Space Age Lasers Reveal Offa's Dyke Missing Link

Western Daily Press ^ | 6-1-2007 | Janet Hughes

[blam]

SPACE AGE LASERS REVEAL OFFA'S DYKE MISSING LINK

BY JANET HUGHES J.HUGHES@BEPP.CO.UK

08:00 - 01 June 2007

It has remained hidden for centuries but space-age technology has stripped away layers of history to discover what excited archaeologists believe could be a missing section of Offa's Dyke.

Aerial laser technology, which allows the experts to see what is hidden below the trees and the undergrowth, has discovered a long strip of earthworks in the Forest of Dean.

And archaeologists believe they may have finally found a missing 250-metre stretch of the Dyke built by King Offa between 757 to 796 AD to keep the English and the Welsh apart. Now they are planning a major study to check out if the findings taken from the air match those on the ground.

"The study has produced some exciting results," said senior project officer John Hoyle, the man charged with interpreting the results from the latest Lidar technology.

"There's a section of earthworks which looks like it could be a missing section of Offa's Dyke. Everybody assumed that particular section had been destroyed by quarrying but this shows it could still be there, hidden under all the brambles and bracken.

"But this isn't an exact mathematical process so now we have to validate the findings by pulling on our boots and trying to find it on the ground."

According to the earliest records by King Alfred's biographer Asser, the dyke built by the former King of Mercia to separate England and Wales, stretched "from sea to sea".

Much of the 80-mile stretch snaking from the Wye Valley to Wrexham is still visible and in places walkers can see the original ditch and rampart which was 27ft wide and eight metres high.

But farming has destroyed some sections in the Welsh Marches and some believe extensive mining and quarrying in the Forest of Dean and the Wye Valley is responsible for large gaps at the Gloucestershire end.

The gaps led some historians to question whether Offa did build his dyke sea to sea or stopped short of the Severn estuary, but local archaeologists believe there is enough evidence to prove he did reach Beachley.

The newly found hilltop earthworks at Wyeseal Woods, near St Briavels, fills the main gap on the Tutshill to Redbrook section of the 8th century barrier and is near the site of a disused quarry.

The new section could prove the dyke did go all the way to the Severn and and help back a theory that any differences in construction are because Offa's ancient builders took a few lazy short cuts in the county and filled in the gaps between older, less impressive earthworks, rather than start from scratch.

The mystery earthwork was pinpointed by the 'Lidar' which sends out 33,000 pulses per second to map the ground below the trees and bushes which are later digitally removed from aerial pictures to reveal what lies underneath.

It is the first time the technology has been used on such a large scale and experts from Cambridge University spent hours flying over the Forest in a small plane mapping 280 square metres of forestry.

English Heritage, the Forestry Commission and the local council paid £100,000 for the cost of the survey to help county archaeologists find out more about what lies under the woodlands.

And the missing section of Offa's Dyke is not the only thing local archaeologists are excited about after seeing an initial Lidar report.

It has helped them identify sites of charcoal, iron and coal workings dating back to Roman times .

[Old Professer]

Dumb headline, I was curious to see what happened to Oprah’s girlfriend.

[Sawdring]

Do you think an average senior in high school would like reading Sykes book? My stepson is getting interested in his Norwegian heritage and I think he might enjoy it if isn’t too technical.

[SittinYonder]

mark

[CholeraJoe]

BTW, the world's highest concentration of 'O' type blood is behind Offa's Dyke.

Having 3 of 4 grandparents with Welsh surnames would certainly explain the almost universal prevalence of O positive in my family.

[blam]

"Do you think an average senior in high school would like reading Sykes book? My stepson is getting interested in his Norwegian heritage and I think he might enjoy it if isn’t too technical."

Sykes book would be fine. Oppenheimer's would be a bit too technical.

[SunkenCiv]

· join list or digest · view topics · view or post blog · bookmark · post a topic ·
	Gods Graves Glyphs	Just updating the GGG info, not sending a general distribution. To all -- please ping me to other topics which are appropriate for the GGG list. GGG managers are SunkenCiv, StayAt HomeMother, and Ernest_at_the_Beach
·Dogpile · Archaeologica · ArchaeoBlog · Archaeology · Biblical Archaeology Society · · Discover · Nat Geographic · Texas AM Anthro News · Yahoo Anthro & Archaeo · Google · · The Archaeology Channel · Excerpt, or Link only? · cgk's list of ping lists ·

[SunkenCiv]

• Ancient Offa's Dyke ... was built 200 years before King Offa was born [2014]
• Ancient graves hint at cultural shift to Anglo-Saxon Britain [2014]
• 'Travellers' flatten 50 yards of Offa's Dyke with a bulldozer: [2013]
• English Heritage steps in to rescue prehistoric earthwork ["Roman Ridge"] [2011]
• Ancient Britain Had Apartheid-Like Society, Study Suggests [2009]
• Medieval canals spotted from air [2008]
• Work Begins To Uncover Secrets Of Silbury Hill [2007]
• 100-Mile-Long Wall in Africa [Sungbo's Eredo] [2006]
• Was Arthur a king or just a battle commander? [2005]
• New Dating For Wat's Dyke [2004]
• Genes show Welsh are the true Britons [2002]

[SunkenCiv]

The Roman historian Eutropius in his book Historiae Romanae Breviarium, written around 369, mentions the Wall of Severus, a structure built by Septimius Severus who was Roman Emperor between 193 and 211:

Novissimum bellum in Britannia habuit, utque receptas provincias omni securitate muniret, vallum per CXXXIII passuum milia a mari ad mare deduxit. Decessit Eboraci admodum senex, imperii anno sexto decimo, mense tertio. Historiae Romanae Breviarium, viii 19.1

"He had his most recent war in Britain, and to fortify the conquered provinces with all security, he built a wall for 133 miles from sea to sea. He died at York, a reasonably old man, in the sixteenth year and third month of his reign."

This source is conventionally thought to be referring, in error, to either Hadrian's Wall, 73 miles (117 km), or the Antonine Wall, 37 miles (60 km), which were both shorter and built in the 2nd century. Recently, some writers have suggested that Eutropius may have been referring to the earthwork later called Offa's Dyke...

The Venerable Bede also mentions the wall built by Septimus Severus. But Bede says that the wall was made of earth and timber, a description which would closer match Offa's Dyke than the Hadrian Wall Antonine Walls.

After many great and severe battles, (Severus) thought fit to divide that part of the island, which he had recovered, from the other unconquered nations, not with a wall, as some imagine, but with a rampart. For a wall is made of stones, but a rampart, with which camps are fortified to repel the assaults of enemies, is made of sods, cut out of the earth, and raised high above the ground, like a wall, having in front of it the trench whence the sods were taken, with strong stakes of wood fixed above it. Thus Severus drew a great trench and strong rampart, fortified with several towers, from sea to sea. Bede’s Ecclesiastical History of England, Bk 1-5

[Wikipedia, Offa's Dyke]