Time Team: Season 22 - Dig One - Knights Hospitaller Preceptory - Shropshire

March 26, 2023 1:17 PM - Season 22, Episode 1

In the first of three episodes in Season 22, Time Team descends on Halston Hall in Shropshire to investigate if Stewart Ainsworth has found a rare Preceptory of the Knights Hospitalier near an old chapel in the middle of a giant estate landscape garden.What's a folly? What's reality? What do the bricks, coins, test pits, crypts, etc. tell us.

Lots of gee whiz gadgets including a new Time Team virtual museum. Dr. Gus Casely-Hayford returns as presenter with a number of your Time Team favorites returning to the program. (No Tony or Phil) And we even get a pub scene and drinks in the field.

The dig is separated into 3 episodes on the Time Team Official channel.

Episode Links:
Day 1 - 34:44
Day 2 - 35:54
Day 3 - 37:04

Ancillary Content:
Trailer
Dr. Helen Geake Q&A
Behind the Scenes

Halston Hall (Wikipedia)
Halston Hall's Official Website
Knights Hospitalier (Wikipedia)
Preceptory (definition)

posted by drewbage1847 (2 comments total)

I'll throw my thoughts in down here. This felt more like classic Time Team than the episodes from last year as they work out the kinks.

Gus definitely seems more in sync and we get more of the back and forth (but not quite like the old trio of Tony, Mick and Phil.) My thought on Gus as presenter as opposed to Tony is that Gus is quite clearly an expert and knows what things mean. Tony wasn't and was a much better conduit for the audience's understanding. Tony was more comfortable being funny (shocker) and Gus's speaking style is so damn soothing.

I liked that Carenza's test pits proved useful (also feel like they didn't push the community aspect as much as they would normally). The archaeology in the ground proved frustrating and answers came in unexpected ways and at the last minute.
posted by drewbage1847 at 10:28 AM on March 28, 2023

Yeah this was a good episode (apart from the actual archaeology being underwhelming). It felt much more -settled- than the digs last year.

I am so glad they are doing them!
posted by janell at 9:01 PM on April 3, 2023 [1 favorite]