EDO3846 - Southfield House, Dorchester; Trench 1

Southfield House lies across the line of the southern defences of the Roman town of Durnovaria, immediately east of the the suggested site of the south gate and the Roman road to Radipole. Following the observation of eight test pits excavated by developers in 1986, an evaluation of the site was carried out by Wessex Archaeology during June and July 1987. Six trial trenches were excavated by machine in the garden of Southfield House, mainly aligned N-S across the line of the Roman town defences. Trench 1 was aligned N-S on the east side of the site. It measured 43m long and 1.6m wide (later extended to 8m wide at the southern end, where it was named Trench 1EX). It was excavated to a maximum depth of 2.09m at the south end and 1.91 at the north end, on to the top of the chalk bedrock. At the northern end lay the outer defensive ditch of the Roman town of Durnovaria. This was 8m wide, but was not excavated. The southern part of the trench revealed the chalk and clay dump layers of the counterscarp bank to the Roman defences, which was traced for a width of 22m. A prehistoric buried soil was sealed beneath the bank. Trench 1 was extended at the southern end to reveal an L-shaped ditch, aligned NE-SW and SE-NW, which may be part of a rectilinear enclosure, dated to the earlier part of the Roman period. The northern arm of the ditch was sealed by the counterscarp bank and may have been deliberately infilled prior to the construction of the town's defences. It was cut by the outer ditch of the defences. Two Roman graves were found cut into the early ditch, with the edge of a third grave exposed at the western edge of the trench.