Cotswold Archaeology – förlag

Excavations at Stoke Road, Bishop's Cleeve in 1997 revealed Romano-British agricultural enclosures, evidence of small-scale ironworking, possible structures and a small burial plQt, dating from the 3rd century AD to the last quarter of the 4th century AD. A small post-built structure, probably a temporary shelter or windbreak, was dated by a single sherd of grass-tempere~ pottery to the Saxon period between the 7th and 9th centuries AD. Medieval remains, dating ftom the 12th to 15th century, comprised a possible stock enclosure, garden plots and the rea~ of toft boundaries running perpendicular to the Stoke Road frontage. A small building, with an ~ntemal cobbled surface and an external stone-lined drain, and several waterlogged pits were r~ealed within one toft. The absence ofbiological remains from other medieval rural sites in Gloucestershire to date makes those from the waterlogged pits of particular note. Evidence of small-scale ironworking from the medieval period was also recovered.

Excavations in advance of the construction of the Gloucester Business Park Link Road, Hucclecote, in 1998 revealed alluvium deposited by the Horsbere Brook, in places up to 2m deep. Radiocarbon dating demonstrates that the alluvium had been deposited by the 12th century BC. Three or four Middle Bronze Age cremation burials were probably part of a flat cemetery, the site subsequently occupied by a Late Bronze Age or Early Iron Age settlement which contained in excess of four post-built roundhouses. In the 1st century AD a settlement that contained a number of probable mass-walled roundhouses was constructed. It was extensively reorganised in the early 2nd century when a series of ditched enclosures were linked to Ermin Street by a 320m-long trackway. A small cemetery of 12 inhumations is noteworthy as it demonstrates that the Late Iron Age tradition of burial by crouched inhumation persisted into the 2nd century AD. Several of the burials were accompanied by grave goods, and one of the males suffered from a very rare form of dwarfism to his forearms, a condition that would have been obvious to his contemporaries. The settlement continued in use until the late 3rd or early 4th century, although the trackway ditches continued to accumulate material into the later 4th century. The trackway and enclosures appear to have survived as visible earthworks into the medieval period as their orientation influenced the alignment of medieval field systems.

Twenty-five years is a long time in the study of prehistory and these papers, given at a conference in Cheltenham in 2004, seek to review the excavations, surveys, chance finds and serious investigations carried out over two and a half decades.

Archaeological work in advance of pipeline construction culminated in excavation at four sites on the Gloucestershire/Worcestershire border by the Carrant Brook and River Isbourne. Geophysical and cropmark evidence has been used to enhance interpretation of the excavated 'slices' across these sites, revealing a changing pattern of human activity and density of settlement from the Mesoltihic to the medieval period. Early features, including a possible Early Neolithic flat grave, suggest that activity in the area prior to the Middle Iron Age was largely ritual in nature. From the Middle Iron Age onwards substantial settlement enclosures were constructed and remained in use to the end of the 1st century AD, when an increased level of activity saw some enlarged and others abandoned and replaced. All four sites were typical of low status Iron Age and Roman rural settlement in southern England, and all were abandoned by the 4th century AD, but with some evidence for later Anglo-Saxon and medieval activity. These excavations add considerably to our understanding of life and death in the late prehistoric and Roman periods, and of the distribution of archaeological remains of all periods, in an area of known archaeological significance close to the confluence of two major rivers: the Severn and Avon.

