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Helen O’Neil, born Helen Evangeline Donovan in 1893, lived with her family at Camp House which straddled the western entrance to Salmonsbury Camp. During the Thirties Helen Donovan married Bryan O’Neil, a British archaeologist who became Chief Inspector of Ancient Monuments. They had met on site. After the 1932-34 excavations, Helen continued with occasional excavationsContinue reading “Archival Rabbit Hole 4”

The Dunning Donovan excavation continued for three more seasons. 1932    The digging season in 1932 was rich in finds, with the discovery of hut sites of three superimposed periods (Roman, late and early iron age) just within the western bank of the Camp. This area was described as site III. At least one had aContinue reading “Archival Rabbit Hole Three”

The largest portion of the Salmonsbury Archive that arrived in the Corinium in 2023 came from early twentieth century excavations. During the Twenties, A.S.Owens of Keble college, Oxford had been bringing undergraduates to Bourton on the Water for quiet study and had wanted to excavate the earthwork which was usually referred to as a RomanContinue reading “Archival Rabbit Hole Two”

Modern archaeological archive reports can be quite dry to someone who responds to the more narrative form of history. So, my way in to understanding this site was historical. I looked for the ways Salmonsbury camp was written about in the past. This rabbit hole was deep – prehistoric sites have been understood in allContinue reading “Archival Rabbit Holes 1”

they write things differently there Salmonsbury Camp – recorded as `Sulmonnes Burg’ (Suhl monnes-burg = Ploughman’s burg) in a charter of Offa of Mercia dated AD 779. The courts of the Liberty or Hundred of Salmonsbury traditionally assembled at the northern entrance to the enclosure throughout the medieval period.  “It is so called from BurgContinue reading “The Past is a Foreign Country”

In the Seventies the redoubtable Helen O’Neill found a strange object on the Avilon site at #SalmonsburyCamp She called it a totem. It isn’t with the archive and after research I have concluded that it was returned to the landowner. It’s whereabouts now are, so far, a mystery. Based on the illustration in GC Dunning’sContinue reading “Totem”

Experiments have begun for my #SalmonsburyCamp project.Recreated the camp in cloth and wool, then I’ve buried it.I’ll dig it up in a month or so.I should have started this social media malarkey a while back after my first days on site but time and task ran away with me. @coriniummuseum @gloswildlife @greystonesfarm@aceagrams @tnluk @dcmsgovuk#acesupported #DYCP