Digging up the past in the Lomonds

Oliver O'Grady with some of the volunteers.

Spring has arrived and many people's thoughts are turning to digging the garden '“ but in the Living Lomonds they are thinking of a much bigger bit of digging.

The Living Lomonds Landscape Partnership (LLLP), set up to conserve the landscape, will be holding its third, and last, Big Dig on Falkland Estate next month – and everyone can get involved.

Audrey Peebles from LLLP explained: “It’s an archeological investigation of royal medieval deer hunting at Falkland and this year’s community dig will be focussing on the ‘deer park pale’ – a large bank with a ditch and wooden palisade on top that would have enclosed the park, keeping the deer inside. The other area of attention is known as the Chancefield trenches, which are thought to have been used in trapping and sorting deer for the medieval park – but no one knows for sure.”

There will be a range of opportunities for members of the public to get involved, from signing up as a community volunteer archaeologist to simply taking a site tour.

The first event of the Big Dig will be a talk by leading experts John Gilbert, Piers Dixon and Oliver O’Grady at Falkland Centre for Stewardship Stables on Saturday (April 9), followed by a guided walk to Chancefield Trenches, where some of the potential explanations for the construction of the trenches will be discussed.

To book a place visit http://www.livinglomonds.org.uk/events/.

The LLLP is an association of organisations in Fife and Perth & Kinross who have come together to deliver a landscape conservation programme between 2013 and 2016. The Partnership has received funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund alongside other funding bodies including Scottish Natural Heritage, Fife Council and Historic Scotland.