Where to Find Archaeology When You Visit

Excavation: Colonial Williamsburg’s Department of Architectural and Archaeological Research is most actively visible between late May and late August, when the annual “exhibit dig” is underway. Public interpretation is an important part of that work, and you are invited to spend as much time as you are able watching and asking questions. Complementary materials are often available on our web page. When you leave the site, or before you visit, please log on for background information and updates.

Archaeologists are currently undertaking a multi-year excavation on the Ravenscroft site at the corner of Nicholson and Botetourt Streets. The 2008 excavation opened in mid-May and ended in late August. We anticipate returning to the Ravenscroft site for a fourth season of excavation in 2009. This project should begin around Memorial Day and last through the end of August, and at that time visitors will be welcome. In the meantime, to learn more about what was found on that site, please visit our featured pages on the Ravenscroft Site.

Occasionally you may encounter archaeologists in the Historic Area at other times of the year, conducting smaller (and sometimes unanticipated) excavations. Should you see them, you are encouraged to stop and ask questions.

Laboratory Tours: Excavation is only a very small part of what archaeologists do. The lab staff is busy year-round, washing, numbering, cataloging, and analyzing finds from the previous summer’s work, and re-examining materials from past excavations. To see what happens in the lab, take the 90-minute tour entitled Rubbish, Treasures, and Colonial Life. This tour, offered four times each Tuesday, provides behind-the-scenes access to Colonial Williamsburg’s Archaeology Lab, and focuses on the exciting research that goes on there. Learn how Colonial Williamsburg archaeologists use material evidence to decipher the town’s seventeenth- and eighteenth-century history, and see some of the more notable and informative of the several million artifacts recovered through excavations here. You will find the schedule printed in Colonial Williamsburg This Week.