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S21 | Dig 1: Iron Age Settlement – Geophys Preview (Patreon)

Published:
2021-10-20 12:22:41
Edited:
2022-06-07 13:03:17
Imported:
2026-06
Tags:

Content

As Dr John Gater frequently likes to remind us (without a hint of bias), "the best thing about Time Team is the geophys!"

In fairness, from the very first episode of Time Team onwards, geophysics has been critical in identifying targets for the team to investigate.

John and his team have employed a range of techniques on both our 2021 sites, mapping out the hidden world beneath our feet with pinpoint accuracy.

We are busy pulling together and analysing the various layers of data for final presentation. Until then – and strictly for your eyes only – here's an advance peek at a portion of the magnetometry survey on the Cornish site.

Remember, this is one piece of a bigger puzzle, and full context will be provided in due course.

But we really want to know what you think, so please share you own analysis in the comments below!

Files

Comments

Mark Cooke

Scale, depth or a hint!

Michael leask

Very interesting site, i love the round bit in the middle, very similar to things here in shetland.

Zoe Propper

I was going to ask if that is a round feature in the middle or my eyes playing tricks

S Arrowsmith

That clear circular feature in the top left is leaping out.

Nina Surr

Hm, wonder what the red and blue are, just an artifact of the processing?

Stephen Gent

Large circle with a smaller one in the middle in he center of the shot and a smaller circle at top left, obvious plough marks

Derek Thom

Agreed the central large feature looks circular and the smaller feature top left likewise. There may be one in the same top left field but further to the right.

Les Neilson

It would be really useful to include a link to an introduction or overview of each project, so I can tell what I'm looking at... would that be possible? Thanks for the reply! I was really thinking as a general thing, to include a link to another article or video introducing the project ( location, objectives, etc. )

Ann H

With out scale hard to tell but the small one reminded me of the dovecots TT uncovered.

Jack D Stout

Yeah, no clue. No doubt that's at least a factor in why I wasn't invited...lol

Debbi Stott

Number of possible pits in top right and hint of another circle below? Also is it a double ditch or narrow causeway running across the lower half? All intriguing and can't wait to hear how John and the team interpreted it. Thanks for all this extra material, it's like being a part of the process ourselves!

TimeTeamOfficial

Hi Les, this is a portion of the magnetometry survey from this year's dig at the Iron Age Settlement in Cornwall (the site with the associated fogou). We'll be providing more context and the full extent of geophys results in due course, so please watch this space.

Paul Brekke

As quite a few others have pointed out, there is an obvious circular feature in the centre (which from previous TT digs seem to turn into roundhouses :-)), and a small circle in the top left that I can't say I've seen the like of before. However, when I start looking for circular features, I seem to see a faint trace of a second circle just to the right and below the most obvious one, with a strong anomaly in the middle (hearth/pit?)? Also, is there a (semi)circle inside the white box to the left and one more below just the white box? And there are some strange, incomplete curved lines in the lower middle which I don't have any idea about :-) Probably noise and vivid imagination :) Can't wait to see what you found in the ground!! :-)

Pamela Langridge

After careful analysis I can safely say... I have no idea what I'm looking at! Can't wait to see the big reveal.

Bill

Hard to get scale but in the bottom half of the image are two parallel lines (pathway?) that seem to terminate in the next field next to what to my eye is large circular feature but that is hard to tell as the feature is truncated by the end of the image.

John Berley

As a trained American archeologist (don't hold this against me), who hasn't been in the field for 40 years, there is always a tinge of jealousy when I see the geophys, side radar and the like. Had we had that when I was digging we could have moved things along much faster, mapping communities (both native Americans' as well Europeans') without having to do complete (really, partial) digs. Walking around for weeks following maps (usually off from a little to completely) with a probe, then putting in a test trench here and a test trench there got old.

Melinda Nagy

I know some of the lines are probably ditches but the pattern is interesting. There is a large circular shape in middle and a smaller one to top left that could be Iron Age huts but the centre one is very large. The crisscrossing at the bottom looks interesting too. If the red and blue dots are current structures, I would start at the other three spots first. If not, I’d want to know what they are first. It will be fun to find out. I think the markings prove that this site could be explored for a long time (maybe in multiple episodes?)

