Time Team Day 12 - Three Tales of Canterbury

Good morning, Thirty One Days of the Time Team continues to press on for October.  I am continuing  with a season eight and an episode on Canterbury.  In fact, this episode is going to tell three different stories from this medieval time.  The Time Team in three days is going to excavate a Roman Pagan Town, a Medieval Factory, and a Medieval Friary.  The run time for this episode is 48:53 and it is called Three Tales of Canterbury.

Sandi Toksvig and Liza Tarbuk, rookie archeologists, join up with Tony and the Time Team.  The Time Team is going to tell three different stories about Canterbury.  The first story involves pagan temple.  Then the Time Team is going to excavate a Medieval Friary and perhaps come face to face with the pilgrims that would have made their way to Canterbury.  Finally the Time Team will learn about a medieval factory.  What will the Time Team find in three days?  

Canterbury was an important city in Medieval History.  It was a place where pilgrims journeyed to.  Phil, Carenza, Mick and Phil talk about what is going ton with this dig and eventually they meet up with Sandi Toksvig and Liza Tarbuk.  The challenge is to uncover as much as they can in three days and the Time Team is going to do it live.

The first trench will go in over a Roman Temple site.  John Gater goes over the geophysics results.  Phil will have to make his way through some concrete to put in the first trench.  Liza heads on over to the bookstore to learn about the Roman remains that were found.  The bookstore was over a former Roman bath.  It was cool to see the Roman bath, the Roman theater, and the Roman House all right at Canterbury.  Back in the yard, Uncle Phil has discovered gravel where the Romans would have walked to enter the temple.  An iron age coin and Roman pottery is discovered at this site.  What is the significance of this area to the temple?  What else does Uncle Phil find in his trench?  Tune into the rest of the episode to find out!

The second trench goes in over the Medieval Factory site.  This factory made roof and floor tiles.  The geophysics results show a giant blob in the middle of the field.  Trench two goes over this blob and trench two goes in by hand.  However the ground is hard, and so a digger is called.  The diggers get potential bigger and finally the trench is dug.  Immediately, bricks are found that indicate that there was a kiln on the site.  During this section there is a bit of experimental archelogy making tiles.  What will be discovered on this site?  Tune into the rest of the episode to find out!

The third site that the Time Team is going to excavate is the Medieval friary.  The geophysics results show some fascinating wall anomalies and trench three goes over those walls.  Over the three days, the Time Team wants to find as much as they can so they can recreate the friary.  Immediately floor tiles are discovered and it is a black and white checkered board floor.  A second trench in this friary site goes over the hospital site.  One of the most interesting finds that were made at this site was a beautifully carved knife handle.  What else will be discovered at this site?  What do these digs tell us about the history of Canterbury?  Tune into the rest of the Time Team to find out.

I was nervous about this episode, because I did not think the Time Team could dig three separate sites in three days.  However I was proven wrong and they handled the digs very well.  This episode was divided up into three different chapters for each of the different stories.  The episode would show all three days at one section, then the next section would do the same thing, and the final section the same thing.  It was an interesting way to do it.  It kept everything together.  This was a very good episode and the story of Canterbury had a good flow to it.  I liked the experimental archeology part of it too.  This would be an episode that I would show to a history classroom.