Two reports are published in this volume: excavations in 2004 at Henbury School, Bristol (by Derek Evans, Neil Holbrook and E.R. McSloy) and excavations in 2005 at Hewlett Packard, Filton, South Gloucestershire (by Kate Cullen, Neil Holbrook, Martin Watts, Anwen Caffell and Malin Holst). Excavations in 2004 at Henbury School, Bristol, revealed the truncated remains of 21 inhumation burials, making a total of 28 burials recorded at the site since 1982. Of these, 24 burials formed a dispersed cemetery of crouched inhumations, the vast majority of which were aligned north/south and lay on their left sides, with equal numbers of males and females (where sex could be determined) and only one child. Poor bone survival rendered radiocarbon dating invalid, and the cemetery is dated by only one grave good: a finger ring from the mid to late Iron Age. However, the cemetery clearly pre-dated a later rectangular enclosure of very late Iron Age (early 1st-century AD) date. Crouched inhumations from the later Iron Age are known from the region but usually from pits or scattered, so the presence of this cemetery at Henbury is significant. Inhumation cemeteries of this date are rare in Western Britain, although they may have been quite widespread. Despite the dearth of surviving features within the subsequent enclosure, the scale of the ditches suggests it was a farmstead, and environmental evidence hints at both livestock rearing and cereal cultivation. Subsequent Roman activity was clearly intensive, and included a further four burials; although difficult to interpret, it adds to a substantial amount of evidence for Roman activity to the north-west of Bristol. Excavations in 2005 at Hewlett Packard, Filton, revealed the truncated remains of 51 inhumation burials within an isolated post-Roman cemetery. All of the burials were extended and east-west aligned, and were arranged in rows and groups. The tradition of east/west-aligned graves is a common late Roman and post-Roman practice, and these were not necessarily Christian. The largest group comprised 24 burials clustered around a central grave that contained an unusual skeleton and evidence for a distinctive burial rite. Overall there were slightly more females than males (where sex could be determined) and ten children. Adult stature could only be calculated in a few cases; males were generally taller that the early medieval average, females shorter. No grave goods were recovered, but four radiocarbon dates obtained from human bone suggest a period of use sometime between the 5th and 7th centuries AD. There was no evidence for contemporary settlement within the immediate vicinity. Other post-Roman cemeteries that are culturally distinct from Anglo-Saxon influenced burials are known from the region. The absence of Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in South Gloucestershire suggests this area remained under British control in the 5th and 6th centuries. The abandonment of this cemetery may have been the result of changes in the religious landscape once the area finally came under Saxon control in the late 7th century.

Two reports are published in this volume: excavations in 2003 at Blenheim Farm, Moreton-in-Marsh (by Jonathan Hart and Mary Alexander) and excavations in 2004 at 21 Church Road, Bishop's Cleeve (by Kate Cullen and Annette Hancocks). Significant remains recorded at Moreton-in-Marsh include a Middle Bronze Age settlement of four post-built circular structures partly enclosed by a segmented ditch, and a series of medieval fields and paddocks with a possible sheepcote structure. A Middle Palaeolithic handaxe was also recovered. The Iron Age and medieval remains recorded at Bishop's Cleeve add to our understanding of past settlement in and around the village, where extensive development has resulted in a number of significant excavations in recent years.

This volume presents the results of a number of excavations undertaken in Cirencester in the last decade which have examined houses, shops, public buildings (including the forum), town defences and cemeteries. Excavations within insula IX found a previously unrecorded corridor mosaic, while work within the western cemetery has revealed interesting evidence for early Roman cremation ritual, along with later Roman inhumation burials. The publication of this volume marks the fiftieth anniversary of the formation of the Cirencester Excavation Committee, and an introductory essay charts the changing circumstances in which archaeology has been practiced in the town over the last fifty years.

Two reports are published in this volume: Prehistoric and Early Historic Activity, Settlement and Burial at Walton Cardiff, near Tewkesbury: Excavations at Rudgeway Lane 2004-2005 (by Jonathan Hart and E.R. McSloy), and Romano-British Agriculture at the former St James's Railway Station, Cheltenham: Excavations in 2000-2001 (by Laurent Coleman and Martin Watts). Significant remains from Rudgeway Lane include two Middle Bronze Age parallel ditches (the remains of an enclosure, or possibly a long barrow), and a Middle Iron Age enclosure superseded by 1st century AD unenclosed settlement, that was in turn replaced by a 2nd to late 3rd-century AD enclosed rectilinear settlement featuring a roundhouse, a well, several burials and an associated trackway. Two 6th-century burials, one with grave goods, were later made within the abandoned farmstead. At the St James's site in Cheltenham, excavation revealed a field system that was used and developed throughout the Roman period, together with a number of pits and postholes, with two late 4th century AD burials.

