COMMPELLING evidence that Reeth enjoyed a prosperous medieval past has been unearthed.

Almost 2,000 items were found during Swaledale Big Dig - a summer-long community archaeology project.

Residents and teams of enthusiasts dug 27 one metre square test pits on private and public land throughout the village.

Most of the items found were pottery fragments, but glass, nails and even a medieval metal lock were also dug up.

The results will be revealed in detail at two free events at Reeth Memorial Hall this weekend – a presentation on Friday, November 28 at 7pm and an exhibition on Saturday from 10am to 4pm.

Project leader Alan Mills, of the Swaledale and Arkengarthdale Archaeology Group (SWAAG), which organised and managed the project said that while it was already know that Swaledale had been more or less continuously inhabited since the Bronze Age, it was striking that within Reeth no dating evidence older than pottery fragments from the late 1100s and the 1200s were found.

He added: "It suggests that this was the time, beginning around the reigns of the first Plantagenet kings, Henry II and Richard I, when a thriving community became properly established.

"We found 52 pieces from this period, but only 21 dating from the 1300s to the 1500s, which the professional archaeologists tell us is indicative of an economic decline.

“That fits with the known history of Swaledale, which was devastated in the 1300s, first by Scottish armies, which for a period of 30 years came south to raid the wealthy Yorkshire monasteries.

"They often travelled the length of Swaledale on their way in and out of the county, and early accounts talk of them rampaging throughout Richmondshire, destroying religious buildings, including Marrick and Ellerton Priories in Swaledale, and also burning villages and manors."

Mr Mills added that in the second half of the 1300s the bubonic plague would then have hit.

He added: “Our finds of more than 130 pieces of pottery from the 1600s indicate that this was the period in which Reeth was finally restored to vibrancy, leading to the royal grant of a market charter in 1695.

"This coincides with the known expansion of the lead-mining industry in the area, which drew more people to live and work in what was then a relatively stable environment."

The project will continue next year when the focus will be on the neighbouring villages of Fremington and Grinton.

The project was supported by the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority and funded by the National Lottery Heritage Lottery Fund.