New Archaeological Research Facility in Caithness
On 24 April 2008, a new, community-owned archaeological research facility in Caithness will be launched by the Castletown Heritage Society with financial assistance from HIE (Caithness and Sutherland) and the European Fund. The facility has been designed to process materials from excavations and its creation forms part of the River of Stone Programme, promoted by the Caithness Archaeological Trust. It is located in the former Castlehill farm steading recently refurbished as a heritage centre by Castletown Heritage Society.
This will be a collaborative venture with AOC Archaeology Group, assuring the viability of the project. Local community members will receive training in archaeological work and the processing of material from other excavations undertaken in Caithness, both those from within the River of Stone Programme and independent of it. Two full-time and one part-time job for local graduates will be created by AOC Archaeology Group at the site and they will work on materials from sites excavated throughout the United Kingdom. The Castletown facility will be linked to AOC Group’s IT network and all information will be shared in real-time.
The processing to be undertaken at Castletown comprises the wet sieving and sorting of archaeological soil samples, the documentation of the results and the dispatch of materials for expert analysis, mainly at British Universities and Museums. Some routine laboratory analyses will be added to the workload following training of the staff.
Processing will begin with the soil samples from the programme of broch excavation along Sinclair Bay, undertaken by the National Museum of Scotland, Nottingham University and AOC Archaeology Group. Very shortly, Castletown Heritage Society will also be announcing receipt of funding for a significant project on the Dunnet Bay area, also part of the River of Stone programme and materials from this site will also be processed at the new facility. In time, materials from many more sites will follow.