John Berley

Any way, based on what I'm seeing here, and not having any idea of the scale or the elevation, I think there is at least one pathway - maybe many - along with field separations, all leading, more or less, to a structure.

John Boudewijn

The scale is tricky, but there are definitely some things there that look like circles to me, even a few semi-circular features that disappear tantalizingly off-map. Then again, my brain could just be adding some wishful thinking and bias since the post title was "Iron Age Settlement"... but the small one on the top left definitely looks to be a cracking result!

David Maeer

Really need a scale to say anything about the circular features. Too easy to say round houses, but if they're 50m across then obviously not. Also what are the blue and red colours signifying?

Max Hale

Ancient trackways?

Karen Meyers

Geophys fascinates me. I'm always amazed at what they can "see" on a seemingly empty landscape

Murray M Wagnon

The large circle seems to have a smaller one in it's center. I would want to put a trench through those. It looks like maybe a round house inside a circular boundary? Another trench through the smaller circle (upper left), and one across the double line (trench & wall") pathway.

Terry Cox

I am interested by the faint interlocking patterns beneath the small circular feature at the top left, and right across the very bottom of the plot.

Steve Mikre

Man made circular enclosures, possible iron age round houses and live stock areas...

Ian Ritchie

It looks like a there might be a round house right in the middle of the image with some post holes or small pits inside. It is a faint image but looks exciting.

Malcolm Wright

The double black linears are grubbed out field boundaries whilst the single black ones are probably ditches, either denoting old land boundaries or drainage.

Malcolm Wright

…. The close spaced vertical lines are plough which do not go deep enough to destroy the hut circle too left and a possible hearth or oven showing as a large black positive just below the bottom linear. The blue low negative and red high positive may be metal fences or time team vehicles!!

Mike Darby

I don't wish to sound downbeat, but it is rather like my [then] 2 year old grandson proudly showing me a scribble and being disappointed that I didn't recognise his dragon!

Amanda Kerr-Munslow

It was the geophys on Time Team which got me interested enough in geophysics to choose an undergrad course with a possible large component of geophysics... and ultimately led to my career in remote sensing of clouds (in the sky.) I'm curious about the circular feature I can see just left of centre.

Mike Darby

Sorry, I can't get used to not pressing , to continue, my eyes have been drawn to the lines at the bottom of the scan, which seem to cross over or under one another, possible denoting different periods of activity??

Warren Feldman MD

I would love to see John talk about what all these lines on a scan mean.

Trish Murphy

Does the blue & red spots mean anything? (Hopefully not a stupid question) ✌️💚

Priscilla Logan

The left top corner looks interesting. Maybe start there, what does John say?

Paul Dent

Is that a faint outline of a large roundhouse in the center of the image - ?

Rita Baker

Considering I have been involved in a LIDAR project just this week, I do know that scale is everything.. I can see the large round feature in the middle, just off centre, but without knowing the scale of this for me it is hard to say if that is a hut circle or a large enclosure ditch/mound with a central "blob"... given the many prominent lines on either side of it, who seem to be either trackways or boundary lines I'd say it is too big for a hut circle. Love to see the actual map as an overlay...

Donna Oglesby

Having been one of those that has been watching Time Team for a while now, on youtube, and STILL watching older shows, I can say clearly that there is a large round house that I will like to look at an also a trench over some of the other lines as well, to hit two of three of them. .either way, My bets are on John Gater! He rocks! along with Phil whom is NOT there:-(. sorry but a HUGE " fan" of Phil's. As a Genealogist researcher, I really admire his work.

Dorothy Africa

What is the square outline on the far left. Several of the curved lines appear to go to it, or does the square form overlay them?

Mark Howell

Sometimes geofuzz is hard to read. Not this time. Definitely a network of smugglers' tunnels plus traces of flying saucer landings.

the polish dude

As a retired farmer I see the vertical plow lines and then the drains draining the field from left to right ,my guess only

Liz McRae

Do I see a circle of ? Post holes in the centre with perhaps a ditch cut around a ? Dwelling

Wolfgang Zenker

I would be interested in the horizontal line of low resistance (?) near the top of the image across the red "blob".

Hypatia1

I just wonder how much processing has happened to this data. If you look at the strip on the right it isn't quite the same shading and there is a gap. I wonder if you couldn't get a lot more detail with more leveling and filtering?

