Tree-Ring Analysis of Timbers from the Guildhall, High Street, Worcester
Author(s): Alison Arnold, Robert Howard, Cliff Litton
Core samples were obtained from 16 different oak timbers, many of them probably reused, forming the frame of first-floor rooms of Worcester Guildhall. The analysis of 14 of these (two samples proving to be unsuitable) produced a single site chronology, WORGSQ01, comprising 11 samples, and having a combined overall length of 249 rings. This site chronology was dated as spanning the years AD 1361 to AD 1609. Not unexpectedly, given the nature of the material, interpretation of the sapwood would suggest that timbers with different felling dates are present. Six timbers have estimated felling dates which cluster in the late-sixteenth to early-seventeenth centuries, and may represent a building thought to have been complete by AD 1617. Two other timbers may have been felled slightly later in the first quarter of the seventeenth century. One timber is unlikely to have been felled before AD 1624 and could have been felled as late as AD 1649. These may represent subsequent periods of building. The felling date of two other dated timbers cannot be accurately determined because they do not have a heartwood/sapwood boundary, but both are unlikely to have been felled before the late sixteenth century. There is no indication of any fifteenth or early sixteenth century material represented by the sampled timbers.
- Report Number:
- 42/2006
- Series:
- Research Department Reports
- Pages:
- 20
- Keywords:
- Dendrochronology Standing Building
