Travel back in time to 11,000 years ago at York Museum Gardens this week.
Work has started today, Wednesday 7 August, to build ‘Britain’s oldest house’.
A team from the York Museums Trust and the University of York, and experts in ancient technology and archaeology, are building a Mesolithic house in York Museum Gardens – using evidence from the world famous prehistoric archaeological site Star Carr in Yorkshire.
The build will take place all this week. The house will be built by Sunday 11 August, with the build remaining in place until Sunday 1 September.
The earliest houses in Britain have been found at archeological site Star Carr – where people built permanent homes after the Ice Age ended.
Though archaeologists don’t know exactly what these houses would have looked like, the house construction uses techniques and materials, such as stone tools and plant materials, that would have been used 11,000 years ago.
This project was made possible by funding from the National Heritage Lottery Fund.
This week, there is also an activity tent set up in the Museum gardens hosted by the University of York. Visitors to the tent can get involved with a series of hands-on opportunities, discover more from short talks and on-site demonstrations, and handle replica objects from the Mesolithic period.
The build accompanies the Yorkshire Museum’s exhibition Star Carr: Life After the Ice. To find out more and book your tickets, visit their website here.
