NHER 64341 (Monument record) - Late Saxon to medieval and post-medieval/modern features and multi-period finds

October 2016-February 2017. Watching Brief.
Monitoring of groundworks associated with construction of three residential dwellings.
This work exposed a range of sub-surface remains and recovered artefacts relating to several distinct phases of activity. A number of Late Saxon or medieval features were identified in the westernmost part of the site, including pits, at least one ditch and two potentially structural features. Although all of these features produced small amounts of Late Saxon pottery, the presence of a medieval sherd in one of the pits suggests that at least some of this material may have been residual within later features. The remains tentatively interpreted as structural were a small possible post-setting and an adjacent shallow linear feature that may have been the scar left by a timber sill. The largest pit (which produced the medieval pottery) was possibly an infilled chalk quarry. Other finds recovered from these features included two lava quern fragments and a small amount of animal bone. An overlying subsoil deposit (which only survived in this part of the site) produced additional sherds of Late Saxon and medieval pottery. Other evidence for medieval activity on the site included a single medieval roof tile and two fragments of probable kiln furniture, all of which were residual in a later feature. One of the pieces of kiln furniture has patches of a grey to pale greenish-yellow glaze.
Post-medieval to modern remains included two west-north-west to east-south-east aligned ditches, the southernmost of which corresponds with a boundary marked on the late 19th-century 1st Edition Ordnance Survey map and still visible on aerial photographs taken in 1946. An adjacent rubbish pit was probably broadly contemporary with these ditches as it produced pottery of late 18th- to 20th-century date. Three much more recent waste pits were identified in the south-eastern corner of the sites, all of which contained loose fills of soil, redeposited chalk and modern rubbish.
Other residual and unstratified finds of note included two Roman pottery sherds and a single Early Saxon sherd. A small assemblage of post-medieval and modern metal objects was also recovered.
See report (S1) for further details.
P. Watkins (HES), 26 August 2020.