BUDDING archaeologists in Devizes will soon be able to dig up all the knowledge they need on their interest.

National Archaeological Day is taking place on July 23 at the Wiltshire Heritage Museum between 10.30am and 4pm, with free entry for people wishing to learn more about archaeology.

The day, which is aimed at both adults and children, will attempt to educate people about archaeology as well as displaying finds made by people in Wiltshire.

Katie Hinds, the finds liaison officer for Wiltshire, is helping to organise the day and is hoping that, with the help of local archaeological groups, she can generate greater interest among the public in archaeology in order to help discover more about the history of Wiltshire.

She said: "There are vast stretches of landscape that we don't know about so this is where members of the public become very important, as their finds help teach us about the history of the area.

"We still get lots of people coming into the museum who find important things in their back gardens."

The day will allow people to bring in any of their own finds that they might have for identification and will also see activities for children, such as miniature archaeological digs.

Ms Hinds added: "It's going to be a kind of "finds" theme. We're going to have identification of people's finds and we're having the Wiltshire Geological Society coming in. We've got the Trowbridge Metal Detector Club as well to show some of their recent finds and we've got the Archaeological Field Group coming along also.

"As well as that, there are going to be a couple of children's activities, such as sand boxes and little digs."

Ms Hinds, who works for the Portable Antiquities Scheme, admitted that there is often a lot of interesting historical artefacts dug up by people in Wiltshire.

She said: "A lot of my work is with metal detectorists. They find Roman coins, Roman broaches and medieval buckles, amongst other things."

All local finds are recorded by Ms Hinds on the Portable Antiquities Scheme database, which can be found on www.finds.org.uk.