Sewerby Hall Hosts New Anglo-Saxon Workshop For Schools

With its magnificent flower gardens and beautiful mansion house, Sewerby Hall and Gardens is well known for its beauty. A significant Anglo-Saxon cemetery has also been unearthed in Sewerby during the 1950s and 1970s.

East Yorkshire Museums Partnership Education Officer Robert Chester has developed a workshop based on funding from Humber Museums Partnership and Arts Council England to tell the story of the pagan 6th and 7th century Anglo-Saxons who lived and settled in East Yorkshire.

With the help of a local Sewerby firm, Chapel Prints, 3D printed replicas of grave goods have been produced.

Robert Chester said:

 “This is very exciting; one of the problems we have had telling this story in the past is that the finds were too precious and delicate for people to handle. 3D printing allows us to make exact replicas of the grave goods, which people can feel and touch, and along with the fantastic costumes made by one of our wonderful volunteers, we are able to really bring these first English settlers back to life.”

Samuel McKie of Chapel Prints said: 

“It was a wonderful project to be a part of. Being based in Sewerby, I regularly walk under the holly and yew trees which now grow on the grave site. From scanning the actual grave goods to the hours of digital reconstruction and 3D printing,  I found these very modern digital technologies helped bring a real sense of connection and continuity with these Anglo-Saxon people who lived here over a thousand years before us.”

These graves were excavated in 1959 and 1974 and are of national significance. A wooden coffin in which beads and brooches were hung on the body of a woman in her early twenties, was found in a grave containing the remains of two women. There was a woman in her forties lying face down just above and a little way up. There has been speculation that this is a live burial, perhaps the remains of a slave or servant who is accompanying her mistress to the afterlife.

Robert Chester explained:

 “The workshop is for primary school children, so we don’t dwell on the possibility of a live burial. Instead, it is about trying to piece together what the lives were like for the people buried in the cemetery, how they dressed and what grave goods and archaeology can tell us about their lives.”

Sewerby Hall and Gardens offer the workshop in a whole-day or half-day format; more information and costs can be found at www.sewerbyhall.co.uk.