Bridgend Young Archaeologists' Club
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December 2004 The Egyptians The Egypt Centre in Swansea provided the venue for this years' Christmas celebrations. With the help of Stuart Williams and the Egypt Centre's young volunteers, we had a look at Egyptian life and culture and started by trying on the costumes of pharaohs, noblemen, scribes, farmers and dancing girls. Stuart told us that in Ancient Egypt men were more likely to wear make-up, wigs and kilts (skirts) than women! We also discovered that although children are always shown as naked in Egyptian art that is just to help the people looking at it tell the difference between adults and children. Inside the first gallery we had a go at playing an Egyptian board game called 'Senet' and had a look at some 6,000 year old objects from the Museum's collection including shabtis (small statues of servants designed to serve the dead in the afterlife), glass, jewellery and coffin clamps. Here's Kieran holding a shabti.
In the second gallery, 'The House of the Dead', we found out about sacred animals and learned that the Egyptians named their animals after the sounds they made. (Donkeys were called 'Ee-Aaws', small dogs were called 'Yips' and cats were known as 'Miaows'!) We also made offering trays - filled with model food which the dead could eat - and learned how to make a mummy! Making a Mummy The Ancient Egyptians mummified their dead in order to preserve their bodies. We mummified a body of our own! If you'd like to hear all the gory details, then read on! Otherwise, click here to skip to a review of November's meeting.
First of all, we had to remove the internal organs. We placed the lungs, stomach, liver and intensities in canopic jars but we wrapped the heart in bandages and put it back inside the body and pulled the brain out through the nose with a long hook and threw it away. The Egyptians believed that the heart was the source of intelligence and would be needed in the afterlife, whereas the brain was not important.
Next, we filled the body with natron to dry it out and preserve it, placed amulets on it to protect it from evil and wrapped it in bandages. This normally took the Egyptians 15 days but we managed it in 10 minutes! Finally, we performed the 'Opening of the Mouth Ceremony' to restore the mummy's senses and allow it to eat, speak, see, smell and hear. Our mummy was finally ready to be placed in a coffin.
If you would like to find out more about Ancient Egypt, click here to have a look at a website designed by the British Museum. You can even have a go at playing Senet yourself!
Viking Life Three of our sessions so far have had links with the Vikings. We’ve looked at how they write, what they’ve left behind for us to find and how they made their clothes. But who were the Vikings – fierce hard-drinking warriors in horned helmets, right? WRONG! OK, so admittedly there was some piracy, warfare, raiding and pillaging and they were rather good at it, thanks to an incredible skill at boat-building and seafaring and a culture where fighting earned fame, wealth and power. But Vikings were also farmers, weavers, craftsmen, poets and merchants; and we know that there was peaceful immigration of families into Britain in the 10th century because Anglo-Saxons and Vikings needed to get along to allow trade. Place-names, archaeology and DNA testing all show that this happened. Raiding other countries wasn’t unusual for the time (late 8th to 11th century). What gave the Vikings a bad press was their targets – monasteries, including one of the most famous and sacred, Lindisfarne. The monks were understandably miffed and, being the authors of much of our historical sources, tended to produce a rather biased account! This month Sam Emmett, site supervisor from the excavations of a Viking settlement on South Uist in the Outer Hebrides came to speak to us. Sam told us that people began living on the settlement in the Iron Age and stayed there until the 15th Century. We looked at photographs of the excavation of Mound 2, which had had a series of houses on it dating from the 10th Century AD to the 14th Century AD. One of the houses on the Mound had curved walls and Sam told us that this house had been built in the shape of a boat.
One of the houses (House 3) happened to be the same size as the Resource Centre: 20 metres long by 6 metres wide. We decided to recreate the house. Click here to read about our discoveries.
