Thursday, July 5, 2012

Gorham's Cave Excavation Set ForSummer

This summer, scientists and curators at the Gibraltar Museum are planning a six week excavation in Gorham’s and Vanguard Caves. Both are sites known to have been occupied by the Neanderthals and Gorham’s was additionally visited by Phoenicians.

The excavations will run from July 30 to September 9 and will involve a team of 35 scientists, students and volunteers from Gibraltar, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Spain, and Italy.

Of the six weeks, the first three will be dedicated to Gorham’s Cave and the last three weeks to Vanguard Cave.

Gibraltar Museum have been planning this summer’s work since last years excavations as the excavations require a great amount of preparatory work.

The work not only involves excavation but also processing and cataloguing of all finds. To achieve the best flow of results the teams at the caves are assisted by teams at the Gibraltar Museum’s Field Station at Parson’s Lodge and in the museum’s laboratories at Bomb House Lane.

In charge of these laboratories is the project’s Co-Director and Chief Laboratory Scientist, Dr Geraldine Finlayson of the Gibraltar Museum who is currently preparing the museum’s laboratory, assisted by Collections Manager, Mrs Marie Mosquera.

Thousands of items should be retrieved during the course of the excavations and every care will be taken as usual to ensure that these objects are conserved and maintained in suitable environments. The laboratory’s function extends to Parson’s Lodge where a sieving station will be established. This is the first line laboratory that will receive the daily finds from the site and the bags of sediment that require detailed filtering.

From here the finds are taken to the museum’s laboratory.

The Museum’s team will have six weeks of hard work and long hours ahead of them as the day’s processing finishes well into the night in order to be ready for the next day.

Commenting on the work ahead, Dr Geraldine Finlayson said “not having a summer holiday has become a part of our family life. Our son grew up thinking summer holidays involved digging in caves! We are totally devoted to this research which has produced major ground-breaking results at world level. To achieve such results requires a commitment that goes well above the call of duty and we have a fantastic team of people in the museum, without whom all this would be much more difficult to achieve.”

Thursday, July 5, 2012

Gorham's Cave Excavation Set ForSummer

This summer, scientists and curators at the Gibraltar Museum are planning a six week excavation in Gorham’s and Vanguard Caves. Both are sites known to have been occupied by the Neanderthals and Gorham’s was additionally visited by Phoenicians.

The excavations will run from July 30 to September 9 and will involve a team of 35 scientists, students and volunteers from Gibraltar, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Spain, and Italy.

Of the six weeks, the first three will be dedicated to Gorham’s Cave and the last three weeks to Vanguard Cave.

Gibraltar Museum have been planning this summer’s work since last years excavations as the excavations require a great amount of preparatory work.

The work not only involves excavation but also processing and cataloguing of all finds. To achieve the best flow of results the teams at the caves are assisted by teams at the Gibraltar Museum’s Field Station at Parson’s Lodge and in the museum’s laboratories at Bomb House Lane.

In charge of these laboratories is the project’s Co-Director and Chief Laboratory Scientist, Dr Geraldine Finlayson of the Gibraltar Museum who is currently preparing the museum’s laboratory, assisted by Collections Manager, Mrs Marie Mosquera.

Thousands of items should be retrieved during the course of the excavations and every care will be taken as usual to ensure that these objects are conserved and maintained in suitable environments. The laboratory’s function extends to Parson’s Lodge where a sieving station will be established. This is the first line laboratory that will receive the daily finds from the site and the bags of sediment that require detailed filtering.

From here the finds are taken to the museum’s laboratory.

The Museum’s team will have six weeks of hard work and long hours ahead of them as the day’s processing finishes well into the night in order to be ready for the next day.

Commenting on the work ahead, Dr Geraldine Finlayson said “not having a summer holiday has become a part of our family life. Our son grew up thinking summer holidays involved digging in caves! We are totally devoted to this research which has produced major ground-breaking results at world level. To achieve such results requires a commitment that goes well above the call of duty and we have a fantastic team of people in the museum, without whom all this would be much more difficult to achieve.”

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Location: Gibraltar