Norton Disney group goes global

An exciting rare find of a Roman artefact thrust the Norton Disney community into the media spotlight. Andrew Vaux explores what’s next for the Norton Disney History & Archaeology Group.

If it hadn’t been for the submission of a local planning application, it’s likely that Norton Disney History & Archaeology Group (NDHAG) would never have been formed as a small group of volunteers researching their local community’s archaeology.

But when residents rallied round to oppose plans for a gigantic rendering plant on top of a hill near their village, which they thought would blight their quaint surroundings, little did they know where it would lead.
Realising that a piece of land close to the village had traces of Roman occupation on it that could be irrevocably damaged by the plans, they began work to expose the historic importance of the site.

Luckily, the county council eventually rejected the planning application, partly on the grounds of the damage to the “historic environment”, but the wheels had already been put in motion for the growth of the local historical group and its exciting archaeological finds.

Secretary of Norton Disney History & Archaeology Group, Richard Parker explains: “We did a lot of work researching the Roman villa and started to do some archaeological investigations ourselves in archives and museums. Then, with the dismissal of the planning application, we realised there was an awful lot of interesting archaeology around the Roman villa, so carried on from there.

“We’ve been fundraising and carrying out geophysical surveys, field walking and, more recently since 2022 carrying out excavations in partnership with Allen Archaeology, a local Lincolnshire-based commercial archaeology company which has given us a lot of help and support.

“Norton Disney is often called ‘the site that keeps on giving’ by archaeologists because there’s something new which keeps coming out of the ground!”

Hidden treasure
It was during an archaeological dig in June 2023 that the site ‘gave’ NDHAG something extremely special indeed.

Richard explains: “We found lots of evidence of industrial activity. People had been smelting iron up there, and I’d called Norton Disney the ‘Iron Age Scunthorpe!’

“We moved to our now-known Roman site where we’d initially had some metal detectorists go in and find some Roman coins which gave some dating information.

“And then, working with Allen Archaeology, we had a geophysical survey commissioned, which gave us some clues as to where the archaeology is precisely in the ground – ditches, buildings, and things like that.

“There was this dark blob about five metres across on the geophysical survey which we decided to put a trench across, just to find out what it was in the ground. And that’s where we found a lucky dip in local archaeology.

“About a metre down, out popped one of the rarest and most unusual Roman items you could possible imagine – a Gallo Roman dodecahedron!”

Richard still remembers the excitement to this day.

“At the time, I was making the tea. I went running across having heard these cries from the trench and Rob Evershed, who was the archaeologist in charge of the dig, was holding this thing up with Richard Watts, who was the person who found it.

“They said ‘We’ve found a Roman dodecahedron.’ I’d only ever read about those before, I’d never actually seen one.

“Up until then there were only 32 known examples in Roman Britain. Ours was the first found in Lincolnshire. Just 130 found elsewhere in northwest Europe.

“What was interesting about ours was that it was complete. There’s nothing missing on it, whereas a lot of others are found in bits. It’s in lovely condition, and it’s large. In fact, probably as large as they go, about 8cm across and weighing about 254 grammes.

“Having found this rather exceptional thing, we all crowded around and stopped work for a couple of hours whilst we discussed what we were going to do next.”

Digging for Britain
In terms of fame for NDHAG, following the dodecahedron find the rest, as they say, is history!
Richard continues: “Luckily, we’d been already filming for BBC TV’s Digging for Britain. I rang the producers and said ‘look we’ve found this amazing item’ and they asked me to do some footage for a ‘Dig Diary.’

“The dodecahedron subsequently went in what they call ‘The Tent’ on Digging for Britain, where Alice Roberts has a closer look at things. This was last September and then we appeared on Digging for Britain in January.

“At first, the dodecahedron was on display in Newark, and we arranged for it to go to the Lincoln Museum in May. It then hit the national media again. We appeared on BBC’s Six O’Clock News, Have I Got News For You, and in media across the globe, including Times of India, Miami Herald, and several European magazines and journals.

“So, it was literally a massive international story about the finding of the Norton Disney dodecahedron. We had thousands of hits on our website and lots of social media interest in it, as you can imagine.

“The publicity was really helpful because it increased interest in us as a little group, and also attracted some funds which helped towards excavations on this year’s dig.”

So, after all the excitement of last year’s dig, what happened this year?

Richard says: “We found the dodecahedron on the second to last day on last year’s dig. The original idea for this year was to go back and find out a bit more about why we found it when we did. Basically, what is this thing, and why was it there?

“Architects are literally scratching their heads to this day, and arguing as well as to what its purpose might have been.

“There’s a myriad of the bizarre and the unusual and we’ve been bombarded with ideas like it’s a knitting device, it’s a device for putting candles in, it’s a device for measuring distances. The most unusual one, which I quite enjoyed, was that it was a Roman dog treat dispenser!

“People look at it and come up with a use for it. The thing is, it’s not a tool or a practical item. It has no wear and tear on it. The metallurgy is slightly strange in that it has a lot of lead in it. It’s about two-thirds copper, a third lead, with a tiny amount of tin in it, which makes the metallurgy difficult to pour into the mould and would probably have taken several attempts to get a perfect one, as there’s a lot that go wrong in the manufacture.

“It’s more likely to have been some sort of religious or ritual device. To be honest, I’m quite happy that the mystery remains as it gives us something to focus on!”

Protecting history
So how does the excavation process work?

Richard explains: “Being amateurs, we have two digs a year and must spend the other 50 weeks fundraising!

“Excavations are primarily in two parts. There’s the excavation itself, where you find things, and then you’ve got the post-excavation work which takes much longer. It’s much more thorough as you get experts to look at the finds and try to identify what they are, give you some dates, and give you more context around the wider site.

“That’s just about to start now from our June dig. We’ll pass our finds on to Allen Archaeology, and it’ll probably take them about three to four months to go through each individual piece of pottery.

“At the end of the process we’ll get a report from Allen Archaeology. We make sure it goes to a database of archaeologists known as the Historic Environment Records in Lincolnshire. This is an official database run by the county council. We’ll also put the findings on our website and publish them on social media.

“This autumn we start fundraising again, looking for grants and donations. Hopefully we’ll get the money by next spring and then it’ll be a case of speaking to the landowner to agree if we can visit again next June to dig some more large holes.”

Richard concludes: “We’re probably the luckiest Lincolnshire archaeology group by far, to find something which has literally taken the world by storm.

“But we didn’t get there by accident, we got there by a lot of careful and methodical work, going through the museum archives, looking at things like aerial photographs, commissioning geophysical surveys, doing field walking, and gathering all that information to build up a picture as to where the archaeology was.

“We’re extremely grateful to local landowners and supporters, including Gusto Homes, who kindly give us the services of a digger driver and MCB Brothers from Langford, who lend us a very large excavator every year. Also, Allen Archaeology for their partnership work with us and professional expertise. Without them, none of what we’ve done would have been possible.”

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