Welton-le-Wold, Lincolnshire: An Understanding of the Ice Age

English Heritage ALSF summaries. 2002/2003

EH Project Number:	3447MAIN
Funded Unit:	Heritage Lincolnshire

Introduction and background to the project

In the late 19th century, sand and gravel extraction was started in a former river valley on the northeastern limit of the small village of Welton-le-Wold, located in the chalk Wolds of Lincolnshire. The quarry ceased to operate in the mid 1970s, after nearly a century of excavations, leaving an area of extraction of approximately 50Ha. The quarry was landscaped after operations ceased, but the legacy of exhausted ground with little agricultural value lives on. Tree planting schemes to improve the landscape in the early 1990's are only just beginning to mature due to the poor land. The recent entry of part of the site into the Countryside Stewardship Scheme by the landowner and the acquisition of part of the site by the Lincolnshire Wildlife Trust is an attempt to diversify and create an asset out of the former extraction site.

Whilst the quarry was operational, exposed faces revealed a sequence of up to 13m of three distinctive tills overlying some 10m of sands and gravels. The latest till has been firmly identified by its erratic content to the Devensian tills of the Holderness coast of Yorkshire. The lower two tills and the sands and gravels, however, are more problematical.

The material

In the late 1960s and early 1970s three Acheulean type hand axes, a flake and a collection of faunal remains were collected from a depth of 2-3m into the gravels below the tills from the western quarry section. The section from where the material came was examined and recorded by C. Alabaster and A. Straw and the results published in 1976.

At the time, the published report ascribed the archaeological and fossil material to the Hoxnian interglacial, and thus, dated both the two lower tills overlying the gravels to the Wolstonian.

The sequence

Since then, the remapping of deposits in the Midlands has revealed that the glacial sequence at Wolston is in fact the westward continuation of Anglian deposits in East Anglia. The 'Wolstonian' is therefore redundant as a name for this cold stage and until recently, it was widely accepted that the only Middle Pleistocene glaciation that could be recognised in Britain with any certainty was the Anglian.

This view is now challenged by a number of geologists, some of whom recognise glacial deposits that can be correlated with OIS 16, 12, 10, 6 and 2. The implications for the sequence at Welton-le-Wold, is that the dating of the lower two tills and the underlying sands and gravels is now unresolved and disputed. The implications for the archaeological material at Welton-le-Wold, is that it could be post Anglian (post -OIS12) and belong to the interglacials of OIS 7 or OIS 9 or, it could be equivalent to the pre-Anglian Bytham Formation, with an OIS pre-12, a difference of more than 200,000 years.

Site importance

The completeness of the glacial sequence, the potential of the site to resolve critical questions of chronology in regional Pleistocene studies and the existence of stratified Middle Palaeolithic artefacts make Welton-le-Wold one of the most important quaternary sites in the East Midlands. Because of this, the quarry is a designated geological Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) and a Regional Important Geological Site (RIGS). The evidence, however, has been quite literally buried under a mass of quarry overburden when sand and gravel extraction was suddenly abandoned in the mid 1970's.

Facelift

Over the winter of 2001/2, the quarry received 'Facelift' funding from English Nature to re-create key exposures in the western and eastern limits of the former sand and gravel pit. The primary aim of the Facelift grant was to enable the significant educational and research potential of the quarry to be realised.

The Facelift grant has successfully kick started a re-interest in the quarry. The inception of this project is a direct result of increased awareness of the importance of the site and increased accessibility to it.

Aims and Objectives of the Project

The fundamental aim of the project as a whole is to apply a multi-disciplinary approach to further understand and enhance the archaeological and geological resource at Welton-le-Wold former sand and gravel quarry.

The project proposes to build on the work done in the 1970's with the benefit of greatly improved scientific techniques and understanding and enhance and develop the quarry as a regional educational resource for individuals and groups in all areas of formal and informal education, as well as visitors and local residents.

To achieve this, the project has been structured into 4 separate project areas; each of which has its own main aims. These are:

Project Area 1: A re-examination of the artefact and vertebrate fossil assemblages.

