A penny and a brooch

Two rare objects have recently been kindly donated to Amgueddfa Cymru-National Museum Wales by metal detectorist, Pete Anning. One is a silver penny of King Aethelraed II (978-1013, also known as ‘The Unready’), probably minted in Gloucester during the 990s. The other is a fragment of a 7^th or 8^th century decorated copper alloy penannular brooch. Both objects were found in the same area in the Vale of Glamorgan.

The objects are unfortunately broken, but that does not lessen their archaeological importance, and the coin has been designated a find of national Welsh importance by the Portable Antiquities Scheme (PAS).

Dr Mark Redknap, Head of Collections and Research in the museum’s History and Archaeology Department, said of the brooch fragment:

“Any discovery of Early Medieval metalwork has special significance as we know so little - compared with the later Medieval period – about fashions and styles circulating around Wales. The surviving terminal is decorated with a recessed panel, ridges imitating filigree, and a central setting for a glass or amber stud. It belongs to a style of brooch characteristic of Western Britain.”

As neither of the objects are classed as treasure under the 1996 Treasure Act, they are legally the property of the finder and landowner, but luckily for AC-NMW, Pete generously decided to donate them to the museum’s collection.

Deciding to donate

Pete has been detecting for two years, and this is not the first time he has given away his finds:

“I think the most exciting thing I ever found was a Bronze Age axe head that I found after my friend (who is also a farmer) gave me call to say they had been clearing out some ditches and I might want to have a go in the spoil. After recording the find with Mark Lodwick (PAS Co-ordinator for Wales) I gave it to the farm and it now has pride of place on their mantelpiece. The axe had been there for over 3000 years and it didn’t seem right to take it away.”

When Pete found out that his penny and brooch fragments, as Welsh examples of Anglo-Saxon and Early Medieval objects, were important and rare, he decided that, “it was only right that the finds should be donated to the museum. Whether it’s 3000 years old or 30 years old, it all once had a purpose or meaning. Everything has a story.”

Once an object enters a museum collection, those stories can be told by archaeologists and other researchers, and the object will be conserved and looked after for future generations.

The value of donations

Donations are valued by museums as they do not always have a fund to purchase objects for their collections and have to rely on Friends groups or applications to funding bodies such as the Art Fund. In Wales, the Saving Treasures; Telling Stories project has been using its National Lottery funding to acquire treasure and some PAS-recorded objects for national and local collections since 2015, but this source will soon be coming to an end.

So, in the words of Dr Redknap, “We’re extremely grateful to Pete for his generous donation to the national collection.”

But whether finders donate, sell or keep their objects, Pete encourages everybody to get their finds recorded with PAS: “I had no idea what the early medieval brooch fragment was until Mark Lodwick saw it. I knew it was old…but that was it. If you’re not sure check – otherwise you could be throwing away some invaluable ancient history!”

My name is Brian and I live in Talbot Green. When I was in school I used to do gardening in Y Pant. In the winter I used to help my dad in the garden.

I worked in Remploy in Tonyrefail for ten years starting in 1974. We used to do all sorts of jobs. Then I did four years in Llantrisant, and twenty five years in Porth. On Fridays we finished early and went to the pub for lunch. I retired in 2013. I have the opening plaque from when Remploy opened in Porth in 1988. The building has been demolished.

Since I retired I have done a computer course and a photography course. I have also done pottery and pop art, and I have a big collection of paintings that I have done.

I came to the Take Charge coffee morning in August 2018 and found out about the chance to help at The Secret Garden at St Fagans National Museum of History. That’s when I decided to start gardening again. I’ve learned about teamwork, we work here in a team.

I enjoy doing it, I feel happy. I look forward to coming out and abought especially. I feel tired after, but good tired. My favourite job is raking. I’ve learnt that I enjoy volunteering.

The Secret Garden is maintain and developed by Innovate Trust whose main work is to support people with learning disabilities, mental health issues and people with physical impairments.

