Recent excavations near Whittlesey in eastern England have uncovered a Late Bronze Age (1100–800 cal BC) occupation site, comprising wooden structures built over a freshwater palaeochannel—the Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement . Its destruction by a catastrophic fire has provided an exceptional opportunity to investigate how people inhabited and affected their world in the final decades of the Bronze Age in Britain.
Full Answer
What was the Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement?
Recent excavations near Whittlesey in eastern England have uncovered a Late Bronze Age (1100–800 cal BC) occupation site, comprising wooden structures built over a freshwater palaeochannel—the Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement ( Figure 1 ).
What is the significance of Must Farm?
Must Farm Bronze Age Settlement. What is Must Farm? At the Must Farm excavation site between Peterborough and Whittlesey archaeologists have uncovered one of the best preserved settlements dating to the Late Bronze Age (1000 – 800BC). Initial excitement was generated by the discovery of log boats, fish traps and a wooden platform.
What happened at Must Farm?
The Must Farm pile-dwelling site is an extraordinarily well-preserved Late Bronze Age settlement in Cambridgeshire, UK. The authors present the site's contextual setting, from its construction, occupation and subsequent destruction by fire in relatively quick succession.
What is the exact location of Must Farm?
/ 52.5552361°N 0.1773194°W / 52.5552361; -0.1773194 Part of a Bronze Age settlement was uncovered at Must Farm quarry, at Whittlesey, near Peterborough, in Cambridgeshire, England.
Why did the Must Farm Bronze Age settlement preserve so well?
As the material lay on the riverbed it was covered with layers of non-porous silt which helped to preserve everything from wooden utensils to textiles. It is this degree of preservation which makes the site fascinating and gives us an unprecedented insight into life during the Bronze Age.
What did Archaeologists find at Must Farm?
Must Farm has the largest, and finest, collection of textiles from the British Bronze Age. These extremely delicate objects were preserved by the unique combination of charring and water logging resulting from the destruction of the settlement.
Where is Britain's Pompeii?
CambridgeshireThe level of preservation at the site, in Whittlesey, Cambridgeshire, has been compared to that seen at Pompeii, a Roman city buried by ash when Vesuvius erupted in AD 79.
Can you visit must farm?
The Must Farm Timber Platform Project is an excavation running from September 2015 to April 2016. As the site is situated in a working quarry we are unable to accept general visitors, volunteers or host a public open day. There are opportunities for local interest groups to visit the site by appointment.
When did the Bronze Age begin in Britain?
around 2200 BCBronze Age Britain Initially items were made from copper, then from around 2200 BC bronze (which is harder than copper) was made by mixing copper with tin. Bronze gradually replaced stone as the main material for tools and by 2200 BC the period known as the Early Bronze Age had begun in the Britain.
Why do some archaeologists refer to the Must Farm site as the British Pompeii?
The discovery is also being described as "the British Pompeii" because the site is so perfectly preserved. According to CNN, the settlement was actually destroyed by a fire 3,000 years ago.
How much of Pompeii is original?
But what visitors often don't realize is that only two thirds (44 hectares) of ancient Pompeii have been excavated. The rest -- 22 hectares -- are still covered in debris from the eruption almost 2,000 years ago.
How did they find Pompeii?
The archaeological site was first discovered in 1549, when an Italian named Domenico Fontana dug a water channel through Pompeii, but the dead city was left entombed. Within a century, the age of royal treasure hunting and piracy swept through the ancient city.
Who discovered Pompeii in 1748?
of important objects in three dimensions and making detailed plans of architectural remains laid the foundations for the indispensable procedures of modern archaeology. De Alcubierre shifted his focus to Pompeii, which had just been (re)discovered in 1748.
When was Pompeii found?
Ancient Roman Life Preserved at Pompeii | National Geographic. When Mount Vesuvius erupted cataclysmically in the summer of A.D. 79, the nearby Roman town of Pompeii was buried under several feet of ash and rock. The ruined city remained frozen in time until it was discovered by a surveying engineer in 1748.
Bronze Age Settlement
Thanks to funding from Historic England and Forterra, in August 2015 we began a new project – Bronze Age Settlement. T his was a 10-month excavation of a settlement at the site that was destroyed by fire, causing it to collapse into a river channel, preserving the contents in situ.
Bronze Age River
In 2011 the Cambridge Archaeological Unit, University of Cambridge, in collaboration with Forterra, began to unearth a series of extraordinary finds. What we found, what we learnt and what we know about the history, geology and archaeology of the area, can be explored in Bronze Age River.
Where did Must Farm “Fit”?
This was a period of rising sea levels and encroachment of lands which had previously been dry. We are seeing a community which is adapted to life at the fen edge – with access to wood, crops and animals from dry land, but making skilled use of the neighbouring waterways.
Why is Must Farm Important?
It is the depth and waterlogged nature of the site which make Must Farm so important. Objects which would normally have decayed or have been destroyed by agriculture and subsequent development have lain undisturbed.
When were decaying timbers discovered?
In 1999 decaying timbers were discovered protruding from the southern face of the brick pit at Must Farm. Investigations in 2004 and 2006 dated the timbers to the Bronze Age and identified them as a succession of large structures spanning an ancient watercourse.
Conventional or Unconventional Site?
