FEW Oxford people could have dreamt what sleeping remains of day-to-day city life were lying under the Westgate Shopping Centre car park, waiting to be unearthed by experts.

Archaeologists digging around have become a frequent sight there as the ground is prepared to play host to the expanded shopping centre.

To most with roots here, the corner of town flanked by Norfolk Street and Old Greyfriars Street will strike up images of the old multi-storey car park.

But the number of finds at the ancient site – the city’s biggest ever dig – has sparked imaginations of people from across the city as its history has been laid bare for all to see. And not just for the experts.

The Westgate project attracted more than 3,500 people over two weekends in July and September as history buffs cast their eyes over finds from up to 750 years ago – including those believed to have been used by the Greyfriars in the 14th and 15th centuries.

Daggers and wooden spoons have been among the latest discoveries, which are to be looked after by Oxford Archaeology before becoming part of the archive collection at the Museum of Oxford.

Oxford Archaeology senior project manager for the site, Ben Ford said: “We were overwhelmed with the positive feedback that we had from the open days.

“It shows that the public are genuinely interested in the archaeology of the area they live in, and it is often difficult for people to get access to these kinds of finds.”

The medieval buildings were demolished as a result of Henry VIII’s Reformation nearly 500 years ago, when the Church of England broke away from the authority of the Pope and the Catholic Church.

Among the buildings found so far are medieval kitchens, with thick walls and stone hearths blackened by ash from fires.

Elsewhere a culvert from the Thames, constructed to provide a water supply at one end of the complex, and clean the latrines at the other, has been found.

Objects discovered during recent excavations include part of a ceramic roof, a drinking cup and an iron halberd – a combined spear and axehead which could have been part of a weapon up to eight-feet long.

According to Oxford Archaeology the halberd head would likely have been used in the Civil War period between 1642 and 1651 – a fraught period in Oxford’s history as Parliamentarians waged a long campaign to take the city from those loyal to the King, who made the city his capital.

Mr Ford said: “This object brings to life a poignant event from a well-known period of English history: the loss of a weapon by a soldier, perhaps during the end-battle before Oxford was finally taken by Cromwell’s Parliamentarian troops. Perhaps a fight that saw the soldier, its owner, killed.

“For me this object brings home the power of archaeology as it made me reflect that in a world full of conflicts, we too had a period of turbulent and violent civil strife, but that this helped forge our country into what it is today.”

But taking such care with objects wasn’t always the case. Mr Ford said until the 1990s, building developments on historical sites did not have to be excavated, so many were old remains were destroyed during construction.

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Luckily, historians did keep an eye on some previous developments at the site.

Nowadays though an excavation must take place before building work can start. As part of the planning process, Oxford City Council requested that the group open up the site to visitors.

Mr Ford said: “It is our job to provide the public with information that satisfies their interest in history.

“It should not be shut away from the general public but we make it possible for these objects to be seen.”

Excavation started in June last year and is set to finish in the spring.

Builders have now moved to the construction phase of the scheme, which will see two major new sections of the shopping centre built by autumn 2017.

No more open days are planned, but visitors can now see the area as it is excavated through a window in Norfolk Street, and a series of talks inspired by the work continues.

About 2,000 people visited the now-closed Oxford Westgate Pop-Up Museum in the Oxford Central Library to see what has been found.

* The next talk about the Westgate archaeological dig will be Excavations at the Oxford Blackfriars by George Lambrick, at 6pm on Tuesday, October 13, at Oxford Castle Unlocked. Book at oxfordpreservation.org.uk