Monmouthshire Antiquarian Association Blog

A Legacy from Newport’s Victorian   Era by Mary Evans Copyright Newport Museum and Art Gallery, Percy Scannel's archive,  Ref. 1906, 96.469.1. Postcard dated 1906. For more postcards  click here Access to green spaces became a valued part of our lives during lockdown and public parks played a major role in many areas. As I have been walking through Belle Vue Park and Tredegar House Parkland over the past few months it has struck me how their reopening during lockdown was carrying on the tradition of the public park movement of the late 19th Century. Newport reopened its parks on the 18 May this year when initially visitors were limited to a 5 mile radius. The oldest of its parks, Belle Vue, is a legacy of the public park movement which was such a success in the later part of the 19th Century and  depended on funding from town and city corporations across Britain. In the early part of the Victorian era access to public open green spaces w...

          Young Archaeologists’ Club Archaeological Reconstruction Workshop  by Oliver Blackmore (A version of this article first appeared in The Welsh Federation of Museums and Art Galleries newsletter in late 2019) Newport Museum and Heritage Service cares for an important prehistoric boat plank excavated at Goldcliff, Newport in 1992. The plank dates from a late Bronze Age, approximately 3,000 years ago. Because of its fragile organic composition, the plank has been in storage for the past 27 years. With the help of the Welsh Federation of Museums and Art Galleries, this significant object is now on display and has inspired and engaged the South East Wales branch of the Young Archaeologists’ Club (YAC).   The Goldcliff Bronze Age boat plank  –  a challenging object to interpret.   Newport Museum approached the Welsh Federation for grant aid to help the Service acquire a state-of-the-art display case to make the plank accessible. To he...