Hi pawb, my name is Joe Lewis and I am a Learning Officer at St Fagans National Museum of History. I have been working for Amgueddfa Cymry - National Museum Wales for 10 years this year.

This year is also 10 years since the volunteering department was set up in National Museum Wales.

I began my career in Amgueddfa Cymru as a volunteer in the summer of 2009. I volunteered at the National Roman Legion Museum in Caerleon where I spent the summer dressed as a Roman and engaging with the public. After this experience I was asked to join the pool staff to help facilitate school sessions and public events.  

Between 2009 – 2011 I did a part-time Masters in Archaeology and volunteered for the Portable Antiquities Scheme, based at National Museum Cardiff. This volunteering role gave me experience in object photography and identification. It was through this experience that I was given the opportunity to catalogue an assemblage of Roman artefacts from Brecon Gaer Roman Fort. This gave me my dissertation topic and later the opportunity to publish 2 papers on Brecon Gaer.

Before I started volunteering at National Museum Wales I had been unemployed for several months and was suffering with depression. Volunteering helped to give me vital work and academic experience that helped me get a job and out of depression.

I owe a great deal to the volunteering department for giving me the opportunities I’ve had to lead me to where I am today. A massive thanks to them and a Happy 10^th Anniversary!

A few months ago, I was given the opportunity of a lifetime. I was invited to work at Amgueddfa Cymru as an artist in residence and asked to organise a project to celebrate 10 years of the volunteer programme. The project has consisted of a series of creative workshops with volunteers at sites across the country, which have fed into the creation of a celebratory artwork.

My name’s Robin Bonar-Law, I’m a self-taught artist and graphic design graduate of Falmouth University. From the time of my graduation up until my residency, I have been working in the catering industry so my artistic outlet has been primarily restricted to latte art. The creative industries are incredibly competitive and coming from a low-income family I have often felt stifled by a lack of social mobility. I take portrait commissions and enter competitions when I can but over the coming years, I would like to make the rewarding leap into self-employment by becoming a freelance mural artist.

Early this year I applied to an artist opportunity based at St Fagan’s. After a thoroughly exciting interview process, I was asked to join the team and given an open brief, ‘Create an artwork that is inspired by the volunteers and showcases the amazing contribution they have given to the museum. The process should also include a series of creative workshops with volunteers.’ With over 900 volunteers this year alone this was no small task, nonetheless, overflowing with unbounded enthusiasm and a sense of freedom (from the coffee shop) I got to work planning.

The project is split into two main components; the workshops and the final artwork. I love drawing and wanted to run a series of ‘mark-making’ workshops that help re-introduce the volunteers to the idea of drawing as something that’s fun and relaxing. By normalising and simplifying drawing through a series of games and activities, I hoped to make it less daunting and something relaxing that they may enjoy doing brief moments of spare time.

As well as allowing me to teach the volunteers new drawing techniques the workshops served as a time for the volunteers to teach me about their roles and experiences at the museum. From the beginning of the project, I have wanted to create an authentic artwork that represents the true collaborative spirit of the volunteer workforce and the best way to do that is to meet them and get their personal input. Visiting the sites and talking to members of staff was another valuable resource.

I have met such a large number of enthusiastic and happy volunteers, they are all equally passionate and have truly enriched my experience. The workshops have been far more rewarding than I could ever have expected, I hope the volunteers enjoyed them as much as I did.

My favourite part of any project like this is the final, hands-on crafting of a design, but there’s no point rushing into it without a strong design process as a foundation. Alongside the workshops, I started amassing a large pool of research to help shape the direction of the artwork. I gathered inspiration from celebratory imagery such as friendly society banners, religious artworks, Flags, political/social murals etc. I also furthered my knowledge of Welsh craft and traditions by meeting with curators, visiting volunteers outside of workshops and making use of the information on display to the public. I wanted to create a final piece with mulitple layers of complexity; representing the wildly diverse range of roles, having that celebratory feel and being reminiscent of the traditional craft that imbues each site.