This volume contains the results of four archaeological projects undertaken within the historic suburbs of Bristol. Excavations at nos 26–28 and at nos 55–60 St Thomas Street were both within the 12th-century planned suburb of Redcliffe, just to the southeast of the medieval city. Investigations at Harbourside and at Cabot House, Deanery Road, were undertaken in the medieval district of Billeswick, to the southwest of the city centre and in the vicinity of Bristol Cathedral, formerly the church of the 12th-century St Augustine’s Abbey. However, it is the general lack of evidence for significant development at these sites throughout the medieval and post-medieval periods and up to the beginning of the 18th century that provides a common theme.The scarcity of evidence for medieval and post-medieval development at the Billeswick sites, Cabot House and Harbourside, is unsurprising as both were in the ownership of the abbey or cathedral throughout this period, and were clearly of value as undeveloped land, either as parkland (as at Cabot House) or meadow (i.e. Canon’s Marsh at Harbourside). The dearth of evidence from the St Thomas Street sites in Redcliffe was more unexpected, though this appears to corroborate documentary evidence suggesting that this part of the suburb remained something of a backwater into late post-medieval times. At nos 55–60, there was little evidence for anything more substantial than simple boundaries and timber structures, perhaps used for drying cloth, until the beginning of the 18th century. At nos 26–28 there was no evidence for tenements until late into the post-medieval period and the site may well have been part of a medieval grange. The development of the first substantial buildings at both St Thomas Street sites, of new streets and terraces at Cabot House, and of the ropewalks and later industrial development of Canon’s Marsh at Harbourside, all reflect the rapid expansion and building boom Bristol enjoyed in the 18th century, largely a result of the city’s involvement in the Atlantic trade.

This volume contains the results of two archaeological projects undertaken within the Frome Valley, Gloucestershire. The first describes a Beaker pit and evidence for a Romano-British settlement at Foxes Field, Ebley Road, Stonehouse; the second details the remains of medieval enclosures and a fishpond at Rectory Meadows, Kings Stanley. There is little to connect the two sites, other than them being less than a mile apart, with the site at Foxes Field principally comprising an early Roman-British rural settlement and late Romano-British burial ground; and the site at Rectory Meadows featuring medieval paddocks and a late medieval pond. In fact, with Foxes Field also producing evidence for prehistoric occupation and for a post-medieval path and plough furrows, the two sites largely complement each other in terms of period representation. However, common to both sites is evidence, of just a few fragments of flue tiles, roof tiles and building rubble, to suggest that late Roman villas once stood nearby to both locations. It is the recurring presence of Romano-British remains from archaeological investigations in the Frome valley, often with such evidence for high-status buildings, which demonstrates just how populated this area was during the Roman period in Britain. The burials from Foxes Field, and in particular the close bond that can be implied between the man and woman found in the remarkable ‘double’ grave, serve to remind us that these discoveries are not just ‘relics of a bygone age’, but were once homes to real people who lived, loved and died beside the river Frome.

Archaeological work ahead of pipeline construction in East and South Devon led to the excavation of over thirty sites spanning the earlier Neolithic to early modern times. Early features included a wide scatter of pits dating to the Neolithic and Beaker periods (c. 3700–2000 BC), and a variety of Middle Bronze Age features that included evidence for land division in the Otter valley and South Devon. Iron Age activity was relatively uncommon but included iron smelting near Dartington in South Devon and piecemeal settlement more widely.Later remains included evidence for a hillslope enclosure close to the River Dart and an open settlement engaging in pewter manufacture close to the River Avon, which were both Roman in date. There was also a medieval sunken outbuilding near Powderham containing charred cereals (believed to be a first for Devon), as well as a cob linhay relating to the mapped 19th-century rural landscape near Exton. Although none of the sites were particularly rich in artefacts, more than fifty radiocarbon dates have added considerably to our understanding of the changes in human activity, land use and environment over the past 5,000 years across these parts of Devon.

