Amid rolling fields and woodland, 100 miles north of New York City, a team of archaeologists scoured the land for clues.

Their search was not for Mayan mosaics or Roman ruins - rather, the team was looking for information about an epic period of American history: the Woodstock music festival.

Next year marks the 50th anniversary of the legendary gathering, which brought Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Creedence Clearwater Revival, Janis Joplin and Joe Cocker together for one of the defining musical events of the 1960s.

In advance of the celebrations, a team from Binghamton University's public archaeology facility was enlisted to help map out precisely where the festival unfolded.

"The overall point of this investigation is to kind of define the stage space," said Josh Anderson, the project director, kneeling beside a hole that showed evidence of a fence that kept 400,000 fans from the stage area.

"We can use this as a reference point," he said. "People can stand on that and look up at the hill and say, 'Oh, this is where the performers were. Jimi Hendrix stood here and played his guitar at 8:30 in the morning.'"