Alan Hardy – författare

Between February and April 2002 Oxford Archaeology carried out excavations at 90-93 Broad Street, Reading (NGR SU 7142 7342) in advance of a new retail development. The excavations revealed a cultivation soil and ditch that may have represented activity within the grounds of the Saxon minster; a small assemblage of mid-Saxon pottery was recovered from later deposits, including a single sherd of Ipswich ware. Medieval gravel pits and a bell mould pit were revealed within the back yards of tenements fronting Broad St and Chain St, immediately to the north of St Mary's Churchyard. It is likely that the bell mould pit was for the casting of 13th century bell for St Mary's. The pits contained exceptional assemblages of bird, fish and animal bone, suggestive of primary butchery and skinning in the vicinity, as well as the presence of a high status household. There were also notable assemblages of 11th- to 13th0century pottery and 16th- to 17th-century glass. Excavations at 7-8 Broad Street (Market Way), Reading, revealed part of a possible 16th- to 17th-century tavern or inn, situated behind the street frontage. A stone cess pit and cellar were revealed, built in the 16th century and demolished in the 17th century. A large collection of pottery associated with the serving and consumption of drink, fine Venetian-style glassware and few early clay pipes were recovered from these features. Limited evidence of medieval occupation was also found, in the form of rubbish pits, although much of the site had been severely disturbed by the construction of the Corn Exchange in the 19th century.

Southampton was one of England’s leading medieval ports. During the 13th century and again in the 15th century, its trade in major commodities such as wine, wool and cloth made it one of the most prosperous and cosmopolitan towns in the country. From the later 16th century, however, much of the international trade was lost to other ports (principally London) and Southampton suffered a long decline, until its fortunes revived with the growth of passenger trade to America in the mid 19th century. During the Second World War the city suffered devastating bombing, and here, as elsewhere, post-war reconstruction paid little regard to the historic character of the old town. Medieval property plots were widened or ignored, building heights increased, and the construction of the Castle Way inner ring-road during the 1950s sliced through the medieval gridded street pattern. In 2006 Oxford Archaeology were appointed by CgMs Consulting, acting on behalf of Linden Homes Southern, to carry out an excavation in advance of the construction of apartment blocks in the town’s medieval ‘French Quarter’. The site covered approximately 0.5 ha, bounded to the west and east by the historic frontages of French Street and the High Street (formerly English Street), where an impressive sequence of medieval vaulted cellars still survived. These were accompanied by numerous pits, cess pits and wells yielding significant finds and environmental assemblages, including rare and exotic items. The most significant property – Polymond’s Hall –had a distinguished history and was home to notable residents such as the Venetian Consul in the 15th century, and poet and hymn writer Isaac Watts in the 18th century. This book uses new evidence from the excavations to revisit many ongoing debates on the origins and development of Southampton. It also seeks to provide an evocation of the depth and richness of the town’s history and an insight into the lives of the occupants of the excavation area, in the heart of the late Saxon and medieval town. From the 13th century onwards, this included 22 tenements that survived for 650 years.

Oxford Archaeology carried out excavations for Skanska Construction (UK) Limited on behalf of the Highways Agency along a new road south of the then existing A2 between the Pepperhill and Marling Cross junctions. The road varied from 50m to 80m wide, and nearly 3km of the route (some 15ha) was stripped to archaeological levels prior to excavation. The route lay immediately north of the line of the previously excavated High Speed 1 (HS1). Additional areas (totalling 0.85ha) were excavated c 1km further east, where new ponds were being created north and south of the A2 alongside the Cobham services. Features of every period from Neolithic to post-medieval were found, together with residual Mesolithic flintwork. Early Neolithic activity included one very large posthole associated with a flint scatter east of Tollgate. Later Neolithic/early Bronze Age activity was slight, except for a Beaker pit containing a large assemblage of finds just west of Tollgate, not far from a double Beaker burial on the adjacent HS1.In the later middle Bronze Age two partial enclosures associated with probable metalled trackways were found, one containing a house, pits/hollows and fences, the other without internal features, but becoming a focus for later cremation burials. Scattered pits and cremations were also found further west. Late Bronze Age and earliest Iron Age activity was very sparse, but early Iron Age groups of pits were found at intervals along the route, often with fourpost structures and occasionally ditched boundaries. Some of the pits contained very rich assemblages of finds indicative of ritual deposition, and also included the largest collection of briquetage of this period from Kent. In the middle Iron Age activity became nucleated west of Tollgate, where another metalled trackway had enclosures, pits and four-post structures either side. This settlement continued in the late Iron Age, during which two high status burials took place, one in a bronze-bound bucket, the other accompanied by six brooches. Also in the middle Iron Age a major ditched boundary was dug overlooking the Downs Road dry valley, and burials were made within it and at its end. A ditched settlement was established at Cobham in the late Iron Age, but did not continue into the Roman period. In the early Roman period the focus of occupation shifted to a new, larger rectilinear enclosure overlooking the Tollgate dry valley. Only the northern edge was examined, but this contained one very large rich burial pit and an attached cemetery with two more high status burials, all dated AD 50–70. Other burials continued until the later 3rd century AD, when settlement activity also ceased. Fields were laid out alongside the major Iron Age boundary, and middle and late Roman burials continued in and alongside it, one of whom isotope analysis has shown to be a foreigner.Only a single isolated sunken-featured building could be dated to the Saxon period, but three low status medieval settlements of the 11th/12th centuries were found, two west of Tollgate and the third east of Cobham services. All three were characterised by sunken-featured buildings. Only one settlement continued and grew, but was abandoned in the mid 14th century.

