Amateur archaeologists can get specialist advice to help identify their discoveries at a special event hosted in conjunction with Freshford School and Freshford and District Local History Society.
The free ‘Archaeology for Everyone’ event features an object identification and family activity session at Freshford Memorial Hall on Saturday 3 March, from 11am to 3pm.
Members of the public are encouraged to bring along any items they have unearthed – whether they were discovered with a metal detector, in the garden or while walking the dog.
The local finds liaison officer from the Portable Antiquities Scheme and staff from the Bath & North East Somerset Council-run Roman Baths Museum will be on hand to help identify the objects.
Councillor Cherry Beath (Lib-Dem, Combe Down), Cabinet Member for Sustainable Development, said: “Bath & North East Somerset Council is pleased to hold another ‘Archaeology for Everyone’ event and we’d like to encourage as many people as possible to come along to the session at Freshford Memorial Hall on Saturday 3 March and bring their finds – big and small – with them. We live in a truly distinctive place and such discoveries can offer an important source for understanding our past.”
Staff from the Roman Baths Museum have worked with children from Freshford School on an archaeology discovery day as part of a ‘Let’s imagine’ week, and there will be a special display of their work at the Memorial Hall. The Freshford and District Local History Society display will also help visitors to find out more about the area.
Stephen Clews, Manager of the Roman Baths, said: “We held a similar event at Radstock Museum a couple of years ago – which was very successful – with a medieval dagger being donated on the day. We also had a finds day in Bath in 2010 which resulted in an African spear being identified.”
The Portable Antiquities Scheme is a voluntary scheme to record archaeological objects which are found by members of the public in England and Wales.
Every year many thousands of objects are discovered, many of these by metal-detector users, but also by people whilst out walking, gardening or going about their daily work.
