Norma digs up the past

THE face of a Roman goddess has been unearthed by an eagle- eyed Sunderland gran after 1,800 years

Norma Gill couldn’t believe her luck when she realised she’d dug up the head of goddess Brigantia at Arbeia Roman Fort in South Shields.

The 75– year– old from Seaburn is a member of the community archeology project WallQuest at the Baring Street fort and has been regularly digging at the site for more than a year.

However, Mrs Gill says the head of the statue, which has delicately carved facial features and is wearing a mural crown, is the best thing she’s ever stumbled upon.

She said: “At first I thought it was just a stone, it looked like a three inch pebble on its side, but then I saw a line on it, so I knew it was something else.

“Then as I carried on digging I could see what resembled the end of a chess piece, which turned out to be her crown.”

Mrs Gill, a retired teacher, was accompanied on the dig by her grandson Peter Gill, 19, from Sunderland.

The gran- of- four said: “It took around 10 minutes for me to get it out and then Peter poured some water over it to clean it up.

“Then when I saw the face of the goddess I thought ‘ how glorious’.

“It’s the most wonderful thing I’ve ever come across, everyone came over to see it. I also do metal detecting and once I found a Celtic cross, but the statue I think is definitely the oldest and best thing I’ve found. ”

It’s thought that the statue is of Brigantia, the goddess of the Brigantes, the tribe whose territory included what is now know as the North East.

It’s also known that the northern goddess was worshiped at South Shields as an altar dedicated to her was discovered in 1895 only 100m away from the current find spot.

Nick Hodgson, WallQuest project manager, said: “The head is a truly wonderful find. Northern Britain was a dangerous place for the Roman army in the second century AD; if the goddess is Brigantia it shows how keen the Romans were to placate the spirits of the region.”

The head will go on display at Arbeia after conservation work in spring 2015.

WallQuest is encouraging members of the public to volunteer for the project as they continue their quest to locate the missing parts of the puzzle.

For more information visit www. hadrianswallquest. co. uk.