Post Dig Analysis: Bodies in the Shed (S13E01)

Very excited that the U.K. is getting Covid under control through vaccination. Hopefully, we can get to digging soon.

I am never concerned about finding a specific period or building. For me it is just interesting to understand what there is, or isn't there. The magic is in finding out what you can about the site itself.

Kieran Gane

Really enjoyed this discussion and the extra information given about the report to read . These posts are so interesting , thanks so much .

Sarah Holloway

Your write up was so interesting to read. I rarely eat figs, they are just not something I think of buying, but that little recipe of figs you wrote at the end sounds really good.

Sonia Hamilton

A Roman delicacy, Ficus Newtonae? (Forgive my inept attempt at Latin.)

Jeff Lanam

Thanks for keeping us updated!

Emily Flotilla

Wow, what a terrific post. Thank you.

The bit about the fig is so interesting! I lived in Brooklyn for 18 years, and one of the best kept secrets about Brooklyn is that there are probably a good 50,000 fig tress in its 77 square miles! This is, of course, the result of so many Italians moving there over the last hundred and fifty years or so. Brooklyn is almost entirely what you would call terraced houses, what we call brownstones or row houses. A complete block of such houses creates inside its confines a micro-climate where a surprising range of flora can grow. (One year, I had a solitary cherry tomato ripen on Christmas Eve! It was very red but totally flavorless! Still...) Anyhow, the first place I lived in Brooklyn had previously been owned by an Italian American family who grew grapes in the back yard, and who had two very nice fig trees back there as well! One was a green fig, the other a black fig tree. The black figs were the tastiest. A black fig, sliced in half, with a hunk of really good Reggiano Parmigiano cheese, wrapped in a thin slice of prosciutto... absolute heaven. And you knew when it was time to pick them because you had to chase the wasps off them. The ecology of the fig is tied into being pollinated by wasps. I really wonder if in Roman art or literature or whatever, there are any references to the connection between wasps and figs.

Dan Hermann