Progress continued to go well late into the year, despite some wet conditions. One of our favourite finds was a well-preserved copper alloy penannular brooch, recovered from a ditch fill. This type of brooch was very common in the Roman period (although actually appeared in Britain prior to the arrival of the Romans) and we think this one may be 4th century AD in date. Very similar examples have appeared at Roman military sites, including along Hadrian’s Wall.
Meanwhile, there was another exciting early discovery, where a stone wall was starting to be revealed that turned out to be part of a corn dryer. This is a feature that was traditionally used for drying grains of barley ready to make beer—where the barley was placed on wooden floorboards overlying a stone ‘oven’, within which a fire was lit in a stokehole that warmed the air. A little like an underfloor heating system!
Elsewhere on the site a human burial came to light where the skull had been removed and placed between the knees of the individual. This is a practice we have come across at several sites before, such as at Black Cat Quarry, and is occasionally known across much of eastern England and the Midlands in the later Roman period and during the transition to Christianity.
That’s it for now. We’ll be bringing you more discoveries from this site soon, so make sure you don’t miss an update by following us on Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram and Bluesky!