Finding history in a load of rubbish…

ANCIENT rubbish is throwing up new clues about an East Yorkshire market town’s past – and could be an example of medieval flytipping.

Archaeologists carrying out a dig ahead of a £120m development in Beverley have uncovered thousands of shards of pottery and animal bones underneath what was a modern tanning yard.

The bones come from goats and sheep, probably from the Yorkshire Wolds, which would have been butchered on Saturday markets before their skins were carted to the ancient tanneries, which operated in the town in the medieval period.

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Part of the lower leg and hoof were kept to act as “handles” when the skins were lowered into tanning pits, containing dog faeces and lime. Archeologists have also cut sections through a waterway called the Tandyke, which carried polluted water through the tanneries before discharging into Beverley Beck.

The pottery, found in the ditch, could be evidence of medieval flytipping from nearby houses.

Project manager Trevor Brigham said: “Rubbish disposal was a huge problem in the medieval period. They had collection points, but people were throwing it into any available open ditch and they were the subject of legal proceedings because of problems people had with drains becoming blocked. But what was considered rubbish to people living then is a great source of information for modern research.”

The leather would have been used for shoes, boots and purses, and among the finds being sorted at Humber Field Archeology’s offices in Hull, is a nearly complete example of a medieval shoe – which is only minus its sole.

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The tanning industry declined after its heyday in the 14th century, but re-emerged in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The archeologists are working ahead of the first phase of the scheme which will see 130 homes built by Stamford Homes in the shadow of Beverley Minster.