Hunt for Teesdale village left deserted after black death

ARCHAEOLOGICAL volunteers are surveying a medieval hamlet in the upper dale that could lead to an excavation of the site later this year.
A team from Altogether Archaeology last week took measurements and captured data from about eight medieval long-houses at Middle Farm, near the Strathmore Arms pub.
The team believes there may also be two roundhouses from the Anglo-Saxon and Roman period nearby.
Volunteer Martin Green, from Altogether Archaeology, explained that the buildings date as far back as the 1200s and 1300s.
He added: “It may well go back further in the past. A lot of the land would have been ploughed. A lot of oats, some barley and wheat, and patches of beans and vegetables. They would have had hay meadows by the river.
“It is difficult to know how many people there were. One estimate is 150 people or so, about as many as there are people in Holwick now. It was quite a bustling hamlet.”
He said the climate was a lot warmer during that period which allowed for crops to be planted but the arrival of Black Death and a colder climate led to a decline of the population.
Agriculture switched to sheep and cows because fewer people were need to manage the animals, he added.
Evidence has also been found of a path and the remains of shieling huts up to the higher ground of the fell.
Animals would have grazed on the fell in summer and be brought down into the valley during the winter, Mr Green said.
He added: “This might have been one of the biggest settlements in the area because it is in an ideal location next to a spring. It could date back further, possibly Anglo-Saxon, we don’t know.”
Altogether Archaeology was established initially by the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty Partnership (AONB) using to Heritage Lottery Funding to determine the archaeology of the North Pennines.
One of the first projects was to investigate the lowland areas of Teesdale to build on work done by Dennis Coggins and Ken Fairless to survey the uplands in the 1970s and 1980s. It was during this investigation, Mr Green said, that the Holwick hamlet was discovered.
Altogether Archaeology was transformed into a community archaeology group after the Lottery funding ran out, and it now funds itself through membership fees.
Current finances allow the group to carry out one or two excavations each year.
They were previously successful in discovering a mesolithic (middle stone age) hunting ground at Cow Green, and more recently uncovered a Roman road near Hexham.
Mr Green said that depending on the outcome of the survey at Holwick, which included taking GPS and theodolite measurements to exactly position the longhouses, an excavation of the site could take place later this year.
Altogether Archaeology volunteers extended their thanks to landowner Strathmore Estate and tenant farmer Andrew Robinson.