EAST CORNWALL DIVERS

Nautical Archaeological Society (NAS) Courses

NAS Intro Course

Back in March 2006 a number of club members attended an Introduction to Foreshores and Underwater Archaeology Course. This one day course was run by Jon Parlour at DDRC Plymouth. The course covered the following subjects and included a practical session at a swimming pool.

• Basic insight into the principals of Archaeology
• Introduction to a variety of site types.
• Introduction to the basic dating methods in Archaeology
• Introduction to UK protection for maritime archaeological sites
• Introduction to the 2D surveying method
• Practical pool session
• Classroom drawing session
• What next?

What next? We had such a great time and learnt so much on the intro course that we decided to continue on and do the NAS Part 1.

NAS Part 1 Course - Certificate in Foreshore and Underwater Archaeology

In November 2006 we attended the NAS Part 1course. The course was again run by Jon Parlour from DDRC. On the first day, we were at the Torpoint Rowing Club, and the second day at DDRC.

Day 1

We started the morning with a interesting talk from Neville Oldham On site location techniques. He used example of some of the sites that he has found and worked, namely the Salcombe Canon site and the Erme Estuary wrecks. He went on to describe the various dating techniques and how they were applied to these sites. He had many photos of artefacts found at each of his sites.

In the early afternoon we had a practical session, which was a chance to refresh our memories on 2D surveying techniques. Various objects (canon, gold "Chocolate" coins etc) were place around the Torpoint Rowing Club car park. A datum line was placed along it's length. Each of the items was measured in to the datum.

Later in the afternoon we took the club boat out for a practical session. Breakwater Fort was the destination. NAS had already sunk a small sailing boat out there, so that it could be used show how hard it is to work practically underwater. The vis at Breakwater is always poor at the best of times, and today was no exception. The first group went in a took 19 minutes to locate the wreck. The first they knew of it was when they bumped into it. Having taken a few measurements they left a delayed SMB tied to the bow so that the second group could locate it easier.

Day 2

Day 2 started with a talk from Martin Read who is a Conservator. Martin had spent many years working on the Mary Rose project. He gave us an overview of finds handling and the problems associated with waterlogged materials. He was able to show us photos and give examples of finds from the Mary Rose and how they were both excavated, handled and preserved.

In the afternoon we had another practical session and Jon introduction us to 3D surveying techniques. We also were given the opportunity to record the results using Site Recorder 4 SE, which is a specially designed survey software for Marine archaeology.

Later that afternoon we had to take an exam on all the subjects that we had learnt up to date. Needless to say we all passed.

We would all like to thank Jon Parlour and his guest speakers for making it such an enjoyable weekend.