Photoessay #2785 - Heathrow

For this week,  for my landscape arachaeology class, we had to read this long reading prepared by the archaeology people who were researching the site that would be used for the (now complete) new Terminal 5 at Heathrow airport in London.

165 pages of tight detail and some inferences...it does demonstrate different kinds of data that archaeologists can use...excavation, pollen, insect remains, postholes, waterholes, pottery, piles of burnt flint, tools.  The project intensively studies a fairly large area next to the airport which was used as a sludge works when they started.  That's a big area where they spread out sewage to dry and then sold the resulting solid as fertilizer (pictured).  Apparently, this was established in 1934 and Heathrow Airport was built (or maybe developed further) in 1945.

This report covered the period 3600 - 700 BC.  Even after that long haul, I was left wondering, well what happened next?  The high point (so to speak) for me was the C1 Stanwell Cursus, a several mile long elevated walkway used for ritual purposes near the beginning of this interval.  Quite a monument; predated agriculture and farm animals.


A picture of the sludgeworks circa 2002 prior to the building of Terminal 5.  I love the idea of knowing what it was like prior.