NHER 67126 (Monument record) - Medieval to post-medieval remains

September-October 2014. Trial Trenching.
Evaluation of proposed development site.
The seven trenches excavated revealed numerous ditches and several discrete features. The majority of these remains produced little or no dating evidence, although the small assemblage of finds recovered suggests that most (if not all) were probably medieval to post-medieval in date (earlier material being limited to a small number of prehistoric worked flints).
Although a small number of early medieval pottery sherds were recovered these were mostly found alongside later, high medieval pottery. The one exception was a north-to-south aligned ditch in the central part of the site, which contained three sherds of early medieval pottery.
The only feature that could be regarded as convincingly dated to the medieval period was a west-north-west to east-south-east aligned ditch in the south-west corner of the site. This produced a total of 15 medieval pottery sherds and also contained dumped burnt material. Two undated pits in the same trenches contained similar burnt material and there was evidence that a series of fires had been lit within these features. Small quantities of medieval pottery were also recovered from a possible pit and a west-north-west to east-south-east aligned ditch in the south-east corner of the site. It seems reasonably likely that at least some of the excavated features at the southern end of the site were associated with occupation along Martham Road. Other notable features in this part of the site included a probable extraction pit that contained single sherds of medieval and of late medieval/early medieval pottery and a small undated ring-ditch. The latter was circular with a diameter of only 3.5m, suggesting it was most likely a drainage gully associated with a stack stand.
The majority of the features uncovered across the remainder of the site were ditches. These were mostly undated, although it is clear from the variety of alignments that multiple phases of activity were represented. A number were aligned north-north-west to south-south-east, matching the orientation of former field boundaries depicted on the Hemsby tithe map (S1). These included two particularly substantial features, the westernmost of produced fragments of post-medieval pottery and brick (although it should be noted that this material came from the upper portion of the last in a sequence of recuts - the origins of the boundary could be much earlier).
See report (S2) for further details.
An archive associated with this work has been deposited with Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2022.172).
P. Watkins (HES), 22 June 2023. Amended 24 August 2025.