By: MOLA Headland
Park Street and the Coffin industry
October 11, 2019Josie Wall works at the Coffin Works Museum, which is run by Birmingham Conservation Trust, as Operations and Volunteer Assistant. Josie’s particular interest and area of expertise is Victorian funerals and the garden cemeteries that opened outside cities in the 19th century. In this blog she explores Birmingham’s legacy as…
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Archaeologists reveal hidden history of Birmingham to the public, as HS2 Park Street excavation ends
September 19, 2019A team of 70 of our archaeologists has completed the main archaeological excavations at Park Street for the new Birmingham terminus of the HS2 railway and will be sharing initial finding with the public at a Heritage Open Days event on 21 September 2019. The extraordinary dig, the biggest of…
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Ask the Expert: Not just any old gridiron
September 11, 2019MOLA Headland Registered Finds Specialist, Owen Humphreys, explores what a Roman gridiron can tell us about cooking technology in Roman Cambridgeshire. One of the largest ‘smallfinds’ from the A14 excavations is a complete Roman gridiron, found deposited in a ditch. Known as a craticula in Latin, gridirons like this were…
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Heritage Open Day: Exploring the archaeology of Park Street burial ground
September 5, 2019Date: Saturday 21 September 2019 Time: 10:00 – 17:00 Price: Free Location: Eastside City Park, Curzon St, Birmingham , West Midlands, B4 7AP (Near The Woodman Pub and Thinktank) As archaeological excavations of Park Street burial ground for HS2 come to a close, meet archaeologists from MOLA Headland carrying out…
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Food or foe? Exploring unusual plant foods along the A14 Cambridge to Huntingdon improvement scheme
August 12, 2019Archaeobotanical remains, from prehistory to the post-medieval period have been uncovered along the A14 Cambridge to Huntingdon improvement scheme. We know that cereal crops such as wheat and barley were staple plant-based foods at ancient settlements and sites along the route, and we uncovered the earliest physical evidence of the…
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A walk through Digbeth’s history
July 22, 2019As archaeological excavations of Park Street burial ground for HS2 come to a close, MOLA Headland Community Engagement Officer, Andy Sherman, explores the hidden historical treasures of the immediate area in this blog. If you’d like to explore the often-forgotten gems of Digbeth for yourself, then download our self-guided walk….
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Digital recording: Advancing archaeological practice for HS2
July 12, 2019Yesterday evening, the team behind the St James’s burial ground excavation for HS2, celebrated at construction industry awards, the CN Awards, as finalists in the category Best Use of Technology. The multi-disciplinary team – made up of archaeologists from MOLA Headland, expert engineers, archaeologists and construction professionals from Costain Skanska…
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The value of excavating Park Street to understanding the development of Birmingham
July 5, 2019Josephine Adams is a historical researcher and specialist in burials in 19th century Birmingham. In this blog she explores past excavations in Birmingham and the potential of the Park Street burial ground excavations, being undertaken by MOLA Headland on behalf of LM for the HS2 project, to allow a better…
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Ask the Expert: Anglo-Saxon textile making on A14C2H
July 3, 2019Across the scheme we’ve uncovered items which relate to Anglo-Saxon clothing and textile production, sometimes in small amounts, and sometimes in larger, more concentrated amounts. In this blog, MOLA Headland finds expert Lyn Blackmore comments on the evidence we have so far… Q: To make clothes, Anglo-Saxons would first have…
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