June to September 2008

June to September 2008 at Heslington was a busy period despite the seeming lack of dry weather and only a few glimpses of the sun. Additional areas were stripped adjacent to the east side of Area A1 almost doubling the size of the original area. Work also resumed in the area to the west of the main A1 excavations to ensure no archaeology had been missed. Work in the newly stripped area to the east of the original A1 area showed the continuation of the Iron Age field system and further evidence for medieval ridge and furrow. The Iron Age fields saw the continuation of the east-west ditches and a further north-south ditch suggesting that away from the area of the pond / water feature and round houses, was an organised system of fields. There was a suggestion of an earlier ditch system on a more north-east/south-west alignment that was cut by the Iron Age ditches; what period this related to is unclear.

There was also evidence for the Romans in the new stripped area with the suggestion of a recut of an Iron Age ditch. The ditch was north-south aligned and turned at right angles to the east. In the angle where the ditch turned to the east a smashed pot was found that is probably of the 1^st or 2^nd century AD and where the ditch exited the southern edge of the trench a Roman coin was found. Other than this very little was found for dating evidence but the stratigraphy clearly shows that the majority of ditches were a continuation of those seen within the original area excavation area of A1.

Work continued on the water hole and the associated ditches through this period and showed that there was a complex sequence of re-cutting of the north-south ditches. Beneath these ditches, arranged along their length, was a series of earlier pits which may have represented a Bronze Age pit alignment. The irregular spacing of the pits, however, suggested that they had served another function. The fact that some contained a single stake, possibly a marker, suggests a possible ritual function.

A ritual meaning may also be behind the discovery of a human skull in a pit to the south-east of the water hole. The skull, lower mandible and the top vertebra of the spinal column were all articulated and indicated that the head was placed in the ground shortly after decapitation had occurred. On the west side of the north-south ditches an area of metal working waste was identified consisting of slag, smithing cakes, and crucibles. This material was incorporated within spreads of cobbles that had probably formed hard standings near the kiln although no direct evidence for a kiln was found. It seems likely that any kiln if it survives lies just to the west of the excavation area.

Collapsed wickerwork on the south side of earliest phase of water hole. Scale 0.5m

The water hole resolved into a series of inter-cut pits and in its earliest form, the sides were shored with wicker work revetments. The dates of these features is yet to be confirmed but it would seem most likely that they belong to the Late Bronze Age or Early Iron Age.

Wooden Bronze Age troughs / well shaft linings. Scale 0.2m

A further pit, located almost immediately to the north-east of the above feature, also contained well preserved timbers which are thought to be the remains of a pair of water troughs or two portions of a sectional well lining. The wood working technology used in the manufacture of these items and the signature marks of metal tools, suggest that they were manufactured in the Early Bronze Age. This was confirmed by the presence of pottery fragments and worked flint of the same date which were recovered from a pit, cut into the top of the feature containing the troughs.

Further exploratory work on the large 'pond' feature located in the north-west corner of Area A1 has been undertaken in the last few weeks. It has proved that the feature is much more complex than originally thought and now appears to have been a managed spring head, approached via a cobbled surface, restricted to the south of the feature, comprising a rough rectilinear, north-south aligned apron of small to medium sized pebbles rammed into the underlying surface. It falls gently towards the north where a steep bath shaped east west aligned depression, also lined with pebbles, was formed against the northern edge of the spring head. At present this is thought to have been constructed to form an access point for water collection. Although further investigation may prove otherwise, an east west aligned ditch, located immediately to the south of the spring head, is thought to be contemporary as its backfills are also sealed beneath the cobble surface.

To gain an insight as to the extents of the metalled surface, a series of narrow slots were cut down on to the top of the cobbles. This also revealed the presence of an extensive masking layer of very clean sandy silt, previously thought to have been natural in origin, which covered the area. As this deposit was removed, it was found to cover a much wider area than originally thought and was also found to be concealing a buried landscape comprising of a series of pit like features and a complex of north south aligned ditches adjacent to the eastern edge of the spring head. Although further work on both the masking deposit and features is needed before they can be fully understood, it was evident that several phases of activity were represented as some of the ditches were cut into the top of a sequence of earlier features (possibly Bronze Age) and had themselves been recut on several occasions. A small amount of Roman pottery has been recovered from the very top of the backfills of the latest phase of some of the ditches suggesting that the site will provide a complex stratified sequence of events from the Bronze Age to Roman period, a phenomenon rarely seen on rural sites of this early period.

Recent work has concentrated on the excavation of groups of ring ditches. The distribution of these features across the site is of some interest as they are almost always located in the corners of fields/enclosures. They occur in clusters, some in a given cluster being small (around 4m diameter) and others large (generally around 8m in diameter). Now excavation is taking place it is also apparent that a number of these structures have been replaced, or rebuilt, sometimes on roughly the same footprint. It seems probable that at any given time there may only have been one large and one small ring ditch within any one cluster. The larger ring-ditches, at least one of which has an entrance defined by large postholes, are interpreted as roundhouses; the smaller examples may also represent some sort of ancillary roofed structure. Traditionally, roundhouse structures such as these have been seen as likely to be occupied by family units. The presence of what appears to be several ring-ditch clusters raises an important question: were these complexes occupied by a single social unit that periodically shifted location within the locality, or by a series of social units (perhaps related or linked) who lived in the locality at the same time. It is hoped that the answer/s to this question may be provided by a combination of a) the number of structural re-builds within clusters, b) pottery dates and c) Radiocarbon dates from suitable materials excavated from various and successive structures.