AIM: To re-evaluate the artefactual and faunal assemblages to gather fresh information about the age, environment and context of the material

Objective 1: To re-evaluate, verify identification and further analyse vertebrate faunal remains

Objective 2: To re-analyse the stone tools

Objective 3: To re-analyse the stone tools and fossil bone for degree of abrasion to provide critical information on the (assumed) secondary depositional context of the Palaeolithic artefacts and bones

Project Area 2: Geophysical and borehole investigation.

AIM: To re-assess and further investigate the context of the finds previously recovered from Welton-le-Wold former sand and gravel quarry.

Objective 1: To locate the original 1970's gravel section, or the existing buried gravel face in the western quarry exposure

Objective 2: To core the sequence of gravel deposits in the western and eastern faces in order to:

reconstruct a stratigraphic section of the gravels for comparison with those recorded by Straw between 1969 and 1972
compare each of the faces
assess the potential for artefact and fossiliferous bearing deposits
Objective 3. To re-assess and re-examine the upper and lower sequence of the Welton Beck Member gravels with modern geological techniques.

Objective 4: To identify and assess deposits for Palaeoenvironmental, fossil and artefactual potential.

Objective 5: To identify and sample deposits suitable for OSL dating.

Project Area 3: Further excavation of the 'Facelift' exposure in the Wildlife Trust Reserve to create a permanent extension of the visible Pleistocene sequence.

AIM: To build on and enhance the educational and research value of the geological resource within the former quarry at Welton-le-Wold.

Objective 1: To further excavate the geological section in the eastern geological reserve to create a permanent extension of the Pleistocene sequence.

Objective 2: To re-examine the Welton gravels with modern geological techniques, following recommendations made in Project Area 2.

Objective 3: To sample deposits for Palaeoenvironmental, fossil and artefact potential according to recommendations made in Project Area 2.

Objective 4: To identify and sample sediments suitable for OSL dating as recommended by the results of Project Area 2.

(NB. Funding for Project Area 3 is being sought from English Nature ALSF. A decision will be made in August as to whether they can support it).

Project Area 4: Outreach and dissemination.

AIM: To complement and enhance immediate and long-term intellectual access to the geological and archaeological resource at Welton-le-Wold.

Objective 1: To raise awareness of the former quarry at Welton-le-Wold as an educational resource amongst schools.

Objective 2: To raise awareness of the former quarry by launching the newly accessible faces in a Welton-le-Wold day.

Objective 3: To involve the wider community in the fieldwork by organising and training a voluntary force to search gravels excavated in Project Area 3.

Objective 4: To enhance the understanding and interest of the geological reserve by developing on-site interpretation panels.

Objective 5: To disseminate information about the geological and archaeological resource at the former quarry at Welton-le-Wold in a clear and accessible form for use by other organisations developing long-term interpretation strategies, educational material and museum displays.

Project Team

The core project team are:

Joanna Hambly, Heritage Trust for Lincolnshire

James Rackham, Environmental Consultancy

John Aram, Geologist

Dr. Jim Williams, English Heritage Regional Science Advisor

Helen Gamble, Lincolnshire Wolds Countryside Service (Lincolnshire County Council)

Specialists and specialist contractors are:

Dr. Danielle Schreve, faunal analysis, Royal Holloway, UCL

Jenni Chambers, stone tool abrasion analysis, University of Southampton

Dr. John McNabb, stone tool stylistic and typological analysis, University of Southampton

Dr. Peter Graham/Interkonsult, Ground Probing Radar

Dr. Peter Barker/Stratascan, Electrical Conductivity

Simon Dawson, Electrical Imaging

Mark Goring/Site Investigation Services, Coring

Dr. Ed Rhodes, OSL dating, University of Oxford,

Dr. Robert Scaife, Pollen analysis

Ben Burgess/Creative Nature, Environmental earth moving

Richard Roberts, Centre for British Teaching, (Lincolnshire County Council)

This page was published 31/07/03