I am in the final stages of the design process and putting the finishing touches to my artwork. Once complete, the modular, hanging banner inspired artwork will be transformed into a majestic, megalithic and meaningful mural adorning the walls of Tŷ Gwyrdd (the new volunteer hub) and made into a digital print for each of the 7 museums around Wales. It will also be made into tote bags and given to each of the volunteers. From the very beginning, I have wanted to create a purposeful artwork that rejuvenates and enriches the volunteer spaces, fostering an environment that helps individuals find a sense of well-being, pride and identity. I can’t wait to show you all the finished product.

I am incredibly grateful for the museum and all the staff that have given me this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Robin's placement was funded by the Hands on Heritage youth project at Amgueddfa Cymru, which is supported through the National Lottery Heritage Funds ‘Kick the Dust’

“Codi i’r Wyneb - Brought to the Surface” is a project on freshwater snails led by the Museum’s Department of Natural Sciences, supported by the National Lottery through the Heritage Lottery Fund. Since our last blog in January, our project has grown from its wellspring in the collections to spill over into the outside world.

This, being midsummer, is pond-dipping season. Fieldcraft is so important to being a good naturalist, and also a good curator. No matter how good the collections, ID guides or apps, there is no substitute for finding things in their natural environment first-hand. So far we have identified and recorded snails from over 50 water bodies in South Wales alone, often with the help of local people and volunteers. As well as being good education for us, this has helped provide data and specimens from less well-studied areas, such as the lakes at Blaengarw, and the Neath Canal at Tonna, and the River Ely. We’ve also followed up a number of historical records to see whether species are still present. In a neat symbiosis, Alice Jones from Cardiff University has also been helping us out as part of her search for snail parasites and their microscopic predators. Lest anyone fear this is a Cymrocentric project, we’ve also been collecting in South-west England, and are heading East soon!

Back at National Museum Cardiff and with the help of the Exhibitions team, we installed our display in the Insight Gallery in time for the Easter school holidays. (In fact, all the displays in Insight have recently been refreshed, so it’s well worth visiting if you haven’t for a while). It features a variety of showcasing the diversity and importance of freshwater snails. To help bring the small shells of the Welsh species to life, we made magnified models of the living animals, approximately 1000 times actual size. These are shown alongside some grapefruit-sized tropical Apple Snails (the world’s largest freshwater snails), and their eye-catching bright pink eggs. The display also includes a mini-diorama of a British river, and a slideshow of images of the project’s progress. One thing which proved surprisingly hard to obtain (in Cardiff!) was an authentic-looking miniature of a sheep, so we made our own. The sheep is there to illustrate the life-cycle of the liver fluke - a big problem for British agriculture, yet one that hinges on tiny freshwater snails.

Since our last update we’ve taken part in public events including “Museums After Dark” and “Fossils from the Swamp”, and even appeared on the Radio Wales Science Café programme. The big one for us was our first Snail Day training course in late April, where we put our draft identification keys to the test. Held at Gwent Wildlife Trust’s Magor Marsh reserve, we are very grateful to the 8 members of the public prepared to be our guinea pigs, while learning as much about the 40 species as we could fit into a day. Our second Snail Day, at the “Aqualab” of the National Botanical Gardens in Carmarthenshire, was also a fully-booked success with thanks to the infectiously enthusiastic Paul Smith and our stalwart volunteer Mike Tynen, who helped amaze some visiting cub scouts by juggling a leech. The fish-free lakes at the Gardens have a huge biomass of snails!

Keen to join in? Our third Snail Day is on the 29^th June, at the RSPB’s Ynys Hir reserve near Machynlleth, once used as the base for the BBC’s Springwatch. If you’d like to take part, please email harry.powell@museumwales.ac.uk. On Twitter, follow @CardiffCurator for the latest updates.