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Roddon
A roddon, also written as rodham, roddam or rodden, is the dried raised bed of a watercourse such as a river or tidal-creek, especially in The Fens in eastern England. Such raised silt and clay-filled beds are ideal for settlement in the less firm peat of The Fens. Many writers have followed the archaeologist Major Gordon Fowler's preference for the word ''roddon'' to define such structures though modern researchers suggest the word ''rodham'' is the more correct local word. Oak preserved in peat through which roddons passed has been dated to around 4000 years before present (Before present, BP). The origin of the raised nature of a roddon is debated; some writers suggest this is due to a silt build-up during marine incursion. Another explanation (and the one most favoured today) is based on the greater shrinkage of peat, compared to that of silt. This theory suggests that the surrounding peat lands have subsided more than the silt-filled banks of the roddon, leaving the banks r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Benwick2
Benwick is a village and civil parish in the Fenland district of Cambridgeshire, England. It is approximately from Peterborough and from Cambridge. The population of Benwick was recorded as 1137 in the United Kingdom Census 2011 with 452 households. The River Nene (Old Course) (part of the Middle Level Navigations) passes through the village, which is thus accessible by boat from the inland waterways network in England. History The settlement's name is derived from the Old English ''bean'' or ''beam'', and ''wic'', meaning "farm where beans are grown" or "farm by a tree-trunk." Benwick's High Street is built on a roddon; the silt banks of the old West Water river. The earliest records of village refer to a garrison built in Benwick by Geoffrey de Mandeville in 1143. In 1221, Benwick had 15 tenants and by 1251, 32. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Bog Oak
Bog-wood (also spelled bogwood or bog wood), also known as abonos and, especially amongst pipe smokers, as morta, is a material from trees that have been buried in peat bogs and preserved from decay by the acidic and anaerobic bog conditions, sometimes for hundreds or even thousands of years. The wood is usually stained brown by tannins dissolved in the acidic water. Bog-wood represents the early stages in the fossilisation of wood, with further stages ultimately forming jet, lignite and coal over a period of many millions of years. Bog-wood may come from any tree species naturally growing near or in bogs, including oak (''Quercus'' – "bog oak"), pine (''Pinus''), yew (''Taxus''), swamp cypress ('' Taxodium'') and kauri (''Agathis''). Bog-wood is often removed from fields and placed in clearance cairns. It is a rare form of timber that is claimed to be "comparable to some of the world's most expensive tropical hardwoods". Formation process Bog-wood is created from the tru ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ely, Cambridgeshire
Ely ( ) is a cathedral city in the East Cambridgeshire district of Cambridgeshire, England, about north-northeast of Cambridge and from London. Ely is built on a Kimmeridge Clay island which, at , is the highest land in the Fens. It was due to this topography that Ely was not waterlogged like the surrounding Fenland, and was an island separated from the mainland. Major rivers including the River Witham, Witham, River Welland, Welland, River Nene, Nene and River Great Ouse, Great Ouse feed into the Fens and, until draining commenced in the eighteenth century, formed freshwater marshes and Mere (lake), meres within which peat was laid down. Once the Fens were drained, this peat created a rich and fertile soil ideal for farming. The River Great Ouse was a significant means of transport until the Fens were drained and Ely ceased to be an island in the seventeenth century. The river is now a popular boating spot, and has a large marina. Although now surrounded by land, the city ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Levees
A levee (), dike (American English), dyke (Commonwealth English), embankment, floodbank, or stop bank is a structure that is usually earthen and that often runs parallel to the course of a river in its floodplain or along low-lying coastlines. The purpose of a levee is to keep the course of rivers from changing and to protect against flooding of the area adjoining the river or coast. Levees can be naturally occurring ridge structures that form next to the bank of a river, or be an artificially constructed fill or wall that regulates water levels. Ancient civilizations in the Indus Valley, ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia and China all built levees. Today, levees can be found around the world, and failures of levees due to erosion or other causes can be major disasters. Etymology Speakers of American English (notably in the Midwest and Deep South) use the word ''levee'', from the French word (from the feminine past participle of the French verb , 'to raise'). It originated i ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Romano-British
The Romano-British culture arose in Britain under the Roman Empire following the Roman conquest in AD 43 and the creation of the province of Britannia. It arose as a fusion of the imported Roman culture with that of the indigenous Britons, a people of Celtic language and custom. Scholars such as Christopher Snyder believe that during the 5th and 6th centuries – approximately from 410 when the Roman legions withdrew, to 597 when St Augustine of Canterbury arrived – southern Britain preserved an active sub-Roman culture that survived the attacks from the Anglo-Saxons and even used a vernacular Latin when writing. Arrival of the Romans Roman troops, mainly from nearby provinces, invaded in AD 43, in what is now part of England, during the reign of Emperor Claudius. Over the next few years the province of Britannia was formed, eventually including the whole of what later became England and Wales and parts of Scotland.Kinder, H. & Hilgemann W. ''The Penguin Atlas of World ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ordnance Datum