Excavation of approximately a third of a hectare in the north-western part of the historic core of Worcester revealed evidence for activity dating from the Roman to the post-medieval and early modern period. The deepest deposits were recorded in geotechnical and archaeological boreholes, and in two sondages: the rest of the site was excavated to the depth of formation level for development. The earliest feature was a Roman road running on the approximate alignment of the present-day Newport Street. Deposits relating to road construction and ground consolidation comprised metal-working waste, with finds of later 2nd to 3rd-century date. No in situ evidence of Roman occupation was excavated. These levels were sealed by alluvial deposits. In the early 13th century the area was divided by boundaries, which were consolidated during the subsequent medieval and post-medieval periods into building plots with frontages onto both Newport Street and Dolday. The Newport Street frontage was developed with substantial stone and timber buildings, some over stone-built cellars. A series of ovens, hearths, structures and surfaces suggest a mixture of craft and domestic activities took place in the back plots of these properties. The style, construction and layout of some of the medieval buildings, coupled with artefactual and environmental evidence, suggest the occupants were relatively prosperous. The major plot boundaries changed little throughout the post-medieval and early modern period, although documentary research indicates a complex history of ownership and holdings featuring sub-division, amalgamation and multiple occupancy. The street frontages of both Newport Street and Dolday continued to be occupied throughout the post-medieval and early modern periods. Open spaces and structural remains, including wells, hearths, ovens and cess pits, in the back plots reflect a variety of activities associated with trade and domestic activity. Finds and environmental evidence has helped to link some of these structures to trades associated with the owners and occupants known from historical records. The remains of bread-ovens, a bake-house, a malthouse and a warehouse for hemp have been identified, and there is more tentative archaeological evidence for cordwaining, cloth-making, brewing and distilling, the latter trades replacing cloth-making as that trade declined in the 17th and 18th centuries. The sub-division of properties and the crowding of small cottages into the back plots during the 18th and 19th centuries reflect the increase in residential occupancy that resulted in over-crowding and a decline in status for this area of the city. The excavations represent the first large-scale archaeological investigation of this part of Worcester. The results complement those of previous major investigations of the Roman and medieval town and provide valuable insights into the economic and social status of the medieval town’s expansion onto the former floodplain. An integrated approach, analysing all aspects of the archaeological evidence in combination with detailed study of the available documentary and historical sources, has been particularly valuable in achieving an understanding of the site in later periods, providing the first major archaeological study of the post-medieval development of the city.

Archaeological surveys and excavations were carried out between 2006 and 2010 in advance of the construction of a gas pipeline in the Gloucestershire Cotswolds. They resulted in the discovery of many new sites and the investigation of eighteen of them dating from the prehistoric to medieval periods.Early Neolithic and Beaker/Early Bronze Age pits in the southern part of the route near Winstone, suggest transitory occupation in early prehistoric times. Early Bronze Age cremation graves on lower ground near Stanway were associated with two slightly later ring-ditches, and another Bronze Age ring-ditch was excavated at Foxcote Hill. A segmented boundary ditch near Winstone was also the location of Iron Age and Roman activity. An Iron Age settlement on Salter’s Hill, Winchcombe, included an Early Iron Age roundhouse, while Middle Iron Age grain-storage pits here and elsewhere indicated other farming settlements. Late Iron Age and Roman occupations in the high Wolds showed a range of remains, including unusual deposits of artefacts, animal bones and burials.A fragmentary sequence of Anglo-Saxon boundary burials was found at the southern end of the route near Sapperton. In the same area, two 12th- to 13th-century buildings near Overley Wood may have been part of the medieval settlement of Pinbury. Trackways revealed near Coberley, Foxcote and Hailes linked rural settlements in historical times.The range of sites and finds from these investigations provide important new information on the human past across parts of a landscape in many respects considered to be marginal.