October 2004 Graveyard Survey
On Saturday 16th October, we
met at St Cein’s Church in Llangeinor to carry out a graveyard survey. We were
greeted by the Revered David Mortimore who told us a little bit about the History of the
Church before we began our survey. Here’s what he said. St Cein St Cein was the beautiful daughter of
the Welsh king Brychan who rejected the many men who sought her hand in marriage and
instead grew up to become a nun, sailing away to Cornwall where she visited St Cadoc at
St. Michael’s Mount. St. Cadoc told her that she should return to Wales, which she
did in 480AD when she settled beside a hillock in a place now known as Llangenny and
prayed so hard that a holy spring burst forth from the ground. The spring is said to have
the power to make the first person to drink from it after getting married dominant in the
relationship. The Church St Cein’s Church is thought to
have been established by the Princes of Morganwg 1500 years ago when they put up a wooden
building to be used for worship. During the 12th Century, the De Londres family
of Ogmore Castle replaced this wooden building with a simple stone church, built in the
Norman style - and the original Norman font can still be seen in the church today. Work
started on the present building in the 1600s, with the church tower being added on in the
1700s. In 1892, the Church was extended over the graveyard to the east to make space for a
choir and a sanctuary. Some of the oldest gravestones in the churchyard, which had
originally been outside can now be seen in floor inside the church. Our Survey We each took a Memorial recording form and went out into the graveyard to see what we could learn about the people of Llangeinor. Gravestones and memorials can be used to help us chart changes in life expectancy or mortality rates (such as how many people died each year or each month and how long people lived), study Christian names, collect information on past generations (such as the types of jobs people did, how many children they had, where they were born and died), examine attitudes to life and death (whether people believed in a soul or an afterlife, whether they wanted to remember the dead person for their achievements or as a family member), find evidence of the stonemason’s craft or local art and search for information on named individuals.
Please click here to view the results of our survey.
September 2004 Ancient Writing This month, we were looking at Ancient writing. Writing is one of the most important human inventions. Since it was first devised in around 3,500 BC, writing has been used to record and spread information. Writing was not invented in one place by one person, but evolved in different places at different times. At the same time as the Egyptians were developing hieroglyphics, the sumerians were developing Cuneiform and the Chinese were developing their own style of writing. Have a go at Cuneiform! In
approximately 3,300 BC, the Sumerians were drawing pictures in clay to record their
business transactions. Over time, these pictographs evolved into simpler symbols that came
to represent sounds and cuneiform was born! Cuneiform means ‘wedge shaped’
because it was written using a reed which left wedge shaped marks in soft clay.
If you would like to learn more about Cuneiform, why don't you join one of the workshops accompanying Queen of the Night exhibition at the National Museum in Cardiff? Cylinder seals Sun 14 & Sun 21 November, 11am & 2pm Take inspiration from printing and writing techniques of Ancient Mesopotamian civilisations and carve a cylinder seal to your own design. Suitable for ages approx. 8+, This activity requires patience, concentration and the use of some sharp tools. Parent/Guardian must supervise this activity. Booking advised (029) 2057 3142. Write at the beginning - Cuneiform Workshops Sat 20 November, 11.30am, 2pm & 3.30pm Taking inspiration from The Queen of the Night plaque, learn to write your name in cuneiform – an Early Mesopotamian writing form that uses wedge-shaped characters, and take home a special chart to teach others. Led by the British Museum’s Irving Finkel, from the department of the Ancient Near East. FREE. Book on arrival at the Museum, suitable for families.
August
2004 Bridgend Branch
Launched! After months of planning and
preparation, the Bridgend Branch of the Young Archaeologists’Club was officially
launched on 17th July, during National Archaeology Weekend. Over a hundred
people came to the event to the event to see the different displays and activities that
were on show. There were a wide variety of activities that visitors could try their hand
at, including washing Roman pottery and tile from Caerleon in Gwent and reconstructing
real Roman pots by carefully piecing together the fragments. Several people showed a
talent for the Viking craft of cord winding, and we hope budding weavers will enjoy the
first 'proper’session on August 21st, where you’ll learn all about
how ancient textiles were made and have the chance to try some different types of weaving
yourself. A real treat was a Viking storyteller, who entertained visitors throughout the
day and inspired an enjoyable performance by some would-be actors among the visiting
children. But perhaps the most popular activity was the chance to have a go a daubing a
wattle fence (pictured left) – and from the many mud-spattered people we met,
we’d say that lots of our branch members are well on their way to becoming real
archaeologists, with a knack for getting dirty!
The launch also saw the proud
unveiling of The Hub, a purpose-built building where school visits to Tondu Ironworks will
be based and which will be headquarters for YAC Bridgend. Although there are still a few
finishing touches to be done, it is clear that The Hub will be able to host a whole range
of activities. We look forward to decorating it with YAC members’work soon!
Guest of honour was archaeologist
Mick Aston of Bristol University and Channel 4’s Time Team, who kindly agreed to
officially launch the branch. In addition to giving a speech and answering questions on
what life as an archaeologist and TV celebrity is really like, Mick mingled with our young
archaeologists, shown here going through the fascinating collection of finds brought by
the Kenfig Society for visitors to sort through. Mick also kindly gave a copy of his book
and autographed a trowel as prizes for our raffle and we are delighted to say that the
winner of the trowel has generously donated it to YAC Bridgend to display in our new
Resource Centre. Our thanks to everybody who joined in with such enthusiasm and helped to
make the day a success. |
