Rendlesham behind the scenes: the final year of post-excavation processing

Featured image: Volunteers examining soil samples for artefacts and ecofacts, using a magnet to pick out hammerscale

Since October 2023, the post-excavation work has been ongoing, following the end of the third and final season of excavation at Rendlesham, as part of our community archaeology project Rendlesham Revealed

A group of volunteers have been processing the material at the Cotswold Archaeology warehouse between October to December, and several volunteers from Suffolk Mind also joined the team for a one-day workshop.

The tasks were very similar to previous years, which included: cleaning and quantifying the objects by material types as well as processing the soil samples to collect any artefacts or ecofacts. The Registered Artefacts, which includes unique objects or metal objects, were all recorded and packed for x-ray or specialist assessment.

Workshop for volunteers from Suffolk Mind processing soil samples to collect artefacts and ecofacts

The volunteers have cleaned, marked, quantified and packed approx. 9.5kg of pottery fragments, dating to the prehistoric, Roman and post-Roman periods.

There was also approx. 28kg of fired clay, most of which came from the trench which contained the remains of a medieval oven.

In amongst the Registered Artefacts were 17 pieces of glass, two loomweight fragments, a bone pin, a fragment of a bone comb, and 110 metal small finds mostly of iron or copper alloy. There was also 1.8kg of metal working waste.

The human remains recovered from the two in situ graves have been sent for radiocarbon dating, which can take up to 14 weeks.

All the excavated material has now been sent to specialists for further analysis, all of which will form part of the overall post-excavation report, along with a description of the site stratigraphy and narrative.

Keep an eye out on our blog for further updates in the coming months.

Workshop for volunteers from Suffolk Mind examining soil samples for artefacts and ecofacts

Find out more

What is involved in post-excavation? Read the first year’s blogs to learn more.

Discover more about the Rendlesham Revealed community fieldwork discoveries.

Learn about the previous archaeological investigations since 2008

This fieldwork is part of the community archaeology project Rendlesham Revealed: Anglo-Saxon Life in South-East Suffolk, funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund. We are very grateful to our many local and national partners who have made this project possible, and for the support of our volunteers and of the landowners and farmers who work and manage this historic landscape.