Early on in the project we discussed a number of different interpretations of the site based on the material recovered during the 2006 excavation. People’s interpretations varied from the site being a hugely significant, “special” timber platform to a site that didn’t contain enough wood to be a building.
Architecture
The pile-dwellings built over the river have a distinct “formality” to them. There seems to be a distinct, organised method to their construction that suggests a well-organised and carefully planned template to the design. All of the posts in the interior and exterior rings are made from the same wood (oak) and have incredibly similar dimensions.
Pottery
One of the most discussed artefacts from the project has been the amazing ceramic assemblage. The range of pottery is fantastic as it appears to reflect a complete, domestic set. Everything from the smallest, individual drinking vessels to the large, coarseware storage vessels are present and in significant quantities.
Animal Bone
One of the most recent groups of finds beginning to emerge from the occupation deposit are small clusters of animal bones. These are excellent illustrations of domestic process and we have just started to see some patterning in these bones.
A Settlement with Routines?
At this stage of the project, it seems that our initial interpretation that the site could be a representative Late Bronze Age settlement has some merit. The notion that the Must Farm site is some form of extraordinary, “special” structure does not seem to be holding up. None of the material we have recovered, so far, appears notably unusual.
What is the must farm site?
At the Must Farm site, the superstructure's untimely and catastrophic demise means that we are able to investigate the undisturbed remnants of an active, functioning pile-dwelling settlement ( Figure 6 ). Its foreshortened life span ensured an absence of later superimposition; as a result, the settlement's brevity is matched by its stratigraphic simplicity. In effect, the entirety of the pile-dwelling settlement is encapsulated in two layers—one representing its construction, the other its demise—with material representing settlement use sandwiched between and amongst the two. Most importantly, the rapid and catastrophic nature of the site's demise has preserved significant elements of the settlement's architectural and spatial organisation. The timber skeletons of individual structures, with fans of subsided rafters and joists, and reoccurring patterns of material culture, suggest that the collapse occurred more or less vertically, with the falling, heavy roof structures bringing everything down with them into the base of the channel.
Where is the must farm?
The Must Farm pile-dwelling site is an extraordinarily well-preserved Late Bronze Age settlement in Cambridgeshire, UK . The authors present the site's contextual setting, from its construction, occupation and subsequent destruction by fire in relatively quick succession. A slow-flowing watercourse beneath the pile-dwellings provided a benign burial environment for preserving the debris of construction, use and collapse, while the catastrophic manner of destruction introduced a definitive timeframe. The scale of its occupation speaks to the site's exceptional nature, enabling the authors to deduce the everyday flow and use of things in a prehistoric domestic setting.
When was the Must Farm Quarry Pit discovered?
Discovery. The presence of timber piles on the edge of the disused Must Farm Quarry Pit was first observed in 1999 by local archaeologist Martin Redding. During subsequent visits, he retrieved later prehistoric potsherds, worked flint and metalwork from exposed sediment around the piles.
How many stilted structures were there in the Pile dwelling?
In plan, the remains of the settlement consisted of hundreds of uprights or pile stumps, which together define the outline and internal settings of at least five stilted structures (structures 1–5) enclosed within a 49.3m-long, curvilinear palisade with an internal walkway ( Figure 5 ).
Where is the must farm?
The Must Farm pile-dwelling site is an extraordinarily well-preserved Late Bronze Age settlement in Cambridgeshire, UK . The authors present the site's contextual setting, from its construction, occupation and subsequent destruction by fire in relatively quick succession. A slow-flowing watercourse beneath the pile-dwellings provided a benign burial environment for preserving the debris of construction, use and collapse, while the catastrophic manner of destruction introduced a definitive timeframe. The scale of its occupation speaks to the site's exceptional nature, enabling the authors to deduce the everyday flow and use of things in a prehistoric domestic setting.
What is the significance of the Must Farm pile dwelling?
The exceptional spatial and temporal coherence of the Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement, together with the particular contextual conditions that preserved its accompanying material intensity, has huge interpretive implications. Along with the ability to reconstruct a Late Bronze Age settlement and its individual household units, the site presents an unparalleled
How much is the environmental cleanup of the Halper farm?
Still to be decided is who’s responsible for the environmental cleanup of the farm, which Lakind said has been pegged at $1.5 million. Any payout will be shared by the families of the 14 children of Herbert and Norman Halper, brothers who took over the farm from their parents.
How many acres does Mark Halper farm?
Mark Halper (left) and his son Jeremy tour the 75-acre farm their family owned before it was taken over by Piscataway in 2006. By Thomas Zambito | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com.
How much money did Halper's family get from the township?
Halper said his family has shelled out some $2 million in legal bills fighting the township to get at their inheritance. The money comes from the $4.3 million Piscataway paid the family when they filed a so-called “declaration of taking” in 2004.
Who settled the Halpers?
In between there’s been a nasty court battle over nearly $18 million that a jury in 2008 said the Halpers were due for land settled by Simon and Bella Halper in 1922.
What year did the Halpers appeal the condemnation?
The Halpers appealed the amount, saying that market forces and inflation, had increased the value of the land 83 percent between 1999 when Piscataway began condemnation proceedings and 2004 when it filed the “declaration of taking.”. A Middlesex County jury agreed and in 2008 a three-judge panel of the Appellate Divison upheld the verdict.
