Fieldwork by the Living Levels project near Torwick Reen, on the Wentlooge Levels, followed reports by members of the public that a wooden drain was sometimes exposed on the foreshore.
The site was visited and planned by Tom Walker and Martin Bell from Reading University and Living Levels volunteer Jerry Cross. Two alder tree trunks laid end to end and joined by pegs were identified which had been cut in box section to create a drain which would have originally been covered by a wood plank. This may have drained water through the seawall at low tide or served to connect drains.
Today the find-spot is 300m seaward of the present seawall. A sample was taken for radiocarbon dating at Queen’s University Belfast with the result AD 1454-1629. It could relate to restoration of the seawall after the AD 1606 flood or a seawall at Rumney which is historically recorded as 1591, although a late medieval date is more probable.
The survey work also identified a number of other wood and stone structures in the area and further survey work is proposed in late summer 2022.
Martin Bell, Tom Walker and Jerry Cross
Jerry Cross with the alder trunk drain.