Voices from the field
'We've spent a whole rainy morning sweeping an exposed field near Flodden, in Northumberland, with a metal detector, when suddenly the detector emits a screech - there's a metal object buried in the ground beneath our feet. We dig carefully with our trowels and, out of the earth, pluck a soil-covered lump. We weigh it in our hands and marvel at its heft, smearing away the dirt to reveal a pock-marked lead sphere, a bit smaller than a tennis ball. It's a cannon ball.' Neil Oliver
'We dig carefully with our trowels and pluck a soil-covered lump ... smearing away the dirt to reveal a pock-marked sphere.'
Some time in the late afternoon of 9 September 1513, it had been fired by English gunners against the army of James IV of Scotland, who himself was to die before the day was done. Did it find its target, cutting its way through ranks of men? Or did it drop short, in front of the Scottish line? Whatever the case, we're the first people to touch this object for 500 years.
We came across these finds having embarked upon the biggest ever archaeological investigation of British battlefields. The project was ambitious, and we were fully aware that we would have to cut our own path through largely uncharted territory. What we needed was a new way of 'doing' archaeology - finding new techniques, new ways of thinking and taking advantage of the very latest technology at our disposal.
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