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Unlocking Hidden
Heritage
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Welcome to the Unlocking Hidden Heritage web page. This page will be updated with news, events and survey results as the project develops.
Project Outline:
The 'Unlocking Hidden Heritage' project is part of the 'Cultural Routeways' programme within the 'Bassenthwaite Reflections' Landscape Partnership Scheme. With funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund, the project will undertake a series of historic landscape surveys, with strong community involvement, on specific areas within the Bassenthwaite water catchment in the Lake District National Park. The survey target areas have been chosen through a process of community consultation and through discussion between stakeholders, Grampus Heritage, the lake District National Park Authority and the National trust. The project aims to increase understanding and appreciation of the historic environment of the Bassenthwaite Lake water catchment. Click Here for a more detailed project description.
Unlocking Hidden Heritage is funded for three years, from January 2007 to December 2009, though it is anticipated that the project will continue beyond this period. The high level of interest and enthusiasm from the community certainly suggests that the project will have a strong legacy.
Project Activities:
Detailed 'level-1' Historic Environment Survey: The target areas for 2007 were the National trust owned woodlands around Derwentwater. Community volunteers were trained in identifying and recording historic environment features. Surveys were conducted in teams and each team was provided with the following equipment: handheld gps, maps, tape measure, camera, 1st aid kit, compass and ranging pole. The Woodland surveys are now complete and the 2008 level-1 fieldwork is focusing on land between Derwentwater and Thirlmere, working along the ridge from Castlerigg and Bleaberry Fell towards High Seat and Armboth.
Desk-Based Research: A programme of archival and documentary research is running alongside the fieldwork. Training in the use of archives is being provided by Cumbria Archive Service in Carlisle records office.
Detailed surveys on specific sites within the catchment are taking place throughout the life of the project: In addition to the 'level-1' area surveys, more detailed surveys are to be conducted on specific sites within the catchment. These surveys will utilise more technical geophysical and topographic survey techniques to increase understanding of archaeological sites and features in the catchment.
The first of these sites was the Caermote Roman Fort survey in June/July 2007. Plans for 2008 include searching for the 'lost' manor of Castlerigg and a geophysical survey of Troutbeck Roman Camps.
News / Events:
Launch Event 31st March 2007
Over 50 people attended the Unlocking Hidden Heritage launch event held at Theatre by the Lake in Keswick on 31st March. The project team were delighted with attendance and evident enthusiasm in the community for the project. The morning session opened in the studio with a welcome from Mark Graham (Unlocking Project Manager) and an introduction to the wider Bassenthwaite Reflections project and partnership given by Karin Crofts (Community Development Officer) . Mark Graham then gave a presentation explaining the background, aims and methodology of Unlocking Hidden Heritage. During the tea-break, attendees were invited to sign-up for fieldwork training days and archival research days. Over 40 people did so! The morning session was completed by a 45 minute presentation by guest speaker Mr Mike davies-Shiel, describing the types of features likely to be encountered during historic environment survey.
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Presentations during the morning session at Theatre
by the Lake
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Mike Davies-Shiel leading the afternoon field visit
in Strutta Wood
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In the afternoon Mr davies-Shiel led a field visit to Strutta Wood near Ashness Bridge, where he showed participants an early mill (bloomsmithy) site and discussed the creation and identification of charcoal platforms. The launch day was a great success and set the scene for a dynamic and productive 3 years. The project team would like to thank all who attended, Mr Davies-Shiel for sharing his considerable eperience and expertise of survey fieldwork and to Theatre by the Lake for providing and excellent venue and helping the event run so smoothly.
Derwentwater Woodlands Level-1 Survey - Spring and Autumn/Winter 2007
250 hectares of woodland have successfully been surveyed by over 40 local volunteers working in teams! We have exceeded our target. Thank you to all who have taken part so far. Click here for the image gallery A report of the survey results will be posted here soon!
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Unlocking Hidden Heritage Survey Teams in Action
: Image
Gallery
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Archive Research - On May 11th 2007 a group of fourteen Unlocking Hidden Heritage volunteers attended an archive training day at Carlisle Records Office. During the session, participants obtained readers tickets to allow them to access the archives and were given an introduction to using the archives by records office staff. The workshop focused on documents relating to the area being surveyed, the woodlands around Derwentwater. At the end of the session, the group divided into teams and divided the research area into blocks. The results of the archival research will be invaluable to aiding our understanding of the survey area. Project volunteers are still at work in the archives and have now completed their research on the woodlands of Derwentwater. This information will be included in the survey report.
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Unlocking Hidden Heritage Archive Training Day
at Carlisle Records Office
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July, August & September 2007 - A period of fieldwork and research focusing on Caermote Roman Fort and Whittas Park to the North of Bassenthwaite Lake (NY 2022 , 3680). An exciting historic landscape research project including geophysics, topographic survey and 'level-1' landscape survey.
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The Caermote Geophysics Report is now completed. Click the image on the right to download the .pdf Plots: Please click the links below to download the plots to accompany the report. We are unable to provide detailed location maps (plots 1 to 3) due to copyright restrictions, but grid references and a location description are located in the report. |
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| Plot 4: Raw data | Plot 5: Trace Plot | |
| Plot 6: Processed | Plot 7: Topographic | |
| Plot 8: Topo 2 | Plot 9: Interpretation | |
| A huge thank you to all who contributed to this fieldwork. Please have a look and send any comments. You may well see features in the results that we haven't interpreted. | ||
April 2008 - Fieldwork has begun on Castlerigg and Bleaberry Fell. Initial findings are exciting and include cairns, old boundaries and at least one shieling. We have already covered a large area and will return to carry out more surveys in Autumn/Winter 2008.
July, August and September 2008 - We have received the scheduled monument licenses from English Heritage and landowners consent to conduct a survey at Troutbeck Roman Camps. This work will begin in late July and will run until October! Please do not hesitate to get in touch if you would like to join in.
More details and dates will be announced here!
Don't forget to register your interst in participating in the project.
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Grampus Heritage and Training Ltd, Ashgill, Threapland, Wigton, Cumbria, CA7 2EL, United Kingdom Telephone: +44 (0) 16973 21516 Fax: +44 (0) 16973 23040 E.Mail: enquiries@grampusheritage.co.uk |
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