It’s been a short week. In typical Tasmanian fashion it has also been a week of mixed weather. Monday saw us melting in 33 degree heat. Wednesday saw us rugged up dreaming of the sun. Needless to say, progress was slow – though we are getting places. We spent the week excavating off the demolition overburden from the foundry space. This comprises a mixture of rubble (sandstone, brick, dolerite, mortar) that was deposited when the building was salvaged in the 1880s. This is mixed with a lot of sediment, from when the site was exposed.

The foundry

The site from a different angle

We’ve got rid of the overburden from over the foundry’s internal space and are just finishing off removing the deposits covering the sandstone footings. As we do so, we are learning about the process by which they salvaged the building during the post-convict period. Evidently they were keen on removing as much building stone as possible, as the footings have been dug out. This has left the remnant footings lower than the surrounding yard and foundry deposits. The act of footing salvaged also resulted in the creation of ‘robber’ trenches, which impacted upon the intact deposits within the foundry.

Next week we’ve got a series of sections to record (we’ve left baulks in place so we can record the height and composition of the overburden we have removed). Then we’ll excavate the baulks and begin the painstaking process of excavating the sensitive deposits of the foundry.