Monument record MDO18029 - Maiden Castle Road Roman quarrying features

Five features which have been interpreted as possible chalk or flint quarries were found during the excavations to the north of Maiden Castle Road undertaken by Wessex Archaeology in 1987 in advance of the Dorchester By-pass construction. The following description is abstracted from the final published report on the site (1). The numbers in square brackets refer to context numbers quoted in the report.

Pit [02308] lay in the central part of the excavation and was an irregular roughly subrectangular hollow up to 6.75m long and 0.75m deep. The lower fills were of chalky soil and the upper fills were darkerand more loamy and may have been the result of deliberate dumping of refuse. A sherd of 2nd century samian pottery and a blue glass vessel of probable 1st century date were recovered from the lower fills. The majority of finds came from the upper fills and were predominantly 2nd-3rd century AD pottery and an iron lift key.

Pits [02255] and [02400] to the southeast of [02308] were irregular uneven features containing only a few pieces of abraded pottery.

Pit [02391] lay in the northwestern part of the site and was a wide shallow elongated feature, which cut across the ditched trackway and also cut pit [02387] which may be an earlier quarry feature. it was filled with chalky soil and the pottery recovered was mainly 2nd century AD in date. It also contained an iron knife and a pennular brooch and a fragment of Roman window glass.

The material dumped into the top of these features may have been refuse derived from a nearby settlement.<1>

SY 676 894 (FCE) A rapid examination of air photography suggests the presence of a number of features, including rectilinear enclosures, linear features and pits, possibly of Prehistoric or Roman date, visible in the process of being excavated to the north of Maiden Castle, c.150m northeast of Bush Road Cottages. <2>

National Record of the Historic Environment, 983909 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Wessex Archaeology, 1987, Dorchester By-pass (Excavation archive). SDO9385.

Woodward, P J and Smith, R J C, 1987, Survey and excavation along the route of the Southern Dorchester By-pass, 1986-1987 – an interim note, 79-89 (Article in serial). SDO9381.

<1> Smith, R J C et al, 1997, Excavations along the Route of the Dorchester By-pass, Dorset, 1986-8, 56-70 (Monograph). SDO9379.

<2> Miller, Andrew, 1993, RCHME: AP Primary Recording Project, 12-FEB-1993 (Unpublished document). SWX1708.

<2.1> Boyden, J R, JRB 3421: 07-8, 10, 16; JRB 3425: 16, 18-30 (Aerial Photograph). SDO20335.

Record last edited

Dec 6 2023 8:30PM