Roundhouse ring ditches

Provisional examination of pottery from the site is of some interest as virtually all is of the mid-late Iron Age, seemingly around 300BC. The near total absence of Roman pottery and material is surprising given the near proximity of Roman period structures to the site. Other finds material is largely restricted to burnt stone (pot boilers) and worked flint. The flint extends in date from the Neolithic period onwards. The absence of bone (excluding a few burnt or mineralised pieces and teeth) appears to relate to acidic ground conditions. The distribution of the pottery and burnt stone appears to reflect attitudes towards refuse disposal. This material occurs overwhelmingly in the ditches that lie in close proximity to the structures. No refuse or storage type pits have been encountered.

No materials or evidence of an industrial nature has been identified. What at first was suspected as being residues relating to iron working has now been identified as manganese rich bog ore. Whilst in the past such material has sometimes been exploited for iron working, there are no pointers (slags, structures etc.) towards this being the case here. It may be that settlement in the locality was geared towards agricultural production. The stockpond (see previous update) indicates a livestock element whilst environmental analysis may yield indications of an arable regime.

Excavation on area A1 will continue for a few weeks and the results of this work will continue to be posted.

Ring ditch

Following on from site stripping and a series of additional evaluation trenches, excavation has now commenced on the northern part of the site, the 2.5ha Area A1. This area contains remains of the prehistoric and medieval / post-medieval periods. The prehistoric remains consist of a rectilinear lattice of ditches that serve to demarcate fields and enclosures together with a series of ring-ditches, pits and other features.

These ditches vary slightly in size though are typically in the region of 0.5m – 1m wide and around 0.5m deep. Considerable lengths of the ditches have been excavated and have produced several dozen sherds of hand-made (probably Iron Age) pottery together with occasional pieces of worked flint.

Three of the total of nine ring-ditches have been excavated. Two, with internal diameters of 4m or less, are very small – perhaps too small to have served as ‘roundhouses’, and produced limited amounts of pottery. The other excavated example, which may well represent a roundhouse, is much larger and has produced an enormous quantity of pottery sherds. The spatial distribution of these ring ditches, both with regard to each other and the rectilinear ditch system, is interesting – of which greater consideration will be given in a later update.

Large pond feature

In the north-west corner area of the eastern A1 trench a large hollow feature has been examined. This feature measures c.20m across, is sub-circular or oval in shape and at least 1.3m deep in its central parts. In most places where it has been examined, very steep edges were apparent, the exception to this being a more gently ramped area which was revetted with wooden wattle work at the base of its slope. Further wattle and wood is also evident elsewhere in the lower part of the hollow. Although most of the fills of this feature are of clean appearance, an amount of hand made pottery and animal bone has been recovered. At the moment this feature is being interpreted as a stock drinking pond (indeed the base normally holds 0.5m - 0.6m of water, once pumping is stopped)! The survival of waterlogged, probably Iron Age, deposits is a first for the York area and it is probable, once interim palaeoenvironmental and wood reports have been received and considered, that further work on this feature will be required.

Area A1 being stripped

The Heslington East site (centre SE 640 506) occupies c.103ha and lies c.3km to the east of the centre of the City of York and on the east side of the village of Heslington. The site is bounded by Field Lane and Hull Road (A1079) to the north, the A64 trunk road to the south-east, and Low Lane to the south. The site is currently divided up into fields which were largely under arable cultivation, principally sugar beet, potatoes, and cereal crops.

The site is to be redeveloped for a new campus of the University of York. The development will involve a combination of building construction and landscaping and in addition there will be a lake up to 1km in length on the southern side of the site.

In accordance with PPG16 several stages of archaeological work have already been undertaken at Heslington East as follows: Two preliminary desk-top studies (Evans 2002; Mason and McComish 2003), a campaign of field walking (Kendall 2003; Mason 2003), a series of geophysical surveys (Bartlett 2003; Bartlett and Noel 2003; 2004) and an archaeological evaluation excavation, undertaken from November 2003 - February 2004 by York Archaeological Trust.

The evaluation excavation especially, identified a number of areas with significant archaeological research potential, particularly for the prehistoric and Roman periods. In the case of three areas (A1 to A3), this potential is high, although in seven others (B1 to B7) sufficient features of interest were found as to warrant their further evaluation.

Areas A1 – 3 are located as follows: A1: South of Field Lane opposite Badger Hill estate (c.6.25ha, centre SE 6355 5075), A2: North of Low Lane near centre of site (c.4.25ha, centre SE 6380 5060) and A3: At the eastern end of site, immediately below Kimberlow Hill (7.5ha, centre SE 6425 5100).

It was decided that York Archaeological Trust should undertake an archaeological excavation in areas A1 and A2, and also undertake additional geophysical surveys over areas B1 to B4 and B7, followed by evaluation excavations in these areas. These evaluation excavations have now taken place and area A1 and part of A2 have been stripped of topsoil and archaeological excavation is underway in area A1.

Unfortunately public access to the site is not permitted, so we hope to keep you informed of our progress with regular updates to this blog, along with any important finds that we make.