Northwoods Archive
Mar 08, 2009 by Claire Statter
With a track record of efficient archive deposition at local museums, L – P : Archaeology was contacted by Cheshire Museum Service when they were given finds from a 1980’s excavation of a Medieval manor house at Northwoods Farm in Audlem, South Cheshire. The site was fully published at the time but the finds, with their original excavation notes, had been kept by the landowners in non-archival packaging in an attic. Cheshire Museum Service wanted to make sure that the artefacts were reconciled with the project documentation, correctly stored to slow deterioration, and made accessible to both researchers and to the museum service for display.
Over the years much of the excavated material, such as coins mentioned in the report, had been lost. The remaining assemblage consisted of enormous amounts of pottery, some clay pipes and even an iron door lock with the key still in place. There were also many bags of building material, plaster fragments and mortar, as well as iron-working slag, all of which (in response to the Museum’s retainment policy) were counted, weighed and catalogued before being disposed of.
L – P organised the Northwoods material into a usuable resource: all finds to be kept were quickly assessed, labelled, rebagged, boxed and catalogued to Cheshire Museum Service standards. A spreadsheet detailing the artefacts was filed with the finds so that each object can be easily identified against the text of the excavation report.
| Client: | Cheshire Museum Service |
| Site: | Northwoods |