Details of Award
NERC Reference : NE/J012394/1
La Cotte de St Brelade: Urgent Rescue and Stabilisation Project
Grant Award
- Principal Investigator:
- Dr MI Pope, University College London, Institute of Archaeology
- Grant held at:
- University College London, Institute of Archaeology
- Science Area:
- Atmospheric
- Earth
- Freshwater
- Marine
- Terrestrial
- Overall Classification:
- Terrestrial
- ENRIs:
- Biodiversity
- Global Change
- Science Topics:
- Archaeology Of Human Origins
- Quaternary Science
- Science-Based Archaeology
- Abstract:
- La Cotte de St Brelade is a collapsed cave system on the island of Jersey. Currently comprising Ice Age deposits preserved within 40m deep ravines on an exposed headland, it represents the most important Neanderthal locality in North Western Europe. Its importance derives from a number of factors but these include: its deep sequence of stratification spanning in excess of 250,000 years, the dense concentration of Neanderthal archaeology, the preservation of Neanderthal human remains and its extensive environmental record. No site in the region offers the opportunity to examine the development of Neanderthal behaviour over such a long time scale and against such a high resolution record of global climate and local environmental change. The site has a long history of research spanning over a century of investigation by a number of researchers. The most recent sustained excavations were carried out by Professor Charles McBurney (Cambridge University) between 1960 and 1978; during these seasons high resolution datasets of dense occupation activity were recovered from the sequence. These included over 100,000 lithic artefacts and collections of mega-fauna bones from two discrete 'bone-heap' layers. These have formed an important part of discussions of Neanderthal hunting behaviour since their publication in the 1980s. Investigations were last carried out at the site in 1982 and the sections from the McBurney excavations were concreted over to protect this part of the site. Since then the site has remained uninvestigated and effectively unmonitored; no work, remedial preservation, or active management has been carried out. In 2010 the Quaternary Archaeology and Environments of Jersey Project was initiated to assess La Cotte and other sites on the island. During the past two seasons our team have identified intact areas of archaeological sediment at La Cotte outside of the concreted area. In 2011 a 4m section of deposit was identified in the western part of the site; this contained finely stratified archaeology preserved within sediments likely to preserve evidence of past environments. These layers form part of a deep geological sequence that has only recently become exposed, as it was previously overlain by discarded spoil from earlier excavations. Recent severe winters had removed this spoil, and exposed the archaeological horizons underneath; these were observed to be completely exposed, saturated and undergoing rapid erosion. Cracks observed within the deposits suggest imminent catastrophic collapse is extremely likely. The La Cotte de St Brelade Urgent Stabilisation project has been developed as a rapid response to excavate, sample and stabilise this critical exposed section. It aims to achieve this through a targeted intervention which will ensure both the capture of high-resolution datasets from the exposed layers, grading these back to form a stable slope which will remain intact until a long-term management plan can be implemented. The section in question offers extremely high potential for significant archaeology and environmental evidence, and has already been demonstrated to be exceptionally rich, producing high quantities of mint-condition lithics, as well as bone fragments within organic deposits capable of preserving pollen and plant remains. The threatened deposits appear to have been laid down within the Last Glacial period (110-10 000 BP), have never previously investigated using modern scientific techniques, and produced Neanderthal fossils in the early 20th century. The internationally significant scientific resource needs to be saved from on-going, rapid destruction before cold and wetter conditions set in this winter. The rapid response set out in this project will not only prevent the loss of evidence from this part of the site, but will provide new high-resolution datasets which will tell us more about the behaviour and palaeoecology of the last Neanderthals in Northern Europ
- NERC Reference:
- NE/J012394/1
- Grant Stage:
- Completed
- Scheme:
- Urgency
- Grant Status:
- Closed
- Programme:
- Urgent Grant
This grant award has a total value of £51,521
FDAB - Financial Details (Award breakdown by headings)
| DI - Other Costs | Indirect - Indirect Costs | DA - Investigators | DA - Estate Costs | DI - T&S |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| £38,200 | £4,408 | £5,788 | £725 | £2,400 |
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