Monument record MDO18113 - Roman Building 5543, Greyhound Yard, Dorchester

Part of a substantial stone-footed building was found behind the northern frontage of the Greyhound Yard insula, to the south of Building 367 during excavations in 1955-6 and 1984. Part of a room with a hypocaust and painted plaster walls, formerly had a mosaic totally destroyed and only debris recovered) was found in 1955. The SE corner of this building was found in 1984. A later wall was found running from this building to the SE corner of Building 367. This building was probably constructed in the later 4th century AD.

Parts of a Roman building originally found during excavations by A. L. Parke in 1955-6 (1) (2) (3). Further parts of this building were Found during the excavations carried out by Wessex Archaeology in 1984 prior to the redevelopment of the area of the former Greyhound Yard. (4) The results of the later excavation were published together with the results of the adjacent Old Methodist Chapel excavations and a summary of the 1955-6 excavations (5). The numbers in square brackets below are context and feature numbers used in the published report (5).

Excavations in the Greyhound Yard in 1955-6 revealed part of a substantial Romano-British building comprising part of a rectangular room oriented NNW-SSE, with stone walls and containing free-standing hypocaust piers of mortared flint and limestone, originally supporting a mosaic floor, totally destroyed, of dark grey, light grey and red tesserae (6). A flue was found in the W wall, presumably leading to an external stoke hole. The internal face of the W wall had been plastered. The channels of the hypocaust had been filled with debris including tesserae, clay roof tiles, and plaster with traces of designs in black, brown, green, red and pink on a white ground.

To the east of these remains, a small length of walling just protruded into the area of the 1984 excavations. This wall formed the east wall of the building and comprised a a flint rubble footing [856], at least 0.5m wide and about 0.6m deep, capped with a layer of flint nodules bonded with hard yellow mortar [857], above which two courses of mortared limestone slabs [619] remained. The southern end of this wall had been robbed out in the medieval period and the shape of the robbing trench suggested a SE corner of this building, about 1.5m south of the exposed wall remains. No associated surfaces were recognised.

No dating evidence was recovered from this structure.

A poorly built flint wall ran northwards from the room with the hypocaust and was on the same line as a wall footing running south from the SE corner of Building 367, which formed part of a room added to 367 in the late 4th century. This wall may have been a boundary wall between Buildings 367 and 5543.

Trust for Wessex Archaeology, 1983, Dorchester, Durnovaria: Excavations in the town centre at Greyhound Yard, and the Old Methodist Chapel (1982-1984): Interim and introductory notes to the current excavations (Unpublished document). SDO9435.

Wessex Archaeology, 1984, Greyhound Yard, Dorchester excavation archive (Excavation archive). SDO9456.

<1> Farrar, R A H, 1957, Miscellaneous Discoveries and Museum Accessions. Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society, 116 (Article in serial). SDO9482.

<2> Farrar, R A H, 1956, Archaeological Fieldwork in Dorset in 1956, 79 (Article in serial). SDO9481.

<3> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1970, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume II (South East) Part 3, p566, no. 198 (Monograph). SDO150.

<4> Woodward, P J , Davies, S M , and Graham, A H, 1984, Excavations at the Greyhound Yard Car Park, Dorchester, 1984, 99-106 (Article in serial). SDO9437.

<5> Woodward, P J , Davies, S M , and Graham, A H, 1993, Excavations at the Old Methodist Chapel and Greyhound Yard, Dorchester, 1981-1984, 55-57 (Monograph). SDO9411.

<6> Cosh, S R, and Neal, D S, 2005, Roman Mosaics of Britain. Volume II South-west Britain, 165.18 (Monograph). SDO10182.

Record last edited

Aug 22 2024 7:26PM