NHER 64438 (Monument record) - Burials and other features within churchyard of St John the Baptist’s Church, Bressingham

May 2017. Watching Brief.
Monitoring of drainage works to both south and north of church.
At least thirty burials east-to-west aligned burials were recorded, all within a rectangular trench excavated for a new soakaway beneath the path to the north door of the church. Several phases of burial were apparent, with successive intercutting of the graves having resulted in the significant truncation of many burials. The majority of the burials were adults, although the stratigraphically-later graves contained a notable group of several juvenile or child burials; suggesting that at one point this area may have been reserved for the burial of younger individuals. The exact date of the excavated graves is unclear with most, if not all, of the finds recovered likely to be residual from earlier phases of activity. It is suggested that burials within graves with rounded tapering ends had probably been buried without a coffin and were therefore most likely medieval in date, whereas the smaller number with evidence for a coffin were probably post-medieval.
The various trenches excavated elsewhere were not deep enough to expose burials, although some other features and deposits of interest were recorded. The earliest deposits associated with the church itself were alternating layers of mortar-rich material and sandy silt that extended beneath the north wall of the 13th-century chancel. These were probably ‘banded’ foundation deposits of the kind often found beneath more substantial medieval walls in the county. Compact flint and mortar layers interpreted as foundation deposits were also identified immediately to the north of the tower and similar deposits were also observed close to the north-west and south-east corners of the north aisle. A construction trench filled with mortar rubble was also recorded at the eastern end of the south aisle.
Three post-holes cut into the foundation deposits close to the tower had probably supported scaffolding during historical remedial work. One produced a number of post-medieval finds.
A range of unstratified and residual finds were recovered during this work including Mesolithic/Early Neolithic and undatable prehistoric worked flints; Late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age, Iron Age/Early Saxon, Roman and Late Saxon/medieval pottery sherds; a fragment of fired clay that could be from an Early or Middle Saxon circular loomweight; post-medieval brick and tile fragments and several pieces of animal bone.
Following the completion of these works all of the human remains were reburied in a trench dug immediately to the north of the new soakaway north of the church.
See report (S1) for further details.
An archive associated with this work has been deposited with Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2018.91).
P. Watkins (HES), 30 August 2020. Amended 9 December 2022.