|
As part of the LOWV project, a
systematic study of the cropmarks in the 12 parishes was
started in January 2005. The most usual cause of cropmarks is
the presence of an old, filled-in ditch in a field. This will
hold more water than the surrounding land, and as a
consequence, crops growing above it will ripen later. From the
air these features show up vividly in late summer when the
weather conditions have been favourable. |
|
 |
These two cropmarks in this photograph, taken in 1995, were
particularly intriguing. photo Chris
Mussen |
|
|
|
 |
An examination of other photographs showed more detail. |
|
After contacting the farmer, we
gridded out the field into 20 metre squares and carefully
walked across the ploughed surface, collecting finds. |
|
 |
 |
The field produced many finds, including a Mesolithic flint
blade, far left, and a Romano-Celtic brooch of the late 1st to
early 2nd centuries AD. |
|
|
|
|
Although we had walked a number of selected fields in the area
looking for finds, this site seemed particularly promising.
Where we had walked in fields with the type of oval
enclosure we could see here we had found quantities of
Romano-British pottery. The larger enclosure seemed therefore
likely to have been a settlement of the Roman period.
The smaller feature, with the very pronounced cropmarks,
was different. We wondered if it was a henge - a type of
prehistoric monument with an external bank. Henges are a
characteristic monument of the Neolithic period taking their
name from Stonehenge. They usually don't have stones though.
Nothing much was known about these features - they were
recorded on Herefordshire Sites and Monuments Record database
as record number 30264 - as two circular enclosures of unknown
date. |
|
 |
On Tuesday 2nd and Wednesday
3rd August 2006 a geophysical survey of the site was carried
out. This was done by Anne and Martin Roseveare of
Archeaophysica and
revealed much more detail about the site.
The large enclosure had
internal partitions, and the smaller one an area of burning in
it's north-eastern quadrant.
The smaller enclosure was found
to have a mound in its centre. This would be more typical of a
Bronze Age barrow than a Neolithic henge.
|
|
|
|
|
 |
The field before excavation. The bump is visible against
the far hedge line. |
|
|
|
|
 |
We began
removing the ploughsoil from selected areas of the site on
Thursday 5th August. The ploughsoil was quite shallow and
patches of the underlying bedrock - the Old Red Sandstone -
were exposed. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Hand
excavation began on Friday 6th August |
|
|
|
|
 |
The area around the entrance to the
larger enclosure. |
|
|
|
|
 |
After a while pottery started to
appear in the fill of the ditch of the larger enclosure. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Mixed pottery and other debris. This
was lying against the outside of the enclosure ditch,
suggesting that it had been thrown in from the inside. This
pottery proved that the site was occupied by people during the
Roman period. |
|
|
|
|
 |
1 and 2 are rims of Severn Valley
Ware, a common Roman period pottery. Other pieces of
Romano-British were also present. 3 is a much coarser piece of
pottery which had been heated to about 500 degrees Celsius.
There was also some slag. |
|
|
|
|
 |
The ditch
totally excavated. Cut through the sandstone bedrock, it had a
gully at the bottom (on the outside) with a step inside.
In the
section, on the left about 60cm from the base, is part of the
dump of Romano-British rubbish, including a large sherd of
Severn Valley Ware. |
|
The larger enclosure shown on the
cropmarks and the geophysical survey was therefore, as
supposed, A Romano-British settlement. It was presumably a
farming settlement, but the slag and other finds suggests that
the people also worked iron, probably as a sort of 'cottage
industry' at times when the agricultural cycle gave them some
spare time.
We therefore turned our attention to
the smaller enclosure. At this stage our working
interpretation was that it was a large Bronze Age round
barrow. |
|
|
|
|
 |
In the south-east quadrant of the circle we found two
features which appeared to be cremations. However closer
examination of the ashy deposit found no fragments of calcined
bone. Even modern cremations leave pieces of bone which are
then ground to powder (this is what we call 'ashes'). |
|
|
|
|
 |
We cleaned off the ploughsoil exposing a solid layer of clay
and stone. This view is in the north-east quadrant of the
circle looking south |
|
|
|
|
 |
The south-west quadrant of the
inside of the circular feature looking south. The clay and
stone layer underlay the ploughsoil. (The wooden peg is the
same one as in the previous view.)
At this stage we still believed
that we were looking at the remains of a Bronze Age burial
mound. The clay could not have derived from weathering of the
sandstone. The only source of the clay here was from the bands
of ancient clay beneath the top layer of the old red
sandstone. Therefore it must have come from the surrounding
ditch.
Two things started us
questioning our original interpretation of this site. One was
the amount of medieval pottery we were finding; the other was
that the clay and stone layer looked suspiciously like a made
surface rather than the base of a ploughed-out mound. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Concentrating on the north-east quadrant of the ring, we
removed the clay and stone layer. Taking a line at 45 degrees
north-east from the centre we first removed the layer to the
east of it. A burnt surface was then revealed. |
|
|
|
|
 |
On this was spread of medieval
pottery - the mound found by surveying was not a Bronze Age
barrow! We then uncovered
the second part of this layer within the quadrant. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Some of the pottery was in
quite large pieces. It had been left where it had been dropped
and then covered with the clay and stone surface. |
|
|
|
|
 |
When we removed all the
pottery, several rectangular red patches were clearly visible
(1 and 2). These were highly magnetic and had clearly been the
location of fires. |
|
|
|
|
 |
In the meantime we were cutting sections through the circular
ditch. This section is directly south of the centre of the
feature. |
|
|
|
|
 |
The section of the ditch
excavated to the bottom. |
|
|
|
|
 |
The positions of the ditch cuts |
|
|
|
|
 |
The section through the
northern part of the ring-ditch excavated to the bottom. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Anne and Martin Roseveare of
Archaeophysica
doing a magnetic susceptiblity survey of a section through the
northern part of the ditch.
|
|
|
|
 |
|
Top: plot of
the magnetic susceptibility readings - Red is high; north (the
outside) is to the left.. These readings suggest that the
ditch was filled up from the north. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Taking samples from the ditch. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Returning to the centre we dug
into the layer on which the spread of pottery had been lying.
This was a dark material with a
lot of charcoal in it.
Below this was a layer of clay
which had been laid on top of the natural sand. There were
several features in this layer. |
|
|
|
|
 |
Taking samples. |
|
|
|
|
 |
The largest of the features in
the clay layer seemed to be a squarish post-hole. |
|
|
|
|
 |
The centre of the ring: The
stone rubble on the left appears to be in a deep feature which
we did not excavate. |
|
|
|
|
|
|
