Archaeological digs

Several archeological digs are taking place throughout Chiswick House and Gardens. Outside the walled area, English Heritage and Museum of London archaeologists are looking for the original route of Burlington Lane, and checking what will be buried if the café is re-located to beside the Inigo Jones gate. On the other side of the House, a team are checking for the original location of the left-hand Goosefoot path, and also for the foundations of the bagnio, the little building that used to form the viewpoint at the end of that path (before it was re-established pointing at the hump-backed bridge).

More relevantly for us, they dug a few trenches in the Kitchen Garden and established the correct location for the central paths and the outer path. A couple of things emerged from that: the central path seemed much narrower than today; and the outer path was much further from the walls – over 3m – which surprised the archeologists (but not us). It was interesting to be able to see the clearly-defined layer of gravel and hoggin (or whatever it was, this is not a technical report!) in the midst of different coloured soil.