Archaeology Actually

Kia ora, Earlier this year, ahead of the start of  construction of a new six-storey building on the University of Otago's Christchurch campus , a team from our archaeological research and consultancy unit at the University, Southern Pacific Archaeological Research (SPAR) , undertook an  archaeological salvage excavation on the site. The excavation was one of the conditions of an archaeological authority for the construction works that had been granted to the University by  Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga .   In New Zealand, these authorities are a legal requirement where there is reasonable cause to expect that earthworks will affect archaeological evidence associated with pre-1900 AD human activity. In the present instance, the site is located on Oxford Terrace in Christchurch along the Avon River, right in the heart of the earliest occupied part of the  Canterbury Association's  Church of England settlement (which was founded in 1850 AD). Archaeologi...

Kia ora, Due to recent work schedules, it has been difficult for my partner and I to take full advantage of New Zealand's post COVID lockdown freedoms and travel very far beyond Dunedin. Fortunately, within less than an hour's drive of where we live there are plenty of scenic walking tracks, opportunities to view local wildlife, and some fascinating heritage sites! Ross Creek Reservoir I mentioned the Ross Creek Reservoir when I talked about the Silverstream Water Race in my last post . This reservoir was created in the 1860s to meet the need for a reliable water management system for the then rapidly growing settlement of Dunedin, becoming New Zealand's first major urban water supply. Built and initially managed by the privately owned Dunedin Waterworks Company (backed by a provincial government guarantee), construction began in August 1865 and was completed in November 1867. The facility was taken over by the Dunedin City Council in 1875. The Ross Creek Earth Dam and Va...

Kia ora, Over the last couple of weeks I've been fortunate enough to be able to take advantage of the slightly relaxed COVID-19 restrictions by visiting some local walking tracks around Dunedin. This included a walk along one of The Silver Stream Water Race Tracks . Water races are a familiar component of historic goldfield archaeology in New Zealand. These are channels that were cut across hillsides to bring water from streams to places where gold was mined.  The Silver Stream Water Race was not established to supply water for gold mining however, but to help meet the demand for water of a rapidly expanding urban population in the nineteenth century. View of North Dunedin ca. 1861 ( Hocken Snapshop , Item 0518_01_003A ). North Dunedin in December 1874 (To create this image I've stitched together two separate photos taken from the steeple of Dunedin's First Church and sourced from  Hocken Snapshop ). In the earliest days of Dunedin ...

Kia ora, For the last month New Zealand has been in lockdown to try and eliminate the Covid-19 virus. This has temporarily placed considerable restrictions on our normal freedom of movement. For most New Zealanders, this has meant travel outside of one's immediate neighbourhood has been limited to the access of essential services, such as grocery stores and medical care. In response I thought I would write a short blog post about a couple of sites of historic interest I've come across during recent walks in my local area - the North East Valley in Dunedin.   I thought it was particularly appropriate to write a New Zealand focused blog post this week, seeing as it is New Zealand Archaeology Week . This is an annual nation-wide event coordinated by the New Zealand Archaeological Association that is now into its fourth year. In previous years events such as public exhibits, talks and guided tours of archaeological sites and landscapes have been held across th...

Kia ora, During a trip to the Republic of Korea (aka South Korea) in 2017 I came across a piece of the Berlin Wall standing in a small square in Seoul.  The Berlin Wall was a concrete barrier that once physically and ideologically divided the city of Berlin in Germany. It came to symbolize the wider division of Western and Eastern Europe during the post-World War II conflict  between "western Capitalism" (the USA and allies) and "eastern Communism" (the Soviet Union and allies) known as   the Cold War .  The piece of this monument in Seoul had been gifted by the Berlin State Senate in 2005 to stand as a memorial and as a sign of hope for the future reunification of the divided Korean peninsula. November 9 2019 marked the thirtieth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall (or more precisely, the lifting of restrictions on movement between the east and west). This anniversary had me thinking a bit about a developing interest of mine - the archaeology of the...

Kia ora, The University of Otago in New Zealand is presently engaged in a number of capital development works across its Dunedin campus and part of my present employment at Southern Pacific Archaeological Research (SPAR), a research and consultancy unit in the University's archaeology programme, has been to monitor many of these works and record any archaeological evidence that is uncovered. Yours truly investigating a cobbled surface uncovered during the archaeological monitoring of capital development works on the University of Otago campus (Photo: Karen Greig). These capital development works have included the construction of a new facility for the University's School of Dentistry, which was preceded by a large open-area archaeological excavation undertaken by SPAR in early 2016. This excavation uncovered extensive archaeological deposits dating back to the 1860s, a period during which the young settlement of Dunedin was developing and expanding rapidly followin...

Kia ora, In December 2017 I wrote a post looking back at some of the highlights of that year in New Zealand archaeology. In that earlier post I noted that the archaeological record in New Zealand was something that often people in New Zealand were either not aware of, or tended to dismiss the importance of (despite it presenting unique opportunities on a global scale). "Real" archaeology is often perceived as something done overseas and not here in our little country in the corner of the South Pacific. A little later than last time, but with 2019 still in its infancy, here is a look back at some of the very "real" highlights of 2018 in New Zealand archaeology (in no particular order):   Significant piece of early European history unearthed in Wellington   Back in January 2018, OneNews reported on the discovery of significant infrastructure from the early European colonial period during the Lombard Laneway upgrade in Central Wellington, including the remai...