discover more about how people lived and farmed the island in the past.

During our first season back in April 2011 we had undertaken a typological study of the prehistoric settlement remains in the north of the island and identified a number of new sub-megalithic monuments. Guided by an extraordinary new LiDAR survey of Skomer, which uses a laser mounted on an aircraft to create a highly detailed terrain model of the island’s ground surface, we identified staggering new complexity to the field systems and clear phasing of boundaries, particularly within the interior of the island.

Returning this year, confident we had mapped the majority of the surviving upstanding remains we wanted to look below the ground surface by using non-intrusive geophysical survey to see if there was evidence of buried archaeological features.

No one has ever attempted geophysical survey on Skomer before so we did not even know if it would work, especially given the volcanic, igneous geology of the island, although its undertaking was potentially hugely rewarding. But it would be by no means easy – just getting the sizeable and heavy equipment to the island needed the helping hand of some willing passengers on the ferry from Martin’s Haven, and particular care would be required when walking with the survey instruments over the fragile, heavily burrowed landscape.

We concentrated our work in the south of the island and the sunny weather of our first two days allowed for good progress. Two approaches were tried; magnetometry, where a hand-held probe is walked over the ground surface along a grid, and resistivity, where a two-pronged probe is lightly inserted into the ground at 1 metre, or 50 cm, intervals.

However, conditions on the island can change rapidly, and by day three, a band of rain and a strong northerly wind, gusting up to 50 mph, forced us inside to seek shelter. Keeping warm with mugs of tea, we began to process the data we had collected with tantalising results. The plots of the combined geophysical techniques give an ‘x-ray’ effect when draped over the map of the fields and have allowed us to begin to identify buried ditches and some circular structures which are not visible on the ground surface. These first results show that both magnetometry and resistivity work on the island, showing slightly different views of the buried archaeology. Further work this week, and in future years, will continue to reveal more of Skomer’s secrets.

Skomer fieldwork blog, April 2012
Louise Barker, Oliver Davis, Toby Driver and Bob Johnston

Further Reading:

• The Archaeology of Skomer and Skokholm | Heritage of Wales News
  On Sunday, 19 February, 3.30pm Dr Oliver Davies, a Royal Commission archaeologist, will be giving a lecture to the Skomer and Stockholm Friends Re-union at the Five Valleys Conference Centre, Nailworth. Gloucestershire ...
• Recent Work On Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire | Heritage of Wales ...
  Skomer has no large grazing animals and so the vegetation is dominated by coarse tussocky grass. A field visit in August 2010 revealed that this formed a kind of fescue mattress effectively obscuring much of the archaeology ...
• Royal Commission films with Ray Mears on Skomer Island ...
  As part of the Skomer Island project, where the Royal Commission is working with partners to map and understand the well-preserved prehistoric houses and fields, we were invited to film with Ray Mears for his new television ...

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The Fan Llia and Fan Dringarth Walk - Brecon Beacons, Aberdare, Powys

Photograph from the downloadable Fan Llia and Fan Dringarth Walk.
NPRN 84567  DS2010_118_003

Overall distance: 13.5 kilometres or 8.5 miles.
Altitudinal range: 360 metres (car park); 400 metres (Llia valley); 500 metres (Nant y Gwair).
Ground conditions: Poorly-drained on the west and south sides of Fan Llia and Fan Dringarth, drier and firmer on the east sides.
Map: OS OLM sheet (1:25000 scale) is recommended and it is this map which is referred to in this guide.
Footpaths: This route is only incidentally related to footpaths shown on the map.
Site References: Numbers in brackets refer to site record numbers (NPRN = National Primary Record Number). These references allow site details to be accessed through the Commission’s on-line database  www.coflein.gov.uk

This walk follows a course along the western slopes of Fan Llia to the head of the Llia valley, across Bryn Melyn and Cefn Perfedd into Cwm Dringarth and tributary stream valleys below Fan Dringarth, and down Cwm Dringarth above the Ystradfellte Reservoir, returning to the carpark across the southern extent of Cefn Perfedd. The walk is notable for monuments of prehistoric, medieval and post-medieval date which can be seen along its route. This is a quiet area for walking being well hidden from more popular routes.

The starting point is the parking and picnic area at SN92721646 on the unclassified road between Ystradfellte and Heol Senni which can be accessed on the south via the A4125 from Sennybridge and Defynnog.

Download: The Fan Llia and Fan Dringarth Walk (PDF)
By David Leighton

Also See: The Source of the Usk Walk - Brecon Beacons National Park

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The Story of Wales – episode 6: Wales and Britain

The sixth and final episode of the BBC Wales series ‘The Story of Wales’ followed the events and changes in Wales from WWII to the present day, covering a host of topics such as WWII bombing in Swansea, the start of the NHS under Aneurin Bevan, the steel industries at Port Talbot, Ebbw Vale and Shotton, the Welsh language movement and the steps towards independent Welsh government. This popular series has been valuable in increasing understanding of the history of Wales and has sparked debate into what it means to be Welsh in the 21st century. The episodes are viewable on BBC iPlayer for the next few days and a DVD is now available through the Open University. The series will be shown again on BBC Two shortly.

