Land Girls Ivy and Dolly will take you on a tour round Sutton Hoo, discovering the ghosts and history of one of the most important Anglo Saxon sites in the world. You will meet Tudor Queen Elizabeth, Anglo Saxon Queen Raedwald and Edith Pretty who owned the site. They reveal the story through sketches, song and dance.
West Suffolk College Performing Arts students will be taking visitors on an amazing journey through time at the National Trust’s Sutton Hoo site near Woodbridge in May.
Land Girls Ivy and Dolly will take you on a tour round Sutton Hoo, discovering the ghosts and history of one of the most important Anglo Saxon sites in the world. You will meet Tudor Queen Elizabeth, Anglo Saxon Queen Raedwald and Edith Pretty who owned the site. They reveal the story through sketches, song and dance.
The determined women all contributed to the history of the historic Sutton Hoo burial site, which contains two 6th and 7th century cemeteries, with one revealing an undisturbed ship burial that included a wealth of Anglo Saxon artefacts now on display in the British Museum
Speculation says that the burial mound belongs to the Anglo Saxon King Raedwald, so his strong pagan Queen forms part of the story. Queen Elizabeth the First commissioned a dig in East Anglia, which may have happened at Sutton Hoo. Mrs Pretty, who lived in Tranmer House overlooking the site, employed a local archaeologist to start digging the mounds. Ivy and Dolly are Land Girls sent to Tranmer House in wartime and that era is reflected with a 1940s dance going on during the performances.
The promenade performance has been commissioned by the National Trust and funded by the Heritage Lottery fund.
Visitors who book for visits on Friday 11 and Saturday 12 May will experience the 25 final year Conservatoire East students performing in their costumes. Tutor Gip Luongo explained: “It’s a major experience of an outdoor performance for students celebrating important Suffolk women through history. For the actors it’s an opportunity through music, song, dance and performance, to tell the story of Sutton Hoo and the amazing women behind it.”
He added that it is also the start of a new partnership with the National Trust and hopefully there will be other exciting opportunities to work together in the future.
To book free tickets for ‘Her Say: Women of Discovery’ on Friday May 11 and Saturday May 12 go to the National Trust website and look up Sutton Hoo Whats On