Time Team Day 10 - Village of the Templars

A Thirteenth-Century of portrait of Christ was found in an outhouse in a village founded by the Templars.  Time Team aims to find out more about the village they discovered and more about the Templars themselves.  A modern-day Knights Templar member invited the Time Team to learn more about his house.   Tony Robinson meets up with Mick Robinson to determine the area where the Time Team will dig.
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The Templars started as a monastery with walls and a gatehouse.  The home where they settled has undergone many renovations over the years.  A historic buildings expert joins up with the Time Team.  The home is in an intriguing “L” shape.  However, it is behind the house on a farm that the Time Team will be investigating.  There was a ditch in a field and may have been a boundary of the monastery.  Mick quickly draws was the monastery site would have looked like and talks about other Templar sites.  He discusses how similar this site compares to other sites.

Time Team starts in on a first trench in the north farm field that seems to hint at a boundary ditch.  Will the Time Team find dating evidence in the ditch?  Tony and Mick catch up with Phil to find out.  There seems to be a hint of a wall in the ditch.  The Time Team has also discovered floor tiles.  So has the Time Team firmly established that this was part of a final boundary?

Robin and Carenza are in the archives and may have found a chapel on the site.  Was it a Medieval Chapel?  The Templars had a chapel in 1309 and even a chapel was mentioned in the Doomsday Book.  So will the Time Team find a Medieval Chapel on the site?

Back at the house, there is an ancient beam discovered.  It is a fireplace mantel and may have been part of the original home for the Templars.  The Time Team brings in a dendrochronologist on site.  Tony is skeptical that the results will be produced in time.  The dendrochronologist assures Tony that the results will be produced in time.

Robin and Tony meet up and talk about the Knights Templar.  The village where the Knight Templar had only three “fighting monks” at once.  Eventually, the village was taken over by the Knights Hospitaller. 

Carenza and Phil continue to investigate the possibility of a chapel on the site.  There was a photograph of a potential chapel that was believed to be from the Middle Ages.  Upon further investigation, there is a doorstep in a wall that seems to hint at the potential of the current wall being a former chapel.   A second trench is being dug at the potential chapel site.

At the end of the night, the Time Team gets together to do a catch-up.  The geophysics results are still incomplete.  So Mick determines that the two trenches will be expanded.  Tony then asks to see when a dendrochronology date will become available.  The dendrochronologist comes in and gives them the date for one of the beams and the tree was chopped down no later than 1610.  So the beam they found was not Templar.  Despite this, there was plenty of other evidence that the site is Templar.

So what will be found in the farmer’s strawberry patch?  What other evidence will be uncovered to tell the story of the Knights Templar in England?  Tune into the rest of this episode to find out more about the Knights Templar!

This throwback episode was a cool episode to watch, especially seeing how many different experts came together to tell the story of the Knights Templar house and village.  The Village of the Templars would be an episode to show for a fun day in history.

A Thirteenth-Century of portrait of Christ was found in an outhouse in a village founded by the Templars.  Time Team aims to find out more about the village they discovered and more about the Templars themselves.  A modern-day Knights Templar member invited the Time Team to learn more about his house.   Tony Robinson meets up with Mick Robinson to determine the area where the Time Team will dig.

The Templars started as a monastery with walls and a gatehouse.  The home where they settled has undergone many renovations over the years.  A historic buildings expert joins up with the Time Team.  The home is in an intriguing “L” shape.  However, it is behind the house on a farm that the Time Team will be investigating.  There was a ditch in a field and may have been a boundary of the monastery.  Mick quickly draws was the monastery site would have looked like and talks about other Templar sites.  He discusses how similar this site compares to other sites.

Time Team starts in on a first trench in the north farm field that seems to hint at a boundary ditch.  Will the Time Team find dating evidence in the ditch?  Tony and Mick catch up with Phil to find out.  There seems to be a hint of a wall in the ditch.  The Time Team has also discovered floor tiles.  So has the Time Team firmly established that this was part of a final boundary?

Robin and Carenza are in the archives and may have found a chapel on the site.  Was it a Medieval Chapel?  The Templars had a chapel in 1309 and even a chapel was mentioned in the Doomsday Book.  So will the Time Team find a Medieval Chapel on the site?

Back at the house, there is an ancient beam discovered.  It is a fireplace mantel and may have been part of the original home for the Templars.  The Time Team brings in a dendrochronologist on site.  Tony is skeptical that the results will be produced in time.  The dendrochronologist assures Tony that the results will be produced in time.

Robin and Tony meet up and talk about the Knights Templar.  The village where the Knight Templar had only three “fighting monks” at once.  Eventually, the village was taken over by the Knights Hospitaller. 
Carenza and Phil continue to investigate the possibility of a chapel on the site.  There was a photograph of a potential chapel that was believed to be from the Middle Ages.  Upon further investigation, there is a doorstep in a wall that seems to hint at the potential of the current wall being a former chapel.   A second trench is being dug at the potential chapel site.

At the end of the night, the Time Team gets together to do a catch-up.  The geophysics results are still incomplete.  So Mick determines that the two trenches will be expanded.  Tony then asks to see when a dendrochronology date will become available.  The dendrochronologist comes in and gives them the date for one of the beams and the tree was chopped down no later than 1610.  So the beam they found was not Templar.  Despite this, there was plenty of other evidence that the site is Templar.

So what will be found in the farmer’s strawberry patch?  What other evidence will be uncovered to tell the story of the Knights Templar in England?  Tune into the rest of this episode to find out more about the Knights Templar!

This throwback episode was a cool episode to watch, especially seeing how many different experts came together to tell the story of the Knights Templar house and village.  The Village of the Templars would be an episode to show for a fun day in history.