If you want to find out more about some of the sites covered in episode 6, follow the links below:

• Swansea (including photographs showing the effects of WWII bombing)
• Llyn Celyn, Tryweryn
• Shotton Steelworks
• Ebbw Vales Steelworks
• Port Talbot Steelworks
• First purpose built Mosque in Wales
• Former Welsh Office building
• Senedd, Cardiff Bay
• Millenium Centre

Other links:

• Link to The Story of Wales website
• Add your own photographs to People's Collection Wales to help tell the story of Wales

Finally, the Royal Commission's superbly illustrated book, Hidden Histories: Discovering the Heritage of Wales is an informative companion for anyone interested in the life and heritage of Wales and is now available for only £19.95 or alternatively only £17.95 for Friends of the Royal Commission with their special 10% discount.


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Surveying at Pen-y-Bryn Slate Quarry in the Nantlle Valley

RCAHMW Investigator Spencer Smith surveying a row of workers’ cottages at Pen y Bryn Slate Quarry in the Nantlle Valley.

Louise Barker and Spencer Smith, Investigators with the Royal Commission are in the process of surveying Pen-y-Bryn Slate Quarry in the Nantlle Valley (NPRN: 33674) as part of the Atlanterra Project .

Pen-y-Bryn Slate Quarry is not as well known as Dorothea Slate Quarry (NPRN: 40539) to the west with its rare surviving Beam engine, or Pen-yr-orsedd Slate Quarry (NPRN: 40565) to the north with a series of aerial ropeways known as 'Blondins'. However, it is important because the complex of buildings used by the quarry workers survives almost complete including  their cottages a Saw Mill and a Weighbridge.

The quarry buildings were not the first buildings to be constructed at Pen-y-bryn, and the quarry takes its name from a 17th-century house which was still occupied while the slate quarry was in production around it and continued to be lived in until after World War II. The house is already designated a listed building by CADW, and when surveyed as part of the quarry complex will provide an important addition to the Royal Commission archive.
 
Dr. Gwynfor Pierce Jones, an expert on the slate industry of the Nantlle Valley and Eryl Williams, Conservation Officer for Gwynedd County Council are among those who viewed the survey work in progress.

Further survey work will be carried out in the coming weeks to survey the pumping system which kept the Quarry pits from filling with water whilst they were being worked by the quarrymen, and an animation of the complex will be completed for summer 2012.


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Aeroplanes, Lasers & Puffins: My Year at the Royal Commission - Part 2

The view from above is often astonishing and can give an understanding and appreciation of the archaeology of Wales that is often not possible from the ground.  I found it difficult at first to orientate myself and get used to the different scales of places and buildings when seen from the air.  Even familiar landscapes that I have lived in for years and visited regularly on the ground appeared so different from the aerial perspective.  But it wasn’t until my first front seat flight that I realised just how tricky it was to look for archaeology whilst also navigating and taking photographs!  It is a juggling act that takes experience and a cool head, but I was always helped along the way by the expert flying of the pilots such as Bob and Gwyndaf at Welshpool and Haverfordwest Airports.

Looking from above can give an entirely different perspective of the archaeology of Wales. Here, on Harding’s Down, Gower, three Iron Age hillforts are sited within a stone’s throw from each other – a view that is difficult to appreciate from the ground.

We fly throughout the year. The low light of winter and spring is ideal for picking out the earthworks of ancients forts and fields, but it was the cropmark months of the summer that I found the most thrilling when we could discover tens of new sites in a single flight. Cropmarks form in ripening wheat and barley when buried archaeological features, such as walls or ditches, stunt or promote the growth of the plants during hot, dry weather. These can leave fantastic shapes on the ground that show the outlines of long-lost forts and buildings.  I still remember the exhilaration the first time I saw one and realised that I had discovered new evidence of the ancient occupation of Wales.

My first cropmark – a new discovery of a small Iron Age defended enclosure in Ceredigion.

What has been great about my time at the Royal Commission is that I’ve been given the opportunity to gain experience of so many different areas of work.  One of the highlights has been undertaking fieldwork on Skomer Island, Pembrokeshire.  Famed for its puffins and other seabirds, the island is also home to one of the best preserved prehistoric farming landscapes anywhere in the British Isles.  I feel really privileged to have been part of a team undertaking a new ground survey of the surviving remains, working in one of the most beautiful landscapes of Wales, with some of the most dedicated and enthusiastic archaeologists the country has to offer.

The puffins of Skomer Island, perhaps curious about our new survey of the archaeological remains.

  

And that is what sums up my year at the Royal Commission: when your office is the front seat of an aeroplane or amongst the puffins on a remote island you know you’re in a good spot!
Oliver Davis won a year’s bursary supported by the Heritage Lottery Fund and the Institute for Archaeologists to train in aerial archaeology with the Royal Commission.  A sumptuous new Royal Commission book by Toby Driver and Oliver Davis “Historic Wales from the Air – Images from the National Monuments Record of Wales” celebrating aerial photography in Wales is due in April 2012.


Oliver Davis, Royal Commission, March 2012.

