Large-scale redevelopment at Kingsway Business Park, near Rochdale, and Cutacre Country Park, near Bolton, has provided an important opportunity to investigate the prehistoric and later rural landscapes in the south-eastern corner of the historic county of Lancashire, now part of Greater Manchester. A combination of archaeological techniques has been employed to explore the archaeology of these areas, principally comprising standing-building survey and open-area excavation, directed towards the investigation of 17 sites. Topographical survey and palaeoenvironmental coring were also used to examine the character of the early landscape. Evidence for prehistoric and medieval activity was discovered within the two areas, particularly a significant Middle Bronze Age settlement and medieval iron-smelting site at Cutacre, although the majority of the remains investigated dated to the post-medieval and industrial periods. These latter remains relate to a range of different rural house types and farm buildings, built by the lesser gentry, and the yeoman and tenant farmers of the region. This volume is the result of a multi-disciplinary approach to the archaeology, with the work of a range of authors from Oxford Archaeology and the University of Salford, and also several external specialists. The results greatly enhance an understanding of the archaeology of Greater Manchester, and, more generally, provide important information on rural settlement in north-west England.

In 2002 the fullest evidence so far recovered for the Roman settlement at Nantwich, a historic salt-producing centre in Cheshire (north-western England), was revealed by an excavation carried out at Kingsley Fields, on the west side of the town, ahead of a housing development. This uncovered a previously unknown Roman road, linking the settlement at Nantwich to the main road network, and, positioned along this, evidence for the collection and storage of brine and the production of salt, together with buildings, enclosures, a well and a small number of cremation burials. Waterlogged conditions meant that organic remains, including structural timbers, were well preserved on the site. These included the two finest examples of timber-built brine tanks excavated from Roman Britain. This volume presents the wide-ranging finds of these investigations.