Time Team Day 13 - The Lost Villa

We are continuing with our fall edition of Thirty-One Days of Time Team with a flashback to season two.
​
Why is there a pagan figure buried in a church?  Time Team is on the case!  They are in the heart of the Wiltshire countryside and the Time Team is here to solve a riddle.  There were no known Roman Rules in the area, except for this figure in a church.  Victor Ambrus sketches it while Tony reads an explanation for the statue.  Why is this statue on the wall?  Was this the site of an earlier pagan settlement?  You do not want to miss this episode of the Time Team.

The Time Team begins taking core samples of the ground surrounding the church and will do geophysics of the site.  Will there be walls found on the site?  Did the Romans build something on an earlier site?  Was this site considered a holy site to the pagan people?  Was this a sacred spring?  There could be years of ritual history buried in the pond? 

The Time Team heads to the archives.  Carenza discovers that there was a possible Roman site in the village and immediately tells Tony the good news.  Maybe the Time Team will have to search to a field outside the village.  In the field, there were Roman tiles discovered.  Will the Time Team be on the verge of discovering a temple?  Tony catches up with Robin and Victor to explore the possibilities of what this temple looked like.

One local farm discovered Roman remains while plowing.  He meets up with Carenza to field walk.  He would like to know more in order to not damage any additional finds.  Carenza is convinced that there is something in the field and rushes to get the geophysics team.  They have to finish up with the church before they go to the field.  Tony and Robin catch up and examine maps of the field over the decades.  Robin wants to come up with a master plan of the area to hand over to future generations.  The geophysics team starts working in the field.

Mick and Tony then meet up with an expert in Roman Statues to see what the statue was that is embedded in a church wall.  Did this statue come from a temple?  Or was this statue found in a household?  Does this seem to change things for the Time Team?  The Geophysics results on the field are showing promise.  There was something in the field.  So, the Time Team view the evidence that was found by the farmers.  Masonry, wall plaster, roofing tiles, and coins were discovered in the field.

The geophysics team will work late into the night to map the field.  The Time Team gathers and discusses what was found.  Mick believes that there is a villa on the site.  Day Two kicks off with the geophysics results.  This is the moment of truth for the Time Team and the results are good.  There is evidence of ditches and squares hinting at a massive complex underneath.  It is clear that something is in the field.  More results are coming in and it looks like there was a potential villa on the site.  It would the first villa found in the area.  The Time Team now faces some challenges before they start to dig.  Will Time Team find a villa in the ground?  Tune into the rest of this episode to find out!

This would be an excellent episode to show for a history class.  There was a good debate on whether or not they should dig the site because of the geophysics results which could lead to some good discussions about archeology.