Help unearth one of England’s last surviving Tudor gardens

Queens garden at Sudeley Castle Credit: Visit England

History lovers are being invited to help archaeologists unearth a long-lost Tudor garden and banqueting house at Sudeley Castle.

A two-week excavation will be held in the grounds of the Cotswold castle in May, to further explore a site which experts believe could reveal one of England’s last surviving Tudor gardens – hidden in the castle grounds for nearly 300 years.

Initial findings at the site in October included fragments of post-medieval pottery, masonry and animal bones, consistent with garden archaeology.

Further explorations of a mound, discovered in the middle of the field, could now confirm that it was once the site of a temporary banqueting house and the location of a huge celebration by Elizabeth I as part of her progress around the country to mark her victory over the Spanish Armada.

Members of the public are now being invited to join a team of archaeologists from social enterprise company, DigVentures, for the excavation in May, and help uncover more of the site’s secrets.

“Finding an intact Tudor garden is an astonishingly rare occurrence,” said Sudeley Castle’s general manager, Wendy Walton. “Bringing it back to the surface would be an amazing achievement and gives us the chance to find out what it would have been like in the days when Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth I and Katherine Parr, Henry VIII’s last wife, walked its pathways,” she added.

Lisa Westcott Wilkins from DigVentures, added: “This buried garden is believed to be one of England’s last surviving Tudor gardens. Most were destroyed in the 18th and 19th centuries when a popular landscaping craze swept the country. We think it is one of perhaps only two in the whole country where the original paths are still in place.”

The DigVentures team has launched a crowdfunding campaign, inviting Tudor history lovers around the world to help fund the investigation.

“This discovery gives Tudor history enthusiasts a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help investigate an absolutely stunning piece of Tudor history, and to learn more about the role of gardens and temporary structures in the Tudor period, especially during the reign of Elizabeth I,” said Lisa Westcott Wilkins.

Crowdfunders will be able to choose whether they want to watch the discoveries online through a series of live broadcasts, or get hands-on and spend a day digging with archaeologists, learning how to excavate, interpret finds and make Tudor discoveries of their own.

The excavation in May will be the most significant archaeological investigation at the Winchcombe attraction since the discovery of Roman villas on the estate in Victorian times.

Find out more at digventures.com/projects/sudeley-castle