Fieldwork



CDAS carries out a varied programme of fieldwork throughout the year. Fieldwork activities are documented and copies held in the CDAS archive. These are available to members on request (some reports may only be available for restricted access due to limitations on their use).

In recent years CDAS has run excavations at a Roman Villa site at Warblington, Prebendal Playing field and West Wittering. The survey group carries out topographical and geophysical surveys. We have acquired magnetometry and resistivity meters as a result of generous grants from the Chichester District Council Coastal Pathfinder Project, the Chichester City Council and the Chichester Harbour Conservancy. On occasions equipment is borrowed from Historic England.

After 10 years CDAS continues to monitor the condition of sites of archaeological interest located within the Chichester Harbour Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. A coastal monitoring group with a particular focus on Medmerry has been recently established and we are active members of the England wide CiTIZAN monitoring project.

Research is undertaken in support of the fieldwork activities and the society has just started to make use of LiDAR data to complement aerial photos and Google.

Sadly, due to changes in farming practice and a reduction in ploughing, the opportunities for field walking are currently limited.

CDAS has a dedicated finds processing team.