EDO4609 - Mentone Lodge, Dorchester; observations and recording 1960

Miss Whitley observed the levelling of the former garden of Mentone Lodge, Dorchester, for traffic improvement, during 1960. At the corner of Weymouth Avenue and Great Western Road an uncambered layer of flint gravel, 3ins thick and resting on natural chalk was observed. It was slightly higher than the surface of Weymouth Avenue and had 4th century pottery upon it. It was also overlain by, what was thought to be the edge of the Counterscarp bank for the outer town defences. The extent and direction of the gravelled area is unknown although it is though to be either the Roman approach road from Radipole which was altered in the late 4th century or an area of hard standing. If it is the road from Radipole then it measures at least 23ft wide. A 'v' profiled ditch, 10ft wide and 4ft deep, was sectioned on the NW side of the gravel area, running parallel to Weymouth Avenue and this may represent a road side ditch. It was backfilled between the 2nd and 3rd centuries. However, it is possible that the gravelling continued beyond the ditch and that the ditch was actually curving to pass beneath Weymouth Avenue. The above mentioned ditch contained one or more burials. The first lay NE-SW without grave goods, the body of a woman aged 20-30 had been buried or thrown into the ditch on its left side, legs flexed and forearms crossed, and the head appears to have been already dislocated. A pit or grave was also noted at the angle of the new garden wall in front of Mentone Lodge and was said by workmen to hold the remains of two skeletons. The pit may have been cut into the counterscarp bank. Other remains suggested a hurried burial in a simlar but shallower pit 10ft to the west; and there was a skull in disturbed upper levels 12ft from the wall of Weymouth Avenue.