Archaeological investigations at Harding's Field, Chalgrove, revealed the remains of one of the most complete examples of a moated medieval manor yet excavated in England. Evidence of a pre-moat occupation dating from the first half of the 13th century, which may not have been seigneurial, was succeeded in the mid 13th century by the construction of the moated manor house. The documentary evidence indicates that this house belonged to the Barentins, a prominent Oxfordshire family. The manor underwent considerable alterations and improvements during the following 200 years, particularly during the early part of the 14th century and, to a lesser extent, in the late 14th and early 15th century. It passed out of the hands of the Barentin family shortly before it was demolished in the late 15th century.

Oxford Archaeology excavated an area of approximately 1800 sq m within the inner ward or court of the precinct of Eynsham Abbey between 1989 and 1992. The excavation area straddled the modern churchyards of the Roman Catholic St Peter's Church and the Anglican St Leonard's Church, both of which were planning to extend their cemeteries. This factor was the immediate stimulus for the excavations, which were wholly funded by English Heritage.Occupation of the site commenced with the construction of a large enclosure in the late Neolithic period. This is reported elsewhere. A hiatus of some 1500 years was followed by the establishment of an early Saxon settlement represented by a number of sunken-featured buildings and associated pits and hearths. This settlement was superseded by u more organised pattern of occupation, represented by timber halls and boundary ditches possibly associated with the minster church which documentary sources suggest was founded in the 7th or 8th century. In 1005 the minster was refounded as a Benedictine abbey, and substantial traces of some of its principal buildings were found. Following a period of instability after the Norman Conquest, the abbey was refounded in 1109. Buildings relating to this transitional period, and temporary structures from the early 12th century were found. The abbey prospered for most of the medieval period before the Dissolution in 1538-9. Precinct buildings revealed in the excavation included part of the Great Cloister (garth, lavatoria and the west and south walks), refectory, kitchens, cellars, domestic range and latrines. Some of these buildings were reused after the Dissolution. Also found were elements of the water supply and waste disposal systems. Extensive and significant assemblages of pottery, tile, architectural masonry, small finds, animal bone and carbonised environmental remains were recovered.To augment the potential of the main excavation, a further programme of geophysical survey, evaluation and selected excavation work was carried out by Oxford Archaeology, or under their supervision, during 1997-8. The intention of the work was to study as much as possible of the abbey's inner and outer wards within the constraints of resources and the Scheduled Ancient Monument status of part of the precinct, in order to place the main abbey excavations in their context. The evidence from the excavations both major and minor - and the surveys, combined with a study of the varied documentary sources, have allowed a rare opportunity to study in depth the development and economy of a major religious house from its origins through to its demise.

During 2004–2005 Oxford Archaeology carried out a series of archaeological excavations along the proposed route of the A421 Great Barford Bypass, Bedfordshire (NGR TL 102 513–TL 159 554). The route extends from the Black Cat roundabout on the A1 and runs to the north and west of Great Barford linking up at its western end to the A421 Bedford Southern Bypass near Water End. A total of nine sites (Sites 1–9) were investigated in detail revealing evidence of activity from early prehistoric times through to the post-medieval period. Earlier prehistoric activity was sparse and largely evidenced through a light flint scatter over the entire route and a single early Neolithic pit on Site 2. Isolated early Bronze Age pits were located at Sites 2 and 6. Following an apparent hiatus in the middle Bronze Age small-scale activity reappeared at Site 2 in the later Bronze Age-early Iron Age. More widespread occupation and associated activities were apparent from the middle Iron Age and have been documented at Sites 2, 4, 6 and 7. Three of these sites (2, 4 and 6) continued to be occupied into the later Iron Age. By the early Roman period Site 6 had become abandoned shortly followed by Site 2, but activity was still evident at Sites 1, 4, 7 and 8. Of these only Site 8 continued to be inhabited into the later Roman period, although a late Roman cemetery was excavated at Site 4, suggesting continued occupation nearby. Site 8 also saw some post-Roman activity as did the adjacent site at Site 9 where a small hamlet was established in the late Saxon/early medieval period possibly over an earlier mid-late Saxon settlement. Two new sites (Sites 3 and 5) saw small settlements established dating to the 10th–13th and 12th centuries respectively.

Details results of excavations along the A477 from St Clears to Red Roses during the Road Improvement Scheme, 2012. Finds include a Mesolithic site in the lower Tâf valley; early Neolithic pits and a post-built structure at Cildywyll; the remains of an Early Bronze Age barrow, 38 burials (some urned), a pyre site, and a Middle Bronze Age drying oven near St Clears; and A Bronze Age burnt mound near Red Roses.