Archaeological Sites

Legal Protection of Archaeological Sites Management and Care of Archaeological Sites Archaeological Investigations Cook's Cove Dunedin corduroy track Kawatiri Omata Gisborne Pilot Project Archaeology Brochures Archaeological Guidelines Archaeological Reports Digital Library

Overview of excavation area
(21 seconds)

Main house on left of modern day cattle trough, possibly dairy to right, external cookhouse to side of main house

If you do not have a copy of Windows MediaPlayer download a free copy from the Microsoft website here.

^ Back to Day 9

Omata, Autridges - Day 11

14 February 2008

Our last day at the Autridge's farm!

We managed to excavate all features in the excavation area and cleaned down the surfaces again to take a good photographic record of the surfaces.

Left: Front of the main house. Right: Later slap hut with fireplace. Photo: Janice Adamson, University of Auckland

All major feature complexes can be explained with working hypotheses. Obviously there will be some fine-tuning to be done during the material analysis.

The main house has been excavated to about three-quarters, the last quarter being buried under a modern concrete cattle trough which couldn't be moved.

The original foundation post still in place. Photo: Janice Adamson, University of Auckland

The house has been re-built during its lifetime. The first building went up with irregular cut postholes and poles of uneven shape. One of the posts could be observed in situ and seems to be part of a puriri trunk (scientific wood identification pending). The second lot of postholes is regular and fairly small with timber of even dimensions.

The working hypothesis for these observations would be that Charles Autridge built the first house without previous experience in building, and that a professional carpenter (or at least someone who had the relevant skills), built the re-constructed house.

The irregularly cut upper part of the well. Photo: Janice Adamson, University of Auckland

The house has a porch on the front side - orientated towards the morning sun - and a fireplace at the back built of timber framing around a possible earth built fireplace (sod construction). It did not seem to have had a verandah or a lean to.

The same pattern can be observed at the well. The perfectly round cut well starts at a level of about 1.7m below the surface, while the upper part of the well is an irregular dug large hole with sloping sides and a small working platform on one side. The working hypothesis for this feature would indicate that the Autridges started to dig a deep hole to try to find water and at a later stage someone with skills in digging wells finished the job with a perfectly round cut, deep well.

Possible dairy, and chicken coup(?). Photo: Janice Adamson, University of Auckland

The area - west of the main house - with the remains of milk jugs nearby shows a small building close to a small structure with walls made out of stakes. It could be the remains of the dairy which was mentioned in the Autridge's claim, and a little chicken house.

The small excavation area about 50 metres to the east of the main house showed the remains of a cooking house cut into the slope, protected from the southerly winds. The finds in this area indicate that it belonged to the homestead.

Closer to the main house, just off the entrance is a second cooking area which looked at first like a Maori-style underground oven (hangi), but it is too shallow for this. This cooking area was protected on three sides by walls and a possible roof, and used cooking stones to steam food. This cooking area does not seem to be used as often as the cooking house.

External cooking house. Photo: Janice Adamson, University of Auckland

The second small excavation area off the two main excavation areas is a small slab house with a fireplace in the back - cut into the slope for protection from the southerlies.

The finds - ceramic and bottle glass - seem to indicate a phase after the land wars. It is quite possible that one of the Autridge family members came back after the Land Wars and looked after the land for a short while.

A visit by members of the Autridge family (on right). Photo: Linda Terry, University of Queensland

As an extra bonus to this successful excavation, we had members of the Autridge family visit us. They showed us pictures of the Charles and his wife and filled us in with some family stories from the time of the homestead.

Yesterday we had also a visit by the crew of Puke Ariki Museum, who will look after the artefact collection once the data analysis is finished.

A site map is still in the making and will be posted soon

A big thank you to another fantastic volunteer crew for all their hard work, to Len & Heather Jury for their enthusiastic support, to the sponsor of this excavation - the New Zealand Historic Places Trust (and provider of support to this web log), to Max Sole the digger driver - no job too big or too small, to Hamish for enduring us interrupting his farm work, a special thank you to Allen Juffermanns and Naio for their hospitality during the hours using their broadband connection, for the survey control on both archaeological sites, and our gratitude to Nga Mahanga Tairi for their support of this research!

The team: Back row (from left): Tom, Nigel, Hans, janice, Sarah, Emma, Linda Front row: Tash, Cathryn, Hamish. Photo: Janice Adamson, University of Auckland

GLOSSARY   Archaeological terminology Like any profession, archaeology comes with its own "language". This glossary helps with less familiar terms, particularly those used on this site. >> Read more

For questions about the Omata excavation, contact archaeology@historic.org.nz