ARCHAEOLOGISTS have dug up potentially significant artifacts at the Bendigo GovHub site in Lyttleton Terrace.
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It is unclear what workers have uncovered but their findings are being assessed by Heritage Victoria, a Regional Development Victoria spokesperson said.
"There will be the opportunity to share details of the findings once assessed," its spokesperson said.
Ripper tales from Bendigo's past:
RDV is leading the build project at the old City of Greater Bendigo offices on behalf of the state.
The $90 million building will house up to 1000 workers from state government departments and the council.
The GovHub site is listed on Heritage Victoria's Victorian Heritage Inventory even if the former offices were not.
A hotel and stables once stood on the site,long before the former council offices were built in the late 1950s.
There was a theatre across the road and the area was also home to an open air shopping market and a host of industrial businesses.
Commercial operators arrived in earnest from the 1870s, according to a council-commissioned heritage study released last year.
However, the area was not as important when Bendigo was established 20 years earlier during the initial gold rush.
"By comparison to the hub of View Street, Pall Mall and Hargreaves Street, the Market Square precinct on Lyttleton Terrace was viewed by commercial operators as being too far away from the city centre," they said.
"It thus remained relatively undeveloped until 1872 when the market was substantially enlarged and some produce merchants and wholesalers set up businesses in the area."
The study's authors noted that larger retailers still preferred the Pall Mall area even after Market Square area businesses took off.
More news:
The archaeological work has not stopped construction workers continuing early preparations for the eventual build, RDV confirmed.
Workers expect to finish building the GovHub in 2022 though that date could change as the project continues.
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