Founded 1906
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Barcombe Work continues at Barcombe where they have now found a section of tesselated floor in-situ. During late August the whole of the BHAS Field Unit joined Chris Butler and his MSFAT team at Barcombe. The excavation had fallen behind schedule as a result of the bad weather during the summer. Barcombe is of course a very prestigious and exciting site, with as expected of such a large villa, many exciting and interesting finds.Some members of the unit had in fact worked all through the summer at Barcombe. All members of BHAS were encouraged to join the courses and volunteer opportunities at Barcombe to gain experiences in all aspects of Roman archaeology, including buildings, features and finds. BHAS will continue to assist MSFAT until the excavation season ends. Notable among the finds in the past two weeks have been Samian pottery with the makers stamp and a piece of erotic Samian ware, probably the subject of next seasons tee-shirts? Autumn and Winter Programme In archaeology very little in the way of field work is sacrosanct. Dates and times and locations vary depending upon weather, crop removal, ploughing and the disposition of the farmer. This year the autumn and winter season will concentrate on geophysics, excavations at Rocky Clump and finds processing. However, if the opportunity arises for field walking then this will take precedent. Fields awaiting field walking include two fields at the top of Ditchling Road, part of the North Brighton Research Project, and the long field at Ovingdean. Another field at Ovingdean was until recently under grass, but is now being ploughed. This field has been the subject of geophysical survey and field walking in this area should provide vital information on the archaeology of this area, where a Roman site is known to be located. Field Notebook 2001 The BHAS Field Unit notebook, a complete list of all of the teams activities during 2001 has now been printed and bound. Volumes will be deposited at Barbican House, the County Records Office, Brighton Museum and other appropriate locations. Our web site manager will be producing CD-Roms of the notebook which will be available for a small fee. BRIGHTON ROMAN VILLA The Roman villa at Brighton, located at the bottom of Springfield Road (Dudley), was recently being excavated by Archaeology South-East. During the month of October 2002 the site of the old Endeavour Garage was demolished to allow commencement of a building project consisting of several blocks of apartments. The buildings are being constructed in two phases and the first section cleared allowed investigation of an area to the east of the known Roman villa. The villa is considered to date from the 1st century A.D. and is known to have possessed black and white geometric mosaics. During the latter part of the professional excavation, and after clearance from the building contractor, the members of the Brighton and Hove Archaeological Society Field Unit were allowed to join the professional unit in their endeavours. The land and old garage buildings had been removed down to a level just above the natural deposits of combe rock. The area produced a number of features including some walls, a well, pits, post- holes and a single burial. The walls revealed protruded only a few metres east of the old garage concrete floors, which still cover the main villa site. The professional excavations produced a sequence of events in this area of an early pit being built upon by later walls and some disturbance occurring as a result of the unstable ground. The wall features appear to have been investigated before and earlier excavations by H.S.Toms and a watching brief during the construction of the Endeavour Garage are deemed responsible for these intrusions. There was evidence of some wall chasing. The pits were of considerable size, with one pear shaped pit almost 1.5 metres in depth. The pits had been sectioned by the professional team, with the BHAS field unit removing only some of the remaining quadrants. Cleaning back a large section of clay with flint, overlying the combe rock, produced a number of post-holes and a small pit. One large pit on the site was constructed and then filled with a deposit of grey clay, into this clay deposit was cut another smaller pit containing a fill consisting of significant numbers of oyster shells. The burial was of an adult, among the bones of the feet were collected a number of hob nails. The burial appears to be aligned with other burials found during the middle of the last century when garage work pits were sunk into the floor below. The most significant feature found by the professionals, and noted in earlier building works, was a beautifully constructed chalk block lined well (see pictures). The well was excavated to a depth of 1.5M and finds of Roman pottery show that it was filled in during a later Roman phase. The BHAS Field Unit examined the well fills and found a coin of Constantius II dated to 347-350AD (pers comm. David Rudling) The pits produced large quantities of pottery, bone and shell. The BHAS unit found a bone pin, an additional one to those found earlier by the professional unit. Other finds by Archaeology South East included a pair of bronze tweezers, and decorated samian wares. The pits lie east of the known villa site, but the peculiar feature of this excavation has been the walls. The walls are substantial and Roman pottery has been found beneath the lower layers. However, the orientation of the protruding walls is on a different alignment to those indicated in the published report (Dudley). The walls may be of an earlier phase or as has been suggested by the Director Richard James a possible mortuary building associated with the burials close by. The final chronology and development of the villa will not be determined until the second phase of the excavation is completed. The members of the BHAS Field unit look forward with eager anticipation to the commencement of this second phase at Springfield Road. The BHAS Field Unit would like to thank both Ian Grieg and Richard James for allowing the members of the Society to participate in their excavations. A complete report on the excavations, with the confirmed dating details, will be compiled by Archaeology South-East. |
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