In the British Isles, an ordnance datum or OD is a vertical datum used by an ordnance survey as the basis for deriving altitudes on maps. A spot height may be expressed as AOD for "above ordnance datum". Usually mean sea level (MSL) is used for the datum. In particular: * In Great Britain, OD for the Ordnance Survey is ODN (Ordnance Datum Newlyn), defined as the MSL as recorded by the tidal gauge at Newlyn in Cornwall between 1915 and 1921. **Prior to 1921, OD was defined as MSL as recorded in the Victoria Dock, Liverpool, during a short period in 1844 (ODL). * In Northern Ireland, OD for the Ordnance Survey of Northern Ireland is Belfast Ordnance Datum, the MSL at Clarendon Dock, Belfast, between 1951 and 1956. * In the Republic of Ireland, OD for the Ordnance Survey of Ireland is Malin Ordnance Datum: the MSL at Portmoor Pier, Malin Head, County Donegal, between 1960 and 1969. [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Holme Fen
Holme Fen is a biological Site of Special Scientific Interest near Holme in Cambridgeshire. It is also a National Nature Reserve and a Nature Conservation Review site, Grade I. It is part of the Great Fen project, which aims to create a 3,700 wetland wildlife area including Holme Fen, Woodwalton Fen and other areas. It is home to a variety of birds, including the Eurasian siskin, Nightingale and Lesser redpoll, and around 450 species of fungi. Home Fen is described by Natural England as the finest example of birch woodland in lowland Britain. Part of it was a mere which was drained in the nineteenth century, and some relict wetland plants survive such as saw sedge and fen wood-rush. Two new lakes have been excavated. Holme Fen, specifically Holme Posts, is believed to be the lowest land point in Great Britain at below sea level. History In October 2015, archaeological work to recover a WW2 Spitfire, flown by Pilot Officer Harold Penketh, that crashed into Holme Fen on 22 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ostracod
Ostracods, or ostracodes, are a class of the Crustacea (class Ostracoda), sometimes known as seed shrimp. Some 70,000 species (only 13,000 of which are extant) have been identified, grouped into several orders. They are small crustaceans, typically around in size, but varying from in the case of ''Gigantocypris''. Their bodies are flattened from side to side and protected by a bivalve-like, chitinous or calcareous valve or "shell". The hinge of the two valves is in the upper (dorsal) region of the body. Ostracods are grouped together based on gross morphology. While early work indicated the group may not be monophyletic and early molecular phylogeny was ambiguous on this front, recent combined analyses of molecular and morphological data found support for monophyly in analyses with broadest taxon sampling. Ecologically, marine ostracods can be part of the zooplankton or (most commonly) are part of the benthos, living on or inside the upper layer of the sea floor. While Myodoc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Foraminifera
Foraminifera (; Latin for "hole bearers"; informally called "forams") are single-celled organisms, members of a phylum or class of amoeboid protists characterized by streaming granular Ectoplasm (cell biology), ectoplasm for catching food and other uses; and commonly an external shell (called a "Test (biology), test") of diverse forms and materials. Tests of chitin (found in some simple genera, and Textularia in particular) are believed to be the most primitive type. Most foraminifera are marine, the majority of which live on or within the seafloor sediment (i.e., are benthos, benthic), while a smaller number float in the water column at various depths (i.e., are planktonic), which belong to the suborder Globigerinina. Fewer are known from freshwater or brackish conditions, and some very few (nonaquatic) soil species have been identified through molecular analysis of small subunit ribosomal DNA. Foraminifera typically produce a test (biology), test, or shell, which can have eithe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Estuary
An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime environments and are an example of an ecotone. Estuaries are subject both to marine influences such as tides, waves, and the influx of saline water, and to fluvial influences such as flows of freshwater and sediment. The mixing of seawater and freshwater provides high levels of nutrients both in the water column and in sediment, making estuaries among the most productive natural habitats in the world. Most existing estuaries formed during the Holocene epoch with the flooding of river-eroded or glacially scoured valleys when the sea level began to rise about 10,000–12,000 years ago. Estuaries are typically classified according to their geomorphological features or to water-circulation patterns. They can have many different names, such as bays, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Holocene
The Holocene ( ) is the current geological epoch. It began approximately 11,650 cal years Before Present (), after the Last Glacial Period, which concluded with the Holocene glacial retreat. The Holocene and the preceding Pleistocene together form the Quaternary period. The Holocene has been identified with the current warm period, known as MIS 1. It is considered by some to be an interglacial period within the Pleistocene Epoch, called the Flandrian interglacial.Oxford University Press – Why Geography Matters: More Than Ever (book) – "Holocene Humanity" section https://books.google.com/books?id=7P0_sWIcBNsC The Holocene corresponds with the rapid proliferation, growth and impacts of the human species worldwide, including all of its written history, technological revolutions, development of major civilizations, and overall significant transition towards urban living in the present. The human impact on modern-era Earth and its ecosystems may be considered of global si ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Before Present
Before Present (BP) years, or "years before present", is a time scale used mainly in archaeology, geology and other scientific disciplines to specify when events occurred relative to the origin of practical radiocarbon dating in the 1950s. Because the "present" time changes, standard practice is to use 1 January 1950 as the commencement date (epoch) of the age scale. The abbreviation "BP" has been interpreted retrospectively as "Before Physics", which refers to the time before nuclear weapons testing artificially altered the proportion of the carbon isotopes in the atmosphere, which scientists must now account for. In a convention that is not always observed, many sources restrict the use of BP dates to those produced with radiocarbon dating; the alternative notation RCYBP stands for the explicit "radio carbon years before present". Usage The BP scale is sometimes used for dates established by means other than radiocarbon dating, such as stratigraphy. This usage differs from t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
