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Archaeologists discover ‘astonishing’ Roman statues on HS2 route
Jane Dalton 2 days ago
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Archaeologists dug up three rare Roman busts but critics said more rare finds may have been bulldozed over - PA© PA
Archaeologists dug up three rare Roman busts but critics said more rare finds may have been bulldozed over
- PA
HS2 bosses have revealed the discovery of “astonishing” Roman statues dug up along the route – to the anger of environmentalists who claim that historic sites are being destroyed.
Archaeologists dug up two complete figures of what appear to be a man and a woman, along with the head of a child, at an abandoned medieval church in Stoke Mandeville, Buckinghamshire.
The find, described as a “once in a lifetime” discovery, also includes a hexagonal glass Roman jug, large pieces of which were still intact despite its having been in the ground for what is thought to be more than 1,000 years.
But opponents of the £106bn high-speed railway, which when completed will run from London to Crewe and Manchester, have accused the company of public-relations spin, or “greywashing”, in announcing the discoveries as other finds are “bulldozed over”.
They pointed out that a 2013 HS2 environmental survey had identified 969 archaeological sites on the route of phase one alone – the London to Birmingham leg – but that the company had decided to investigate only 60 of them.
