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Open area excavation on 14.45ha of land at Cambridge Road, Bedford
was carried out in 2004-5 in advance of development. A background
scatter of Early Neolithic flint, including a Langdale stone axe,
may be related to the nearby presence of the Cardington causewayed
enclosure. Two Early Bronze Age ring ditches sat on a low lying
gravel ridge between the River Great Ouse and the Elstow Brook. A
causewayed ring ditch, 30m in diameter, had a broad entrance to the
southwest, where a shallow length of ditch either silted or had
been filled in. Adjacent to the shallow ditch was a pit containing
three crouched burials, probably in an oak-lined chamber,
radiocarbon dated to the early Middle Bronze Age. A nearby small
round barrow enclosed a deep central grave containing the crouched
burial of a woman, probably within an oak-lined chamber. An
L-shaped ditch to the east, radiocarbon dated to the Middle to Late
Bronze transition, may have been the final feature of the monument
group. It parallels the addition of L-shaped ditches/pit alignments
at other contemporary ring ditch monuments. Shallow linear ditches
formed a land boundary extending north and south from the Bronze
Age ring ditch, and other contemporary ditches were remnants of a
rectilinear field system, contemporary with a scatter of irregular
pits and a waterhole. This phase came to an end at the Late Bronze
Age/ Early Iron Age transition, when a large assemblage of
decorated pottery was dumped in the final fills of the waterhole.
By the Middle Iron Age there was a new linear boundary, comprising
three near parallel ditches, aligned north-south; a rectangular
enclosure and a complex of intercut pits. The pottery assemblage
was sparse, but the upper fills of both the deepest linear boundary
ditch and the pit complex contained some Roman pottery. To the
south-east an extensive Romano-British ladder settlement is dated
to the 1st to 4th centuries AD. Only the northern fringe lay within
the excavated area, comprising successive boundary ditches, along
with pits, a stone-lined well, an inhumation burial and animal
burials. In the early Anglo-Saxon period (5th-6th centuries AD),
there was a loose cluster of three sunken featured buildings with
another to the south. In the middle Saxon period (8th-9th centuries
AD) a small rectangular mausoleum contained a single inhumation
burial, with a second inhumation to the immediate west. Subsequent
land use comprised truncated furrows of the medieval ridge and
furrow field cultivation and post-medieval quarry pits.
Between January 2008 and July 2009, Northamptonshire Archaeology,
now part of MOLA (Museum of London Archaeology), carried out a
series of excavations along the route of a new water pipeline being
constructed by Anglian Water Services as part of a major project to
increase the supply of water to new homes and businesses in the
south-east Midlands region. Nineteen sites were investigated,
dating primarily to the Iron Age, Roman and Anglo-Saxon periods.
The earliest remains were a late Bronze Age/early Iron Age pit
alignment near Seaton, Rutland. The Iron Age and Roman sites were
small rural settlements comprising ditched enclosures, the remains
of roundhouses and pits. Settlements were located near Seaton and
Caldecott in Rutland and in Northamptonshire at Swinawe Barn near
Corby, Thorpe Malsor, White Hill Lodge, Great Cransley and Willows
Nursery. A Roman site near Rushton, Northamptonshire may be
associated with a villa estate. Other sites included part of a
Roman field system at Violet Lane, near Corby, and Roman cremation
burials near Gretton, Northamptonshire. The settlements mainly date
from the late middle Iron Age, 2nd century BC, through to the 4th
century AD, although there was little evidence for direct
continuity of settlement between the Iron Age and Roman periods. An
Anglo-Saxon cremation cemetery dated to the late 5th century to
mid-7th century AD, at Glaston, Rutland, contained 16 cremation
burials deposited in decorated and plain urns along with small
assemblages of grave goods, often also burnt on the pyre, and
including a brooch, glass beads, and fragments of a bone comb and
mount. Later features generally comprised medieval and
post-medieval furrows from ridge and furrow field systems and field
boundary ditches.
A total area of 3.1ha, taking in much of a settlement largely of
the earlier Middle Iron Age (c.450 to c.150BC), was excavated in
1998 in advance of development. Two small pit groups, radiocarbon
dated to the Middle Bronze Age, produced a bronze dagger and a
small pottery assemblage. The Iron Age settlement comprised several
groups of roundhouse ring ditches and associated small enclosures
forming an open settlement set alongside a linear boundary ditch.
Its origin lay in the 5th century BC with a single small roundhouse
group. Through the 4th and 3rd centuries BC the settlement expanded
with the original structures replaced by a principal roundhouse
group accompanied by at least a further two groups of roundhouses
and enclosures and minor outlying structures. A group of structures
and enclosures set apart from the main domestic area was the focus
for copper alloy casting, producing an assemblage of crucibles and
fragments from investment moulds for the production of horse
fittings, as well as bone, antler and horn working debris. The site
also produced good assemblages of pottery and animal bone, an
assemblage of saddle querns and a potin coin. The settlement had
been abandoned by the middle of the 2nd century BC, although the
main boundary ditch survived at least as an earthwork. By the early
1st century AD a series of ditched enclosures were created to the
north of the boundary ditch, perhaps a small ladder settlement,
which fell out of use soon after the Roman conquest. One enclosure
contained two small roundhouses and other curvilinear gullies may
have formed animal pens in the corners of two enclosures. This
final phase is dated by some Late Iron Age pottery, an Iron Age and
a Roman rotary quern, and a small quantity of Roman roof tile. The
discussion considers the physical, social and economic structure of
the settlement. The distribution of finds around the ring ditches
is examined as well as the size of enclosed roundhouses. There is
an overview of the Iron Age roundhouse in the Midlands, using well
preserved sites as exemplars for the range of evidence that can
survive. A typology and chronology for Iron Age pottery is
provided, and the date of introduction of the rotary quern is
discussed, and the consequent effect on the size of storage jars is
examined. Middle Bronze Age pits and a small cremation cemetery,
and Late Iron Age to early Roman settlement on the site of the
nearby deserted medieval village of Coton are also described. With
contributions by Trevor Anderson, Paul Blinkhorn, Pat Chapman,
Steve Critchley, Karen Deighton, Tora Hylton, Dennis Jackson, Ivan
Mack, Anthony Maull, Gerry McDonnell, Matthew Ponting and Jane
Timby. Illustrations by Andy Chapman, Pat Walsh and Mark Roughley.
This volume is the second of two reports on archaeological
excavations undertaken ahead of the eastern expansion of Daventry
International Rail Freight Terminal (DIRFT) which lies in the
northern watershed region of Northamptonshire at its border with
Warwickshire. The excavations, covering 178 hectares, recorded one
of the most extensive Iron Age farming settlements yet discovered
in the British Isles. It comprised at least five individual sites
of house clusters and enclosures, spread around the rim of a
shallow valley overlooking around 100 hectares of open pasture. At
its peak between 400 BC and 100 BC the settlement would have
contained up to 100 circular buildings. Volume 2 describes the
excavations of four of these individual sites, undertaken at
various times by MOLA Northampton (then Northamptonshire
Archaeology) at The Lodge and Long Dole, by Foundations Archaeology
at Crick Hotel, and by Cotswold Archaeology at Nortoft Lane,
Kilsby. The project was managed by RPS. The site reports are
followed by a wide-ranging discussion, putting the discoveries here
and at Covert Farm, Crick (Volume 1) into the context of Iron Age
settlement patterns and dynamics in the East Midland region.
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