Page 90 - Kennemerland VOC ship, 1664 - Published Reports

R. PRICE AND K. MUCKELROY: THE KENNEMERLAND
established finds classes, and including, in cache of lead scraps came from north-west of
addition to the above data, information about further treatment, photographs taken, drawings made, etc. Thus the basic details about the original circumstances of every find, down to the smallest potsherd or musket bullet, have been recorded and can be used in subsequent analysis. After cataloguing, all items were given a thorough wash, and then packed for transportation t o the museum, being wrapped in disposable kitchen towels, wet or dry as appropriate. Any other item which would not have to undergo further cleaning or treatment (notably pottery) was marked with its finds group number at once; otherwise, this was enclosed with it, usually on a Dymo label.
c. Site C
The prime objective in excavating this site in 1976 was to isolate and lift in its entirety the large lump of concretion lying in the middle (Fig. 3). As a consequence, the strict procedures outlined above were modified, and a good deal of time was spent carefully undermining the concretion, in order to detach it from the bed- rock. In the course of this work, a large number of artefacts were recovered which were related to the overlying concretion, or which had evi- dently fallen from it. Notable among these finds was a section of a fine stoneware mug, with a
the concretion, and a ring of iron concretion lay on the sea-bed to the west of it. In this area, the natural, undisturbed substrate consisted of a compacted yellow gravel, while the rocks and stones within it were generally coated with a silvery-grey deposit. On the other side of the concretion, between it and the cliff, the com- pacted gravel was grey in colour. Being directly below the shipping channel through the South Mouth, a considerable number of indisputably modern artefacts were found in this area. In the absence of further systematic excavations in the vicinity of this site, it is difficult to con- clude anything about the origins of this collec- tion of artefacts, or its significance.
d. Sites F and G: description
Site F, the gully whose excavation was started in 1973 and completed in 1974, and Site G, which was excavated in 1976, are contiguous and have somany features in common that they are best considered together. Lying in about 8 m of water on the western side of the channel through the South Mouth, they contained the most concentrated deposits of wreck material so far discovered. Figure 5 shows the main features of these sites, and the nature of the deposits within them; it should be noted that the only boulders shown are those which are firmly embedded in the substrate, and which
blue glaze and decorated with embossed rosettes,
and also a number of fragments of fine clear
table glass, neither of which objects had previ-
ously been found on this site. Eventually the
whole concretion, measuring 1.5 by 1.1 by 0.8
m overall, was lifted intact and transported on
a pallet to Lerwick, where it was processed by
Mr Henderson. Within it he found six broken
and one complete staves of an oak cask 1-2 m
tall, each about 0.015 m thick, to the inside of
which a large number of barley husks were usually considerably abraded, artefacts. It is adhering; presumably this indicates the original worth noting that both of these sites, being
away from the shipping channel, were almost found to be embedded in a layer of tar, and completely free of modern contamination.
contents of the cask (Fig. 4). The staves were
elsewhere in the concretion several peas were separated out.
The deposit over the remainder of Site C consisted of a fairly homogeneous loose gravel, up to 0.33 m deepinplaces. Within this deposit, about a hundred fragments of green bottle glass were found, the greatest concentrations being to the south of the concretion. A small
Below the loose gravel over the greater part of both sites was a level, 0.10 to 0-15m. thick, consisting of what we have termed an ‘organic matte’ (Fig. 6). Physically, it had a fair degree of intrinsic strength, and could often be extrac- ted in sizable ‘plates’. It was formed of a large number of wood splinters and fragments some of them highly degraded and some extremely
could not be moved during excavation.
On both sites the topmost feature on the sea-
bed was a number of medium-sizedboulders, of the range 0.3 to 0-6m in diameter, which had to be removed before work could begin. Next, there was an even covering of loose gravel and shelly sand, including small stones up to 0.2 m in diameter, within which there were a few,
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