Archaeological Dig Pits

The dig pits at Flag Fen Archaeology Park are very popular and we were asked to design something bigger to accomodate whole school group visits at one time. As always, we did our research and we designed a concept to include 3 large dig pits that the children can get into and dig for exciting remains! In each of the dig pits, we recreated convincing replicas of the incredible causeway finds. We created post alignments, morticed boards, tusk tenons, axe hafts and a replica of the wooden wheel that was found very close by. All were made to look just like the real thing. The challenge was to make these all look like the real causeway remains discovered by Francis Pryor in 1982. We think we nailed it! We stained the wood dark brown and made bronze axe type marks in the wood to make it look worked by our bronze-age ancestors' axes 3500 years ago. The pits are filled with recycled rubber crumb as a digging medium and now children can prtened to be real archaeologists and excavate the remains of the Flag Fen Causeway.

To protect the precious, real causeway remains beneath the ground, this whole creation just sits on the surface and each pit is raised above ground. To create the sense of digging below ground, we created a real raised scaffold platform specially adapted for public access. The scaffolding really makes the pits feel like a real dig site and it's very similar to the scaffold structure used during the excavations at the nearby Must Farm. We've loved designing this structure as it brings a real sense of authenticity and excitment to educational visits at Flag Fen.