Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service

Lost Landscapes

Worcester news
of Worcestershire
Project Newsletter
1. June 2017
 HLF grant awarded
Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service (WAAS), in partnership
with Museums Worcestershire, has been awarded 74,900 from
the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF) to bring the Lost Landscapes of
Worcestershire back to life.
Over the next 18 months we will be delivering events and exhibitions
celebrating over half a million years of the area's prehistory, from the
time our ancestors arrived until the end of the last Ice Age 12,000
years ago, culminating in exhibitions in The Hive and Worcester City Art
Gallery and Museum in summer 2018, alongside an exciting programme
of education, research, and exploration.

Arts Council England Collector spotlight:

grant for The Hive
The Hive has been awarded
45,000 by Arts Council
England for a digital art
installation inspired by the Ice
Age, and accompanying artist-
led series of workshops and
events for the public.
The installation will run
alongside the project
exhibitions in The Hive and
Worcester City Art Gallery and
Museum next summer.
We will be working with Arts
organisation Meadow Arts
and digital artists SDNA to
help them find the stories to
inspire the artworks.
Catherine Strickland (1825-88)
Catherine (Mrs H.E.)
Strickland was a
talented illustrator and
administered her
husband Hughs
substantial collections
after his early death,
eventually overseeing
their transfer to
Cambridge University.
Her name survives on
labels in the collections
Below: Mammoth jaw (Cropthorne)
This specimen bears its original label.
The Owen refers to the brilliant but
controversial Richard Owen, with
whom Hugh Strickland corresponded.
 Palaeolithic adjective Paleolithic \p-l--li-thik
of or relating to the earliest period of the Stone Age characterized by
rough or chipped stone implements

Hive mini-exhibition
Look out for a teaser exhibition
in the display cases on level 2 of
The Hiveit will be there until
5th July and then again
throughout August.
Covering Ice Age animals,
human origins and Pleistocene
geology, it introduces some of
the key themes of the project.

Above: Worcestershire
Young Archaeologists Club
members encounter a fragment
of a mammoths ulna (right
forelimb) from Evesham.
Exploring collections
The moose in the attic
High in the attic space of Worcester
City Art Gallery and Museum,
accessible only via a narrow spiral
stair and a walk across the roof, sits
this impressive moose. Acquired by
the museum in the early c20th, and
consigned to the attic in the 1940s
via a since-barred rooflight, were
hoping to bring it down over the
roof and down the side of the
building(!) to feature in next
summers exhibitions.
Why? We know that various species
of moose were resident in Britain
alongside early humans.

Save the date: October half term childrens activities

Watch out for activities at Worcester City Art Gallery and Museum during
half term (24th-26th October). Children will explore the Ice Age and help
to make a Palaeolithic timeline that will feature in next summers
exhibitions.
 What was life like in the Ice Age?
Although it falls within the Ice Age, the last half a million years in
Britain saw huge climatic shifts, from periods where the area now
known as Worcestershire was covered by an ice sheet hundreds of
metres thick, to warm temperate times similar to the climate today.

A staggering variety of animals lived Ice Age? What Ice Age? Come on
here in the past at different times, in, the waters lovely
including:

Auroch (giant wild cattle)

Bears
Birds such as willow ptarmigan
Cave lions
Hippos
Hyaenas
Small mammals including voles &
lemming
Steppe bison
Wolves
Woolly mammoth
Woolly rhino

Neanderthal hunters at Kemerton,

South Worcestershire, 35-40,000 years
ago, alongside mammoth, wild horses,
reindeer and hyaenas.
By Steve Rigby.
 Pleistocene adjective Pleistocene \pls-t-sn\
of, relating to, or being the earlier epoch of the Quaternary or the
corresponding series of rocks. 2.6 million years ago11,700 years ago

