Monument record MDO18269 - Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester; Early Roman Structure 3

Structure 3 was a stone-footed building found in the SE corner of Trench 6, during the 1990 excavations at Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester. Only part of this building lay within the excavation trench comprising part of one room with an opus signinum floor and a walled courtyard to the west.

Found during the excavations carried out by Wessex Archaeology in 1990 in the proposed Wessex Court retail development area between Charles Street, Acland Road, and South Walks, Dorchester (1) (2) (3). The numbers in square brackets below are context and feature numbers used in the report and archive (1) (3).

The exposed parts of this building consisted of part of one room and a walled courtyard to the west. The walls comprised mortared flint footings with a dressed limestone and flint wall surviving on the north side. A drain ran through the north wall. The floor within the room was of opus signinum, which survived in two places. 1st and 2nd century AD pottery and a coin of Gallienus (AD260-268) were found beneath the floor. The coin is thought to be intrusive. The walled courtyard to the west had a mortared limestone block wall on a single foundation course of flint nodules, which defined an area 9.5m east-west and over 6.5m north-south. A single posthole was found within the courtyard.

Structure 3 was cut through by the footings of the Late Roman building Structure 4. The relationship with Structure 2 is unclear. Both were on the same alignment and Structure 2 lay completely within Structure 3. It is possible that they were, in fact, part of the same building. There was some slight indication that the opus signinum floors of Structure 3 overlay the walls of Structure 2, but the relationship was badly disturbed by later robbing activity.

<1> Adam, N J, and Butterworth, C A, 1993, Excavations at Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester, Dorset, 1990. Volume 1: Text & Appendix I (Unpublished document). SDO191.

<2> Adam, N J, 1990, 'Excavations at Charles Street (Wessex Court), Dorchester, Interim Note on Stage 3, October-December 1990' Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society, 115-7 (Article in serial). SDO9415.

<3> Wessex Archaeology, 1989-1990, Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester (Excavation archive). SDO9878.

<4> National Record of the Historic Environment, 1431041 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Aug 22 2024 7:28PM