Archaeology
1930’s British railway carriage found buried in Antwerp
Archaeologists from the city of Antwerp, Belgium, have uncovered a 1930’s British railway carriage during excavations for the Oosterweel Link.
The carriage was found buried along the future route of the Oosterweel Link, part of the greater R1 Antwerp Ring Road being constructed.
According to a press statement by the Oosterweel verbinding, the carriage is stock from LNER – London North Eastern Railway, one of the Big Four railway companies which operated between 1923 and 1948.
The LNER covered the areas north and east of London, and also included the East Coast Mainline from London to Edinburgh, and the routes from Edinburgh to Aberdeen and Inverness.
The company was nationalised in 1948 along with the other Big Four to form British Railways. It continued to exist as a legal entity until it was formally wound up in 1949.
The carriage is painted in red oxide, a colour mainly used around 1930 before it was phased out for the characteristic Oxford blue livery. On the sides are inscriptions reading “”…NITURE REMOVAL TO HOUSE”, “Enquire at any station”, “BK 1820”, and “LNER”.
Image Credit : Oosterweel verbinding
BK 1820 indicates that the carriage is a Container Conflat BK 1820 which was a special wooden decked conflat wagon used for furniture removal, although some were built with insulation for refrigerated use.
Many of the BK 1820 stock were previously cattle trucks, but were converted into container conflats following a downturn in livestock traffic.
Speaking to HeritageDaily, a representative from Oosterweel verbinding, said: “It remains a mystery how the train carriage ended up in Antwerp and why it was buried. It may have been used as a storage space when the North Castle [site of a 19th century fortress] became a recreational spot.”
Header Image Credit : Oosterweel verbinding
Sources : Oosterweel verbinding
This content was originally published on www.heritagedaily.com – © 2023 – HeritageDaily
Archaeologists from the University of Warwick are conducting an underwater study to document the submerged Mesolithic site of Bouldnor Cliff before it vanishes due to erosion.
Bouldnor Cliff is situated in the Solent between the Isle of Wight and the southern coast of England. The site was first discovered in 1999 when divers observed a lobster discarding worked flint tools from its burrow on the seabed.
At a time when Britain was cut off from mainland Europe by rising sea levels, the area of the Solent was a river valley inhabited by an advanced Mesolithic community who developed a boat building technology 2,000 years ahead of their time.
The study aims to find new data on the nature of the late Ice Age environment during the development of the Mesolithic era, and the extent of the interaction between the inhabitants of Bouldnor Cliff and Europe, including the exchange of materials.
Professor Robin Allaby, who is leading the expedition, said: “This is an incredible opportunity to understand the lost world in which the Mesolithic developed using the latest techniques before our chance is gone.”
The study will involve a comprehensive palaeoenvironmental analysis, in addition to state-of-the-art techniques such as optical simulated luminescence for constructing ecological profiles. Furthermore, archaeologists intend to recover archaeological artefacts and environmental markers to reconstruct the past environment.
Dr Kinnaird adds: “This is an exciting research project to showcase the new innovations in luminescence dating, which can tell when an object was last exposed to the Sun. The relevance of this technique in writing the narratives for 4000 years of history, at the time that the British coastline was rapidly changing, is huge!”
According to the researchers, these discoveries carry the potential to significantly transform our comprehension of the era when Britain emerged as an island.
Header Image Credit : University of Warwick
Sources : University of Warwick
This content was originally published on www.heritagedaily.com – © 2023 – HeritageDaily
A study of the “Excalibur” sword found in Valencia has been revealed to have Islamic origins sometime during the 10th century AD.
Valencia is one of the oldest cities in Spain, founded under the name of Valentia Edetanorum by the Romans in 138 BC.
The city was conquered by the Moors in the 8th century AD, and was destroyed by Abd al-Rahman I of the Umayyad dynasty. Under Caliphate rule, the wider city area became known as Madînat al-Turâb (meaning “city of earth” or “sand”).
The sword was discovered back in 1994 in a house on Valencia’s Historiador Chabàs Street, where it was found standing upright in a grave beneath an Islamic era house.
Dubbed “Excalibur” due to the circumstances of its discovery, the sword is made from iron and has a hilt decorated with bronze plates. In mythology, Excalibur was the legendary sword of King Arthur and appears in various medieval poems describing Arthur pulling the sword from a stone.
However, the “Excalibur” from Valencia was found in a sedimentary strata from the 10th century AD and was likely the weapon of a cavalryman from the Andalusian Caliphate Era.
According to the archaeologists, the sword measures 46 centimetres in length and has a slightly curved blade towards the tip. Swords from this period are rarely found well-preserved due to the levels of oxygen and water in the soil that causes oxidation of the iron.
“It is the first Islamic sword that appears in the city of Valencia, with only one similar example being found during the excavations of Medina Azahara, the caliphal city of Abd al-Rahman III, in Córdoba,” said the Valencia City Council.
Header Image Credit : The Archaeology Service (SIAM) of the Valencia City Council
Sources : Valencia City Council
This content was originally published on www.heritagedaily.com – © 2023 – HeritageDaily
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