Excavations at 1–2 and 3 Redcliff Street, Bristol, crossed a number of historic properties and revealed domestic and industrial remains dating from the establishment of the Redcliffe suburb in the 12th century through to the later post-medieval period.Cloth-dying was the dominant industry in Redcliffe in the 12th and 13th centuries, and the well preserved remains of dye-stuffs as well as leather shoes and off-cuts from a cobbler’s workshop were recovered from water-logged pit fills. The pits also yielded the largest assemblage of pottery of its kind from the city to date. The presence of stone-built dye-vat hearths suggest that cloth dyeing continued into the 14th century, when a pair of substantial town houses were also built. Late 14th-century remains include a furnace for lead-bronze casting, which produced cauldrons, posnets and smaller items, including candlesticks, and heralded a new phase of industry that became the pre-eminent activity for the next 200 years. The reverberatory furnaces are amongst the earliest examples of this advanced form of furnace known in Britain. In the 17th century, historic properties were amalgamated to establish a sugar refinery.Other significant aspects of the site evidence include the re-use of architectural fragments from the medieval church of St Thomas, and a large assemblage of clay-pipe kiln material. The discussion and interpretation of the excavated remains is augmented by documentary and historical research which, combined with evidence from other excavations in Redcliffe, further enriches the story of the urban development and economic history of this important suburb of Bristol.

Excavations in 2011 to 2015 within the Western Cemetery of Roman Cirencester resulted in the discovery of 118 inhumation and 8 cremation burials, the largest investigation of a Roman cemetery in Cirencester since the Bath Gate excavations of the 1970s. A greater quantity of grave goods was recovered from this cemetery compared to the Bath Gate cemetery, testifying to the higher status of those buried here.Nine burials survived within a postulated walled cemetery. The pottery from the fills of these graves had a clear emphasis on amphorae, flagons and tazze, indicative of funerary ceremonies involving the consumption of wine, or the pouring of it as libations, and the burning of substances. Just outside the walled cemetery, the burial of a 2 to 3-year-old child contained a magnificent enamelled bronze figurine of a cockerel, dateable to the 2nd century AD. Such figurines are rare finds, with only four or five similar examples known from Britain.Burial activity continued into the 4th century AD. One unusual later grave had a reused sculpted and inscribed tombstone placed face down immediately over the coffin of an adult male. Only 15 inscribed tombstones have been previously recorded from Cirencester so this is a noteworthy discovery, made all the more important by its archaeological context. The tombstone is dedicated to a 27-year-old woman named Bodicacia and has a fine sculpted pediment containing a representation of the god Oceanus. Significantly the god’s face and claws were deliberately mutilated prior to its placement within the grave, which could be a very rare example of Christian iconoclasm from Roman Britain.

Two enclosures were recorded – near Rodway was discovered a small Middle Bronze Age farmstead containing evidence of two roundhouses, with associated pottery and plant remains; and at Sandy Lane a Roman villa was shown to have developed from a Late Iron Age ridge-top settlement.

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.

The series of archaeological investigations summarised in this volume took place to the east of Lydney between 2016 and 2020, in response to an extensive programme of residential development in the area. Four programmes of archaeological investigation were undertaken during this period by both Cotswold Archaeology and Headland Archaeology. The four main investigation areas were located in close proximity to one another, with in some cases coterminous boundaries, situated towards the north of a wider area of land to the east of Lydney that had been subject to preliminary archaeological investigations. The archaeological results from the investigations evidently related to a densely occupied archaeological landscape, with evidence for activity dating from the prehistoric through to the post-medieval and modern periods.Post-excavation analysis was undertaken for each of the four phases of archaeological excavation individually, and standalone archive reports are available for the individual investigations. However, given the closely interrelated archaeology identified in the individual excavation areas, the decision was made to publish summary results of the investigations collectively in a single volume, to facilitate easier access to the interconnected results.

This volume focuses on remains of the Beaker period to Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age (c. 2400–350 BC) from three multi-period developer-funded excavations on the clay uplands of Suffolk, within which four burnt mounds were investigated. The sites were excavated by Cotswold Archaeology (CA) and Suffolk Archaeology Community Interest Company (CIC) (now Cotswold Archaeology). At Marham Park (Fornham All Saints), overlooking the valley of the River Lark, features included a Beaker period burnt mound complex, a Beaker roundhouse, Beaker pits, an Early Bronze Age burnt mound complex, Middle Bronze Age field systems/enclosures and probable Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age land division boundaries. At Laxfield, above a tributary of the River Blyth, a burnt mound site of earlier Bronze Age date was located in the vicinity of subsequent Middle Bronze Age enclosures. At Hepworth, a fragmentary Beaker period/Early Bronze Age burnt mound site was recorded on higher land above tributaries of the River Dove.