Robert Wise

To an untutored eye … Is the actual geophys that fuzzy? What depths are we seeing? There actually is a rough scale. In the videos from the first dig there is a hedge row between the main site and the extra bit… kinda hard to geophys there … tends to leave white blank spaces… And so that large circular feature is HUGE! Looks like there are several layers? The long, and obvious, arcing lines might be ditches? Also what are the long dark lines covering so much of the graphic from N to S (assuming top is N?) … ridge and furrow? That straight? I believe I see two circular shapes, one small and top left, and the other large and roughly center? At least two (?) pits … top right? And maybe more in the additional area bottom left? If I was planning trenches based on this geophys result I’d try to put a trench in at least one spot on each layer. A guess … the ridge and furrow being a layer, the ditches (?) another, the pits a third, and the circular shapes a fourth (?).

Graham Dombkins

I wonder when the move from circles to lines and angles was made? Was it just that circles can only work up to a certain size? Was it an improvement in materials and engineering? Which group made the leap first?

Ian Macintosh

I see a small circular feature top left. A large circular feature in the centre with a central feature within it. The square features within the two central enclosures seem to be aligned on the same orientation.

L0j1k

> As Dr John Gater frequently likes to remind us (without a hint of bias), "the best thing about Time Team is the geophys!" Hahaha! He's right tho, you know!

L0j1k

I see a couple of faint possible roundhouses, which are easier to spot if you rotate the image (or your laptop!) 90 degrees. But also very interestingly, very faint in the central part appears to be some sort of enclosure, maybe a ditch, with something there in the center. Possibly a barrow?

MishaFox

Some interesting anomalies. The center circle is large enough to be a major feature

Jeanne Peskett

As others have said , it's hard to make a judgment without the scale or contextual history. There are plough marks, but are these historical or has the land been used for grazing animals? I'm seeing two large circular feature in the central area. A smaller circular feature top left, and a cluster of circular features towards the lower are of the image. What looks like a trackway overlays another circular feature on it's way to the linear/possibly rectilinear feature to the left of the image. Then there are what are possibly land drains or boundary ditches. So do we have a large roundhouse(or two, maybe one replacing another) surrounded by a cluster of smaller dwellings, one (or two) medium roundhouse with lots of pits, one roundhouse a few pits and some circles caused by later animal feeding stations. What is the linear /rectilinear feature, which looks to be later in origin. Can't wait to find out!

Amy Singerle

I see the circles but always have a hard time figuring out what the lines mean. Are they divisions of pastures possibly or divisions in the settlement or are they roads. I wouldn’t think they would be current divisions since they aren’t straight lines. But this is so interesting. I was excited when I saw the circles :).

Jeanette Moon

I see circles too and one faint square with a blob in the middle. Am I seeing things or am I right?

Suze

OMG!!!! It's an ancient Time Team logo lost below the surface!!! You can just make it out, might have to squint a little! So did they have their own team...or did they know you were coming?

Elizabeth B Hess

would be helpful to provide aerial view so we can rule out existing roads, waterways, pathways. Maybe a third circular feature above and to the right of the large feature at the bottom? More, please

Mrs Mary Ellen Johnson

I see several circles but not sure what the curving lines are though I suspect they are old. The double set could be a ditch but I have never been very good at reading geophysics results. They are very interesting though I have to view everything on my phone so it's not easy to pick many things out. I cant wait for someone to explain there results lol. Take care and stay safe please everyone Mary-Ellen UK

Bruno

Can’t wait to see more.

Dietrich Kappe

Are those plow lines running vertically?

Tari Nz

It is stunning to see these on a new tablet! I have tried to pause old YouTube videos on my phone and squint at the geophys…never quite worked out. These are beautiful!

Nick Balmer

There are "two" layers of landscape on this plot. The darkest lines are relatively recent. Maybe post 800 AD, or possible 1550 AD. You appear to have a post Medieval sunken lane running across the centre from left to right. The other ditches above are farmer ditches. Not all were dug at the same time, as you have a T shape where one has been connected at a later date that the top of the tee was dug. The second layer which is deeper is much older, with traces of an Iron Age, or similar dated roundhouse, and the remains of an associated field system, with lots of very small walled or turf banked garden sized plots.

Brian Kilgore

I can see a faint circle in the middle with another circle inside it, a round house?