Summary of the minutes
Bernician Studies Group AGM 2026
6.00 pm Room 1, Irish Centre, Gallowgate, Newcastle-upon-Tyne
We elected our Officials: Chair Joy Rutter (JR), Secretary Sue Ward (SW), Treasurer Ray Shepherd (RS);
and our Trustees: Joy Rutter, Sue Ward, Raymond Shepherd, Deborah Hancock, Dorothy Cowans, Alison Drummond Reddish and Hilary Rimmer.
The Research Directors remain Professor Diana Whaley, Colm O’Brien FSA and Max Adams
Among other things, we discussed:
- Suitable items to acquire with the £500 kindly donated by former Chair Jack Pennie.
- Field work for 2026 and possible topics for group meetings in the Spring.
Field work projects planned for 2026
1 – Dere Street: Hilary Rimmer and others to examine sites along this Roman road, particularly those which might be pre- or post-Roman. To include mapping, LiDAR and a bibliographic search for previous relevant published studies.
2 – Ancient Woodland: Dorothy Cowans and others, in association with the University of Newcastle, using Optically Stimulated Luminescence (OSL) to examine the antiquity of boundaries at Hanging Leaves wood.
Possible topics for meetings in Spring 2026
1 – Yeavering: updates on current work at the early medieval Ad Gefrin site near Wooler.
2 – Place-names ending in ‘tun’: Further consideration of which ‘tun’ names might be ‘purposeful’. This follows the recent session with Eric Cambridge and our own Professor Dian Whaley based on the book Purposeful Names by John Blair and Anne Cole (2025).
Next Meeting: Thursday 5 February 2026: 6.00 pm, Irish Centre
Topics: various, including ‘purposeful’ place-names and forthcoming fieldwork