I Dig Sheffield | Digging around Sheffield and the Peaks

Urn from Doll Tor

Object glossary

Bronze Age
2500-900 BC. In this period most people were farmers. They built stone circles, and wealthier people were buried with objects in round burial mounds. The working of bronze was developed over many centuries.

Cairn
A cairn is made up of stones piled on top of each other. In the Bronze Age, cairns could cover a human burial or cremation.

Capstone
A capstone is the top covering stone of a cist. A cist is a setting of stones, containing a human burial or cremation.

Cist
A cist is a setting of stones containing a human burial or cremation. Cist can be various shapes and can be buried underground or covered with an earth mound.

Excavator
An excavator is a person who digs into the earth, for example to find archaeological remains.

J. P. and J. C. Heathcote
The Heathcotes were a father and son team who excavated archaeological sites mainly on the Peak District moors. They published the results of their work and the finds were housed in their museum at Birchover. These are now in Weston Park Museum.

Scraper
A scraper is a type of stone tool, with at least one working edge. They were probably used for wood-working or scraping animal hides.

Stone circle
A stone circle is a roughly circular or oval setting of upright stones. Stone circles can have other stones circles inside them.

Urn
An urn is a pottery vessel like a vase that can be many different shapes and sizes.

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