View Part 1
<< Aeroplanes, Lasers & Puffins: My Year at the Royal Commission - Part 1

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Gwaith Celf Diwydiannol Unigryw yn Ennill Cymorth Cronfa Dreftadaeth y Loteri

Melin Pant-yr-Ynn, Bethania, NPRN:-28620

Mae Cronfa Dreftadaeth y Loteri wedi dyfarnu £46,700 i Gomisiwn Brenhinol Henebion Cymru i brynu casgliad unigryw o fwy na 600 o luniadau a dyfrlliwiau gwreiddiol gan Falcon Hildred, artist sy’n gweithio yng Nghymru’n bennaf . Mae’r Comisiwn Brenhinol, sydd â’i swyddfa yn Aberystwyth, yn gweithio mewn partneriaeth ag Ymddiriedolaeth Amgueddfa Ironbridge Gorge (yr IGMT) i achub y cofnod gweledol nodedig hwn o adeiladau a threfweddau diwydiannol er mwyn i genedlaethau ddydd a ddaw gael ei fwynhau.

Mae’r casgliad wedi’i gatalogio gyda chymorth gwirfoddolwyr, a bydd sganio o ansawdd uchel yn sicrhau y bydd lluniau digidol gwych ohono ar gael ar-lein drwy Coflein (cronfa ddata ar-lein y Comisiwn Brenhinol) a gwefannau Ironbridge a Chasgliad y Werin Cymru. Yn ogystal, bwriedir cynnal arddangosfeydd, sgyrsiau cyhoeddus a chyhoeddiad awdurdodol yn 2012 i roi rhagor o gyhoeddusrwydd i’r casgliad.

Mwynglawdd a chwarel lechi’r Oakeley, Blaenau Ffestiniog, NPRN:-404307

Artist hynod ddawnus yw Falcon Hildred ac mae ef wedi cysegru gwaith ei fywyd i gofnodi adeiladau a thirweddau diwydiant yn y bedwaredd ganrif ar bymtheg a’r ugeinfed ganrif. Mae ei waith o werth esthetig, hanesyddol a chymdeithasol mawr gan iddo fwrw ati i gofnodi’r newidiadau technolegol a pheirianyddol, a ffordd o fyw sy’n diflannu’n gyflym, yn fanwl iawn. Mae’r lluniadau’n cofnodi Blaenau Ffestiniog (cartref yr artist oddi ar 1969 a man y mae wedi cofnodi llawer arno) ac amryw o drefi diwydiannol yng Nghymru a Lloegr, gan gynnwys Caerdydd, Casnewydd ac Abertawe yn ogystal â Grimsby, Coventry, Llundain a Birmingham.

Falcon Hildred wrth ei fwrdd lluniadu

Caiff arddangosfa fawr o ddetholiad o’i weithiau gwreiddiol ei chynnal yn Oriel Coalbrookdale yn Ironbridge o ddiwedd mis Medi 2012 tan fis Ebrill 2013 a’r bwriad yw mynd â’r arddangosfa ar daith o 2013 ymlaen. Caiff fersiynau digidol o’r arddangosfa eu dangos yn y Sioe Frenhinol ac yn yr Eisteddfod Genedlaethol yn 2013. Ym mis Medi 2012 cyhoeddir llyfr a fydd yn tynnu sylw at bwysigrwydd y casgliad a’r artist. Y cyhoeddiad hwnnw, a’r ymchwil ar ei gyfer, fydd y sail i gyfres o sesiynau newydd o addysg ac estyn-allan yn Ironbridge o dan arweiniad staff addysg yr Amgueddfa a’u gwirfoddolwyr. Cynhyrchir deunydd addysgol hefyd ar gyfer gwefan Casgliad y Werin Cymru.

Wrth sôn am y dyfarniad, meddai Peter Wakelin, Ysgrifennydd y Comisiwn Brenhinol, “Mae prynu’r casgliad hwn yn golygu y caiff oes o waith cofnodi ei diogelu at y dyfodol. Mae Falcon Hildred yn rhoi i ni ffyrdd newydd o edrych ar adeiladau a thirweddau hanesyddol ac yn ein hysbrydoli. Mae’n apelio at bawb – o blant ifanc i benseiri ac arbenigwyr ar dreftadaeth. Mae clywed y bydd yr adnodd gwych hwn ar gael i bawb am byth o hyn ymlaen yn newyddion arbennig o braf.”

Wrth esbonio pwysigrwydd cymorth Cronfa Dreftadaeth y Loteri, meddai Steve Miller, Prif Weithredwr Ymddiriedolaeth Amgueddfa Ironbridge Gorge, “Rydyn ni’n ddiolchgar tu hwnt i Gronfa Dreftadaeth y Loteri am ein helpu ni i brynu’r casgliad rhyfeddol hwn. Rydyn ni’n edrych ymlaen at weithio gyda’r Comisiwn Brenhinol i sicrhau y gall cynifer o bobl â phosibl fwynhau gwaith artist disglair ac unigryw sydd wedi dogfennu’r oes ddiwydiannol mewn ffordd mor gwbl nodedig”.

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