CBA West Midlands funding award

A grant of 1000 from the
Council for British Archaeologys
West Midlands branch will allow
the project to hold training
workshops for metal detectorists
across the region in Autumn 2017.
Many of the Palaeolithic artefacts
found in this area have been spotted
on the surface by fieldwalkers.
Detectorists are keen eyes on the
ground, but Palaeolithic artefacts are
notoriously difficult to identify.
The training, organised in partnership
with the Portable Antiquities Scheme,
will equip detectorists with the skills
to recognise Palaeolithic and other
prehistoric stone tools, and help
Above: handaxe from Hallow, them learn more about this
Worcester. c240-190,000 years old, fascinating period in the West
found on the surface of an arable field Midlands.
We have also secured the loan of
a 3D printer and scanner from
West Midlands Museum
Development managed by
Left: Ironbridge Gorge Museum Trust.
reconstruction This will be used for educational
of an adult workshops and training next summer.
male
Neanderthal.
These highly Hominin noun
specialised, hominin \h-m-nn, -nin\
large-brained
people lived in any of a taxonomic tribe
Ice Age Europe (Hominini) of hominids that
for over includes recent humans together
200,000 years. with extinct ancestral and related
forms
 Creature feature:
Woolly Mammoth Mammuthus primigenius

How big were they? How long did they

An adult woolly live?
mammoth was about the Probably up to about
same size as an African 60 years of age,
elephant limited by the
Males measured 2.7m- longevity of their final
3.4m at the shoulder, set of teeth, which
and weighed up to 6 would emerge at about
tonnes the age of 30.
Females measured 2.6m- Once this final set
2.9m at the shoulder, wore out, the animal
and weighed up to 4 would no longer be
tonnes. able to feed itself.
A newborn calf
weighed about 90kg! What did they eat?
Grasses, sedges and flowering plants, plus
shrubs and trees in warmer climates.

When did they live?

Woolly Mammoths were
just one of a number of
species of mammoth. Their
closest living relative is the
Asian elephant. The Woolly
Mammoth diverged from
the Steppe Mammoth,
becoming a separate
species about 400,000
years ago.
Mammoths died out across
Europe towards the end of
the last Ice Age. The last
Where did they live? known from Britain lived
about 14,000 years ago.
In an area called the mammoth steppe, stretching
from North America across Northern Asia and Europe Some isolated populations
survived longer. On
Although they lived during the Ice Age, the image of
Wrangel Island in the
herds of mammoth trampling through Arctic blizzards
Arctic circle, a small
is misleadingalthough very well-adapted to cold
number survived until
(thanks to features such as small ears), they also
about 4000 years ago.
survived warm interstadial periods in which the
They would have been
temperature was similar to Britain today
alive at the time
Stonehenge was built.
Call for volunteers
Between now and summer 2018, we
will be looking for volunteers to help
us uncover the hidden treasures of
Palaeolithic Worcestershire.
We know that Palaeolithic tools and
animal remains are scattered across
collections and museums across the
country, and need help to find out
what else may be out there!
If you are interested in
researching the history of the
collections and the collectors,
helping us to catalogue the finds,
assisting with the conservation
and display of the material, or
helping us to prepare and deliver
outreach and education events,
then please get in touch with project
officer Rob Hedge:
01905 844825
rhedge@worcestershire.gov.uk
A mammoth discovery
https://www.explorethepast.co.uk/2016/08/a-mammoth-discovery/
Exploring collections
University of Reading
archaeology student Sophie
Morland is spending two weeks
with us doing dissertation
research on Palaeolithic artefacts
from Worcestershire.
She is aiming to find out more
about the artefacts themselves
how they were collected, and
what they can tell us about
attitudes to archaeology at the
time of their discovery. The
Worcester City Art Gallery and
museum has its origins in the
Worcestershire Natural History
Society, collecting since 1833,
making it one of the oldest-
established collections in the
country.
Mammoth tusk,
discovered
Spring 2016 in
Tarmacs Clifton
Quarry, south
Worcestershire &
recovered by
WAAS
Supported by grants from:

For more information, please contact:

Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service

The Hive,
Sawmill Walk,
The Butts,
Worcester WR1 3PD

archaeology@worcestershire.gov.uk
01905 845620
www.explorethepast.co.uk

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