Mudlarkers

[RedGinger]

Darn, I wish we had this show in America! Maybe the American History channel will start airing it. How many in the UK are watching it? It looks like you can watch episodes on the site. Super cool.

 

[rockbot]

Talk about addicting Red. I would love to scratch around the tides.[]

 

[RedGinger]

Me too! From what I read, you need a special permit and an even more special permit to search the oldest areas. The things they find are unbelievable. England has a very diverse, ancient history. When I see a stone age axe they found, I think, "What was happening right where I'm living, or in America at the time that was made?" If I ever visit England, there is so much to see and do, but I would try to somehow get together with the mudlarkers, to dig.

 

[bostaurus]

It is hard to get that permit and from what i remember they have to have their finds inspected by the officials and anything deemed 'important' goes to the museums.
I think Britain is pretty good about paying for stuff though. Now whether they pay for every find they take or if they pay a reasonable price...I don't know.

 

[RedGinger]

ORIGINAL: bostaurus

It is hard to get that permit and from what i remember they have to have their finds inspected by the officials and anything deemed 'important' goes to the museums.

Well, I can dream! I would have no problem giving my finds to a museum. It would be nice to find out exactly how old the item was and was it was. As long as I had a picture of it, I'd be proud to have it in a museum and happy if it was an important discovery. Bottom line, I just want to dig up some cool stuff in the mud.

 

[bostaurus]

England is one of those places that you can have a chance of finding stuff anywhere. A friend that lived up the street from me dug up some Anglo-Saxon coins in ther garden. She took them to the local museum and they told her that an ancient footpath used to run through the area where her house stood. Just have to leave it up to imagination as to how the coins ended up in the dirt.

The Roman excavation I worked on in the summers stood in a cattle pasture. One day the director took us over to the cattle trough and told us to look what the farmer had used to hold it up off the ground....it was bits of carved stone from the Roman villa...to the farmer they were just bits of stone.

 

[CALDIGR2]

I was there a few years ago and actually walked the Thames at low tide. Bloody freezing cold, but old trash everywhere.