Between 2022 and 2023, archaeological investigations were undertaken at Harlestone Park, Northamptonshire, exposing evidence for a landscape shaped by humans over several millennia. Straddling the Dallington Brook near New Duston, the site has shed light on how this riparian landscape has been exploited in varying ways since the Early Neolithic through to the modern day. Initially occupied periodically, perhaps on a seasonal basis, the site eventually became a focus for funerary activity during the Middle Bronze Age, with two groups of cremation burials situated either side of the brook. Subsequently, during the Late Bronze Age to Early Iron Age, the site was incorporated into an area demarcated by an extensive network of boundaries defined by alignments of pits.

Excavations were undertaken ahead of redevelopment at Redcliff Quarter in Bristol between 2016 and 2018, enabling the investigation of medieval and later properties along Redcliff Street and St Thomas Street. A sequence of archaeological remains survived from the early 12th century to the modern period, providing detailed information, complemented by documentary research, about the lives, diets and trades of the suburb’s inhabitants. The results indicate that some belonged to Bristol’s prosperous mercantile class, while others were probably labourers or worked in trades such as butchery, dyeing and bell-founding. During the Georgian period, the character of both streets changed, as St Thomas Street became primarily residential and Redcliff Street was occupied by industrial concerns. The excavations detailed in this volume provide fascinating and often unexpected insights into the lives of those who lived and worked in the Redcliffe suburb of Bristol between the early 12th and early 20th centuries. This report presents the finds and environmental evidence recovered from the excavations.

Archaeological investigations by Cotswold Archaeology on behalf of the Science Museum Group ahead of the construction of the Collection Management Facility, Science and Innovation Park at the former site of RAF Wroughton, a Royal Airforce airfield that opened in 1940, produced evidence for a double pit alignment, an open settlement of Iron Age date, and a series of Roman enclosures and a small Late Roman cemetery. The site lies on a raised chalkland plateau, part of the North Wessex Downs, and overlooks Swindon, the Thames Valley and the Cotswolds to the north with the higher chalk downs, the Ridgeway and Barbury Castle just to the south. The earliest evidence for human activity included an isolated Beaker pit and a small number of worked flints of Neolithic and Bronze Age date. However, the first substantial evidence for activity on the plateau was a pair of converging pit alignments that crossed the north western part of the site. This arrangement may have been designed to funnel people and animals up onto the chalk plateau. The more eastern alignment may have acted, at least initially, as a boundary to an otherwise extensive open settlement made up of roundhouses and pits that was only partially revealed by the excavation. The pit alignments are very poorly dated but their spatial location with the settlement of Iron Age date indicates they are certainly of preIron Age or earliest Iron Age date. The Iron Age settlement was made up of at least 11 roundhouses, a Cshaped ditched enclosure, over 150 pits, and a series of inhumation burials some of which were made in flat graves and others that were made within pits and more rarely a ditch. All the prehistoric burials were radiocarbon dated, which indicated that burial took place during the Early to Middle Iron Age. Some of the earliest burials appeared to have been bound and therefore possibly stored prior to burial within the settlement – suggesting that they were already old and had died sometime before the foundation of the settlement. In addition, to the occurrence of the presence of human remains some of the pits contained more unusual deposits, combinations of material, charcoal or burned deposits, notable dumps of chalk or sarsen. Amongst the material from the pits were groups of associated animal bone, some articulated, animal skulls, various objects including some of more unusual type and more mundane settlement refuse. The open settlement was replaced by a system of ditches and enclosures in the Late Iron Age and Early Roman period and this reorganisation of the immediate landscape also saw the construction of a droveway where the much earlier pit alignments had once converged and reestablished this area of the site as a routeway onto the plateau. In contrast, by the Late Roman period the site was mostly used for burial with the creation of a small Roman rural cemetery in an area between two large enclosures of earlier Roman date. The Cshaped enclosure of Iron Age date was also reused as a focus for more isolated burial and to house an oven. After the Roman period, the use of this site was abandoned as a place of settlement and burial and primarily only used for cultivation until the construction of the airfield during the Second World War.

