Thornborough Archaeology Group

TAG has recently received some 3-400 paper Ordnance Survey maps. These came from the Department of Archaeology at the University of York who, earlier in the summer, moved out of their long time home at Kings Manor in central York. The department held a store of thousands of maps from across the whole of the UK but the time had come from a clear-out and luckily Dr Richard Lee, both a member of both the York department and TAG was able to secure a stash specifically to North Yorks and the Thornborough research area.

Maps are close to the heart of every field archaeologist – where are we ? What does the map show? How old is the map? Is there anything showing on it that is either of interest or perhaps contradicts what we think we know ? And of course once one has started looking at something specific on any given map our eye wanders to what else is there that we might not know about. Map addiction ! Whilst maps are predominantly, dare I say it, digital, now, there is plenty of room to roam across historic paper maps.

Fig. 1. Here’s the Skelton Windmill, ca. 1900, site of TAG’s recent Windmill House excavations.

My map interest started when I was about 11-12 years old and a relative started dragging me up Cumbrian fells. Here was this large map that wasn’t a road map but had lots of unusual looking lines, sometimes in close proximity to one another, all over it. Unusual names appeared on the maps, Helvellyn, High Street, Shap Fell etc.  I recall the same relative standing with me next to Stickle Tarn on the Langdale Pikes and telling me this was where prehistoric people used to live. Evidently this must have had some impact both in terms of Cumbrian Fell walking but for archaeology too. 

Many, many, years later I work in the Dept of Archaeology, University of York, at its iconic Kings Manor building in York. I’m in a small room that is swamped with a few thousand maps that the department wants to offload, as it is moving to new premises and….who wants a load of old paper ? I’m trying to select from the 100+ year old Ordnance Survey maps those that will be useful for the Thornborough Archaeology Group. A lot of the maps are first edition at a scale of 1/2500, printed back in the 1920s, 1930s, even some from the 1890s, sometimes numbered limited prints, and so on. It’s true that many of these can be found digitally on Digimap but, for many archaeologists, paper maps are still the real thing. There is nothing like a full size 1/2500 map for clarity. 

Fig. 2 Maps retrieved from the Dept of Archaeology collection at Kings Manor, University of York, and loaded into the rear of my car.
 On some maps there isn’t much change, the Thornborough Henge map shows what we would expect but no surprises. The map of the Sinderby Henge area doesn’t show anything in the henge location, which is interesting. The henge was only re-discovered  in 2002 but that’s not to say there wasn’t an earlier awareness of something in those fields that a map might indicate. But no, just  empty fields. But, of course, it is part of TAG’s research mission in the years ahead to be able to give some detail to these maps and let’s hope that we can !

Fig. 3. The northern henge at Thornborough from a 1929 OS map.

So, TAG has now inherited a physical archive of  around 300 paper OS maps of its study area.  Special thanks to Dr Helen Goodchild at the Dept of Archaeology, at York, for helping to facilitate this. Looking ahead we, TAG, will have to start sorting the maps into an accessible filing system in their new home in Boroughbridge, so we may be calling for some voluntary assistance in this matter.