Introducing our newest YAC: Gloucestershire!
We’re delighted to introduce the newest branch to the YAC network: Gloucestershire YAC, based in Gloucester! Club leader Amelie tells us all about their first session…
Gloucestershire Young Archaeologists Club launched on Saturday 18th October at Gloucester Cathedral with a session, in partnership with The Museum of Gloucester, which took us all over the city of Gloucester, exploring the Archaeology we walk past every single day.
Gloucestershire YAC is an affiliate branch, run by Gloucester Cathedral, delivered in partnership with heritage and cultural sites from across the county. Branch Leader, Amelie Wiseman, is an Archaeologist, Educator and Heritage Professional with a love for buildings and living history, while the wider volunteering team includes museum curators, archivists, local historians and archaeology students.
Our aim is to provide a varied and exciting introduction into everything the past, and material world have to offer with a programme including heritage crafts, experimental archaeology, archiving, science and more.
For our first session we started with exploring what archaeology is, before walking down to the Discovery Centre in Gloucester – a public archaeological archiving project partnered with Cotswolds Archaeology, sorting through 6000 boxes of archaeological finds in the Museum of Gloucester’s’ collection.
Here the Young archaeologists were given a behind the scenes tour, seeing the breadth of artefacts and objects that archaeologists have found in Gloucester during excavations such as Roman shoes, a coprolite (fossilised dinosaur poo!), and animal bone. They also learned about how the discovery project are sorting the items, and protecting them for future display in the museum.
On our way back to the Cathedral we stopped to see some of the sites the artefacts and objects came from – such as the Eastgate Chamber, St Michaels Tower at the cross (where they got to ring the tower bell), and Berkeley Street phone exchange.
At the end of the session the Young Archaeologists described their highlights as:
- Smelling fossilised dinosaur poo (coprolite)
- Learning that Roman shoes were found in latrine pits at the Eastgate Chamber (and seeing some at the discovery centre)
- Holding fossils and bones
- Ringing the bell at St Michaels Tower
- Learning the difference between Archaeology and Palaeontology.
Our next session is on 8th November when we will be exploring all things bones and burials – from skeletons to memorials to grave goods! All sessions are free to attend and include free refreshments.