Extensively illustrated report on an excavation in Oxfordshire near the Iron Age hillfort at Segsbury. Ephemeral traces of Mesolithic and Neolithic activity, including a possible Neolithic timber structure, were found. The remains of a probable Late Bronze Age pit alignment were also found. Small Iron Age settlements comprising round houses, pits and other structures, and burials were revealed. One particular burial in a pit had been subjected to unusual treatment that included the removal of the individual’s feet after death. Small Roman and post-Roman cemeteries also were identified. The small Late Roman cemetery included males, females and neonates. This cemetery is typical for the period and the burials were accompanied by a range of artefacts including coins, brooches, a bracelet and rings as well as an unusual fragmentary double-sided bone or antler comb with a horse motif and ring-and-dot decoration. A small undated cemetery was originally believed to be either of Roman or less likely post-Roman date. However, radiocarbon dating revealed the unaccompanied burials to be of late 7th or early 8th century AD date. Innovative scientific techniques including radiocarbon dating and Bayesian modelling, aDNA and isotope analysis have revealed some important details such as familial relationships and dating that would not otherwise have been known. Small assemblages of finds included worked flint and prehistoric pottery, Roman and later pottery, worked bone, glass and metalwork.

A few scatters of Mesolithic and Neolithic flint were found across the development area. Slightly more extensive evidence for Neolithic occupation was represented by a small number of pits from which flint-tempered Neolithic pottery, worked flint, charred plant remains and animal bone were recovered. During the later Bronze Age and Iron Age the first permanent settlements were established. They were characterized by post-built circular structures, pits and cremation burials. Settlement began in the river valley and the western edge of the clay plateau but during the Iron Age settlement shifted onto the clay plateau with eh creation of a five-sided enclosure. By the Late Iron Age and Roman period a farmstead and managed fields were established. This farmstead has been defined as a complex-type farmstead and seems to have been involved in the large-scale production of spelt. Limited evidence was identified for Saxon activity but a few features, including the remains of a tree-lined avenue, may have been associated with the 17th century Hadham and Wickham Halls which were owned by the Capel family. This volume describes the archaeological remains as well as the artefacts and ecofactual material recovered from the excavations.

Early Neolithic occupation (from about 3600 BC) was represented by small groups of pits which were partly contemporary with a well-known round barrow – a protected monument called Wick Barrow or Pixies’ Mound – lying just outside the development site. Later prehistoric remains included Bronze Age burnt mounds, boundary ditches, a Late Bronze Age enclosure, and an Early Iron Age midden. There was more widespread Late Iron Age and Roman settlement, including a seasonally occupied linear settlement with evidence of salt-making. Contemporary activity included a nearby late Roman settlement. On another site a sequence of occupation from the late Iron Age to modern eras was examined. Here historical documents add to the account of the site and preserved the names of some of the farm’s recent inhabitants.

The cemetery was excavated in its entirety and contained the remains of around 300 individuals. Its form is shown to have many characteristics in common with other cemeteries of this period in the western British Isles, including the extended, supine posture of the deceased in simple earth-cut graves largely aligned in a west/east orientation. There were a limited number and range of grave accompaniments. Peculiarities included a concentration of intercutting burials within a small central rectangle, with the later re-use of this space for the deposition of fragments of carved stone, followed by the construction here of a wooden building. The deposition of seashells with a number of the burials appears to be a rite so far unique to this community. The stratigraphic sequence allied to radiocarbon dates on 51 individuals has enabled an unusually refined chronology, showing that the cemetery was used from the early 5th to the later 7th centuries. Measurements of the isotopes of strontium, oxygen, carbon, nitrogen and sulphur in various combinations from a selection of individuals provides insights into aspects of origin, movement and diet. Mitochondrial DNA has provided information on the maternal lineage of 44 individuals, some of whom were buried in the same grave as others of the same lineage. Material remains were sparse but provide insights into the burial practices at this time.