Dig for Victory - Roman project judged the best in Britain

Aylsham's Roman Project in Norfolk was the best community archaeology project in Britain. Credit: Aylsham Roman Project

A project to dig into the Roman past of Aylsham in Norfolk has won the prize for the best community archaeology project in the country.

The dig at Woodgate Nursery in August involved 175 volunteers working alongside professional archaeologists from Britannia Archeology in Bury St Edmunds.

They found the remains of a Roman workshop along with two of the best preserved pottery kilns ever discovered in Britain.

The judges from the Council for British Archaeology described the project as "the friendliest and most inclusive of excavations, and the enthusiasm of everyone involved has been overwhelming."

"Despite the huge number of volunteers who were new to archaeology, the work has been carried out to an extremely high standard."

175 volunteers helped in the project to expose the Roman pottery kilns. Credit: Aylsham Roman Project
Roman fingerprints in a fragment of pot found during the dig. Credit: Aylsham Roman Project

The dig, which found 12,000 sherds of pottery along with coins, pieces of jewellery and Iron Age remains, is just the start of the project to expose the full Roman settlement on the edge of Aylsham.

Landowner Peter Purdy said: "We are going to do it all again next summer and hopefully for years after that. And it all depends on our wonderful volunteers, without whom this would not have been the great success it has been."