Berkeley Festival of Archaeology

During the Berkeley Festival of Archaeology there will be a number of events. Please look out for leaflets and poster with more details.



Saturday 12th July
Join stone conservator Graham O’Hare for a Tour of the Tombs and Wildlife of St Mary’s Church. Then have a go yourself with hands-on Monument Recording. Suitable for all ages.
2-6pm, tickets £5 (including refreshments). Meet at Dr Jenner’s House.


Sunday 13th July
Raptors, Royalists and Ruins — Lots going on in the Church, at Dr Jenner’s House and in the Castle.
Cream Teas and Refreshments in the Church 2.00-5.00pm


Wednesday 16th July
"Berkeley Before the Berkeleys: The Anglo-Saxon Minster Church"
A talk by Michael Hare piecing together the surviving evidence of the substantial Anglo-Saxon settlement at Berkeley. Michael is a Research Fellow at University of Bristol and his paper ‘Anglo-Saxon Berkeley: history and topography’ has recently appeared in the journal Anglo-Saxon Studies in History and Archaeology.
Dr Jenner’s House, 7:30pm (doors at 7pm), tickets £5.

Out of the darkness: Spring’s hope

As Spring brings the promise of new life around us, David Frith looks at the hope for our future promised by the life of Christ

Hazel, celandines, aconites, snowdrops. Can you make a link between these four plants? Perhaps for you, as for me, they are – as early
flowering plants – signs of hope that the winter, however long, dull, cold and wet, isn’t going to last forever. So we look out for them in our garden or in the country and are cheered a little when we see the first yellow hazel catkins in January, or emerging snowdrops in February.

It’s a natural tendency to seek for new signs of hope when all is dreary round about us, in our lives as well as in the natural world. How cheering it is when we see those earliest spring flowers, or gradually realise that the evenings are getting lighter! A particular favourite of mine is a winter honeysuckle which comes out in mid to late January (very early January this year!) and gives a lovely sweet scent at a time of year when we least expect such fragrant blessing.

It’s possibly easier to spot hopeful signs in nature each year because we can identify the repeating patterns of the seasons, but the early
harbingers are the most sought and welcome. So for the gardener, the first strawberries in summer or the first blackberries or plums in autumn are more special than the subsequent bulk of the fruit and vegetable harvest.

Spotting signs of hope in our lives can sometimes be harder, especially if worries or problems are weighing in on us.

Read more: Out of the darkness: Spring’s hope