A project to recreate the earliest dwellings built by Bermuda’s settlers has been given the official go-ahead by the Department of Planning.St David’s Historical Society President Rick Spurling said the group hopes to start soon on building a home like those that sheltered settlers 400 years ago, in 1612.The replica will be erected alongside Bermuda’s oldest house: Carter House at the East End“We have all our permissions and we’re ready,” Mr Spurling said. “I have a container of Virginia cedar ready to go. As you’d expect, it’s too hard to find the custom-sized logs in Bermuda cedar. We have to take what we can.”The project, to begin in the springtime, relies on educated guesswork, since none of the simple wooden, palmetto-thatched houses have been uncovered by archeologists.In sourcing the logs, which are to be shipped next month, Mr Spurling had to find raw tree-trunks instead of squared-off cuts of wood.The project could cost $50,000 or more, and the society hopes to get a break on import costs. Most of the expense comes from the wood, Mr Spurling said.Next comes the excavation of foundations, followed by the laying of rocks and gravel. Fellow historian David Givens, of the group Preservation Virginia, will advise Bermuda’s history buffs on how to recreate the 17th century buildings.Jamestown, Virgina, where the US group has conducted extensive archaeological digs, contained dwellings not unlike those that would have been built in early Bermuda.“Mr Givens will be coming down here in March, and we’ll get everybody who’s interested in volunteering together so that he can go over the whole structure with us,” Mr Spurling said.The St David’s group is hoping for as many volunteers as possible, as well as donations, to assist with the building.“Eventually, what we want to do is replace the wood and daub with limestone, just like they did in Bermuda in the late 1600s,” Mr Spurling said.