Monument record MDO18418 - Poundbury Late Roman Mausoleum R8

Mausoleum R8 lay towards the centre of the western half of the main Late Roman cemetery on site B of the 1966-1979 excavations at Poundbury. It comprised a rectangular structure constructed on a small terrace, with mortared walls, stone tiled roof and highly decorated painted wall plaster. No trace of a made floor was found. The structure had been heavily robbed. Coins within the demolition layers gave a terminus post quem in the late 4th century AD, for the destruction of the building. Seven graves were discovered within the building, containing the remains of two adult males, two adult, a 12 year old child and two infants, in nailed coffins. One Grave contained a bone comb. Reconstruction of the wall paintings within the structure as biblical scenes have led to more recent suggestions that this building may represent an early Christian church in use from the late 4th to 5th centuries. A final use of the building may have been for storing grain associated with an adjacent corn drier.

Found during the excavations directed by Christopher Sparey Green, for the Dorchester Excavation Committee, between 1966 and 1979 during development of the Grove Trading Estate on the eastern slopes of Poundbury Camp, Dorchester (1). The numbers in square brackets below refer to the context and feature numbers used in the published reports and archive (1)(2)(3).

Mausoleum R8 lay towards the centre of the western half of the main Late Roman cemetery on site B. It comprised a rectangular structure 6.4m long and 4.8m wide, which originally had mortared limestone walls with a mortared flint rubble core. Most of the walls had been thoroughly robbed and the robber trenches filled with grey-brown soil with a few fragments of mortar and limestone. It was constructed on a terrace cut into the hillside and filled with chalk rubble.

The interior of the building was filled with a number of layers of demolition including mixed limestone roof tile and painted wall plaster. No trace of a made floor was found. Coins within the demolition layers gave a terminus post quem in the late 4th century AD, for the destruction of the building.

Seven graves were discovered within the building, containing the remains of two adult males [234] & [236], two adult females [173] & [235], a 12 year old child [180] and two babies less than one year old [187] & [188]. The adults and child all had their heads to the west, were extended supine inhumations in simple nailed coffins. Grave [173] contained a bone comb, the other graves contained no grave goods. The infant graves, in the NE corner of the building were not fully recorded. The relative simplicity of the graves is in contrast to both the richly painted interior of this mausoleum and the lead and stone coffins in other mausolea.

Christopher Sparey Green has recently suggested that the scenes painted on the walls and ceiling of this structure included ranges of figures along the south wall in purple, green and white robes or tunics. Some of these figures carried rods and at least one had a white head-dress. A central lost figure seems to have had a chi-ro painted above it on a blue background. The east wall had at least one nude figure possibly in water. Part of the west wall had a cityscape from a semi-aerial perspective, possibly the holy city. In all this represents an unusually highly decorated funerary structure way beyond that normally identified in Roman Britain. It is possible then that this building functioned as a small church rather than a mausoleum, constructed in the late 4th century and continuing in use into the 5th century (4).

The final phase of use for this building appears to have been for the storage of grain associated with adjacent grain drier 2. Charred grain was recovered from the area of the western entrance of the mausoleum which faces grain drier 2, itself in use from the late 5th to the early 6th century (1).

<1> Sparey Green, C, 1987, Excavations at Poundbury, Dorchester, Dorset 1966-1982. Volume 1: The Settlements (Monograph). SDO9630.

<2> Farwell, D E and Molleson, T I, 1993, Excavations at Poundbury, Dorchester, Dorset 1966-1980. Volume II: The Cemeteries (Monograph). SDO9538.

<3> Sparey Green, C, 1966-1979, Poundbury, Grove Trading Estate, Dorchester (Excavation archive). SDO10096.

<4> Sparey Green, C J, Living amongst the dead: From Roman cemetery to post-Roman monastic settlement at Poundbury (Article in monograph). SDO10041.

Record last edited

Aug 3 2010 5:27PM