EDO4817 - Former County Hospital Site, Dorchester; excavation 2000 to 2001

Excavations were conducted by Wessex Archaeology prior to redevelopment of part of the former Dorset County Hospital site, adjacent to and south of Somerleigh Court, in the SW corner of the Roman town of Dorchester. The fieldwork took place intermittently between October 2000 and December 2001. The principal archaeological works comprised three separate excavation trenches corresponding to the proposed footprints of new buildings. Blocks 1 & 3 comprised a single N-S aligned trench along the eastern side of the site; Block 2, an 'L-shaped' trench in the southern part of the site; and Block 4,a sub-rectangular trench in the western part of the trench. There were also three evaluation trenches to the west of Block 4 and a watching brief was maintained on a new service trench across the site and two areas of unscheduled ground reduction. A 'strip-and-record' programme also exposed archaeological remains immediately south of Somerleigh Court, which were preserved in situ. The excavations revealed a sequence of structures, associated features and deposits which document the development of this part of the town from the 1st century AD until the early 5th century. This included a series of early Roman timber buildings set in relatively large enclosures, replaced by a series of stone buildings set along the street frontage (which is projected to run just to the east of the site) with open areas behind. In the 4th century AD, occupation shifted away from the street frontage and a large town house with mosaic floors was built in the interior of the insula. It was constructed on one side of a courtyard and with a barn and agricultural buildings also ranged around the other sides to form an 'urban farmstead'. A dispersed coin hoard is thought to relate to the destruction of the aisled building in the early 5th century. The few post-Roman remains relate to medieval and post-medieval robbing of building stone from Roman structures. Modern features relating to landscape gardening of the site and expansion of the former hospital in the 20th century were also present.