Day 6/7: The heavy hand of history

Sunday/Monday April 6/7, 2008 -As prehistoric structures are exposed beneath his trowel, Professor Geoff Wainwright is well aware of the "heavy hand of history" on his shoulder. How the team interpret the findings of the dig will shape our understanding of Stonehenge forever.

Over the weekend the team continued to work through the marked-out squares. A timelapse film would show the trench deepening in 5cm layers, called spits. Prehistoric features, such as the edges of a bluestone hole, are excavated as they are found - in this case after the first couple of spits.

There are already a few surprises. How some of the sockets intersect doesn't seem to tally with our current understanding of the building sequence at Stonehenge. They "don't fit into those phases awfully well at all", according Professor Darvill.

As the first week's dig came to a close on Sunday afternoon, a chill descended and the heavens opened. In the warmth of the gift-shop you can find Stonehenge snowstorms. Outside, the real thing.

Day 5: Unidentified flying object, identified

Saturday April 5, 2008 -Today's first wave of visitors to the monument were surprised to see a strange craft hovering over the ancient stones. Fortunately, it came in peace. The ingenious device was a remote-controlled 'rotor-cam', providing a bird's-eye view of the dig site.

Watch the video to see exactly where inside the stone circle the excavation is taking place, described by Professor Geoff Wainwright as "the summit of my professional career". Geoff is wearing the black hat, while Professor Tim Darvill sports his favoured blue overalls.

The deeper part of the trench is a partial re-excavation of Richard Atkinson's dig in 1964, the last at Stonehenge. Principal excavator Dr Miles Russell is working in one of the bluestone foundation sockets that has been uncovered, carved out of the chalk bedrock.

The left-hand side of the trench has never been excavated before - you can see the square divisions mentioned in yesterday's update. Notice too, the sieving area further left, and in the middle of shot, a bluestone is safely wrapped in protective padding.

In the second video, well-known archaeologist Phil Harding explains, in characteristic style, his passion for flint. "It gets into the very soul of you", he says. You'd need a heart of stone to disagree.

Day 4: Excitement as dig moves to 'virgin soil'

Friday April 4, 2008 -The Timewatch and Smithsonian excavation entered an exciting new phase on Thursday. There's still work to be done in the bluestone sockets (chiselled into the chalk bedrock), but at last the team could move onto 'virgin soil' - a rare privilege at Stonehenge.

First, the archaeologists marked out the trench into 50cm-wide squares. Then, they chose four squares at random and carefully cleared them to a depth of 5cm, one at a time. Not unexpectedly, this top level had a scattering of "Victorian picnic debris" said Professor Tim Darvill - fragments of glass, clay tobacco pipes and pottery.

The discovery of some broken-up bluestones, at around 11.30am, was much more encouraging, "just the sort of material that we're looking for", explained the Professor. A hammer stone was also found, but made from a non-local material. This means that it was brought to the area, though for now its origins remain a mystery.

News of the dig has travelled far. Today, like many before them, TV crews from Russia and Germany made the pilgrimage to the world's most famous Neolithic monument. In today's video, David Miles, chief archaeologist at English Heritage, explains why this dig is so special, and Professor Darvill reports from the trench itself.

Day 3: Student discovers beautiful Beaker pottery

Thursday April 3, 2008 - It was a dream start for the team at 9.30am, when archaeology student Chris Watkins spotted a finely patterned piece of Beaker pottery. It's the same age as the monument - the "bees knees of finds", said Yvette Staelens, finds coordinator.

Chris had clearly been paying attention - he'd seen something similar in a lecture by Dr Eileen Wilkes of Bournemouth University.

Another welcome find was TV's favourite archaeologist, Phil Harding - onsite to examine all the flint. His presence brought luck, as a fine flint hammer stone was discovered towards the end of the day.

By this time, removal of the backfill from the older digs revealed large holes in the chalk bedrock - foundation slots for bluestones. Our Neolithic ancestors made these using antler picks, then leveraged in the bluestones and packed the gaps with stones.

As the sun hung low in the west, Professor Wainwright noticed "perfect lighting conditions" to see the carved graffiti on some of the sarcens. He knows these stones like old friends, yet even now can appreciate them in a new light. Watch the video update as Professors Darvill and Wainwright report from the trench itself, and find out why the Beaker fragment is so important.

Day 2: Lucky strike as Neolithic tools unearthed

Wednesday April 2, 2008 - After yesterday's media storm, today the Timewatch and Smithsonian team were buffeted by strong winds instead. Fortunately there were some useful windbreaks around: 40-tonne upright standing stones that have endured for over 4,000 years.

At 9 a.m. sharp the archaeologists got back to their business of digging, scraping, brushing and sieving. No time is wasted, and of course no stone is left unturned. As they rolled their sleeves and got stuck in, the camera team arranged their live video-feed and timelapse cameras nearby.

This makes for a scene of striking technological contrast, but some things never change: carrying stuff to get the job done. Archaeologists carry shovels, trowels and eventually bags of stones; TV crews carry cameras, tripods and bags of sand (to use as weights).

But back to the action. The new excavation also takes in previous digs - one from the 1920s and the last one, from 1964. Though they contain jumbled-up 'backfill', you never know what might have been missed. Different digs have different objectives and 'treasure' takes many forms.

Fragments of Victorian pottery and clay tobacco pipes were again in evidence, but the best finds were two razor-sharp Neolithic flint scrapers (pictured) and the kind of stone hammer that might have shaped them. We'll know more about these tomorrow, when a flint tools specialist is due to visit.

Some other visitors feature today's video clip. Stonehenge means many things to many people, and here the local Druid group 'bless' the site before the ground is disturbed.

Day 1: Ground-breaking

Tuesday April 1, 2008 - History was made by the bucket-load today as the Timewatch and Smithsonican Channel dig got under way. The eyes of the world's press were on Professors Tim Darvill and Geoff Wainwright, as together they broke the ground inside the famous monument. That moment, for the record, was 9:20 a.m. on Monday 31, March 2008.

Once media duties were concluded, including live TV news reports, the team got down to the serious business of archaeological discovery. The fine weather made for good progress; by early afternoon all the turf was removed from the excavation area - a 2.5m-by-3.5m rectangle.

Next, the team began to meticulously remove then sieve the topsoil, and found it "littered with nineteenth century picnic debris", according to Professor Darvill. This included fragments of clay tobacco pipes, glass and that seemingly ubiquitous blue and white porcelain. A medieval hairpin was also unearthed.

The dig is largely out of sight to the public, but a live video-feed beams the action to a plasma screen inside the visitors' marquee, affording a ringside view of a unique archaeological event. A Timewatch and Smithsonican Channel preview is also shown on another screen.

A good first day got even better at around 5pm, when professor Darville declared an "ace find". It was a large flake of bluestone which, he explained, shows clear evidence of having been deliberately struck from a larger stone, thousands of years ago.