Wales Heatwave Exposes 5,000-Year-Old Sites as July Rainfall Falls to 5%
Updated
Updated · bbc.co.uk · Jul 24
Wales Heatwave Exposes 5,000-Year-Old Sites as July Rainfall Falls to 5%
1 articles · Updated · bbc.co.uk · Jul 24
Summary
New aerial surveys across Wales have revealed buried Roman buildings at Caerhun, World War One practice trenches at Deganwy and a previously unrecorded Iron Age or Romano-British farmstead near Llandysul.
About 5% of normal July rainfall, after back-to-back heatwaves and a dry April-to-June period, scorched grasslands and created parchmarks that exposed hidden ditches, walls and other remains.
RCAHMW said some features had not been visible for two or three decades, and archaeologist Toby Driver rushed to record them before changing weather erased the marks.
The discoveries also include a 5,000-year-old Neolithic long barrow near Welshpool and possible Iron Age cattle enclosures near Lampeter, showing how drought is briefly uncovering sites from prehistory to the 20th century.