NHER 50808 (Monument record) - Site of probable post medieval field boundaries and possible enclosure

January 2008. Norfolk NMP.
A rectilinear arrangement of ditches is visible as cropmarks on aerial photographs (S1)-(S2), centred at TG 2642 1626. Their orientation conforms to the pattern of enclosure evident in the modern fields and on 19th and 20th century maps. The postulated enclosure (at TG 2643 1620), one side of which is formed by a modern field boundary, may have acted as an agricultural enclosure of some sort, although a function related to settlement or industry cannot be ruled out. Post medieval material has been recovered from locations a short distance to the north and west (NHER 28774 and 20477 respectively). The enclosure appears to have overlain, or been bisected by, a sinuous boundary (perhaps of medieval origin?) depicted on Crostwick Tithe Map of 1839 (S3), and also visible as a cropmark (but not mapped).
The enclosure is broadly rectangular in plan, measuring 61m long and 34m wide. There is no clearly defined entrance; of several gaps in its ditch circuit, that at its southwest corner is most convincing as a genuine break. Some caution should be exercised in the interpretation of this enclosure, as the cropmarks are not entirely convincing as archaeological features, and there is a strong possibility that it is at least partially formed by modern agricultural marks, and/or marks formed by the background geology.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 14 January 2008.