A mystery dating back to before the mediaeval world of television's Brother Cadfael lays waiting to be uncovered amidst the houses and busy streets of a Gwent town.

An ancient sunken track carpeted with leaves and flanked by gnarled trees in an almost-forgotten corner of Cwmbran's Greenmeadow estate wends its way past a bald tump about 15 feet high.

"We know the trackway was in use in the Middle Ages and there is no real reason why it should pass so closely to the tump" artist and amateur archaelogist Richard Davies and project officer for a dig which will explore several ancient sites in Cwmbran said.

"There has to be a possibility that the old trackway was in use long before the time of the mediaeval pilgrims.

"It is even possible that ther tump continued to have some significance well after the prehistoric bronze age when we think it was built.

"The trackway goes from Caerleon to Twyn Barlwm which are both iron age sites dating at least from the time of the Romans.

"We are hoping to turn the pages of a complicated and fascinating story."

A team of archaelogists and volunteers under the supervision of George Children, general manager of Leominster-based Border Archaeology will now dig down from the top of the tump and cut a section through the adjacent trackway.

"We shall have to led the evidence dictate the theory rather than the other way round but there is a possibility of exciting discoveries" he said.

"A lot of people will be interested in what we are doing.

"Television programmes like Time Team have not so much kicked off an interest in archaeology as tapped into to an interest about the past that was already there.

"People have a deep need to know about their past .

"This site is very evocative. You can almost see the pilgrims on the Cistercian Way making their way past the probably much more ancient tump."

Apart from the Greenmeadow site some ancient walls discovered by Mr Davies are to be investigated together with stone blocks found near Fairwater High School and three cairns thought to date from the bronze age which preceded the iron age in the shadow of Twyn Barlwm.

Digging which has been commissioned by a consortium which includes Torfaen Council, the Glamorgan and Gwent Archaeological Trust and Newport University will last until September, 2010.

"Cwmbran was built almost overnight with no time at all for archaeologists to investigate what lay beneath the surface" Mr Davies added.

"Fortunately the town was planned with lots of open sites which makes exciting finds a real possibility."

Professional archaeologists wil be assisted by about 100 volunteers each of whom has been given a detailed brief about archaeological work.

"This isn't treasure hunting but science" Mr Children said.

"We will proceed layer by layer, meticulously recording everything of interest as we go along."

*Progress of the Cwmbran digs can be followed in Argus news updates and on www.ancientcwmbran.co.uk