Monument record MDO18529 - Alington Avenue; Iron Age Early Enclosure System

Evidence for an early enclosure system was discovered during excavations at Alington Avenue in the northern and eastern parts of the main site. It comprised a number of shallow, sometimes irregular ditches and gullies. Some were stratigraphically earlier than the Early Roman D-shaped enclosure or earlier than the Early Bronze Age upper fills of the long barrow ditches. They also respected the area of the Bronze Age double ring ditch suggesting that it was still extant as an earthwork and landscape feature at this time. Finds mainly consisted of flint debitage and heavily abraded early Roman pottery from the uppermost layers. Not all of the individual lengths of ditch are contemporaneous, some are cut by others but not all features can be linked into one stratigraphic sequence. The individual ditch sections do appear however, to combine to form one larger system of enclosure. Two basic phases of development of this early ditch system have been recognised. The earliest phase is composed of two main elements, a large L-shaped ditch system in the centre of the site and a smaller complex in the MW corner of the site. The overall impression is one of a system of NE-SW aligned rectilinear enclosures with a double-ditched drove running in an approximately E-W direction from the double ring-ditch along the southern boundary of the site.

Found during a series of evaluations and excavations conducted by Wessex Archaeology at Alington Avenue, Fordington, Dorchester between 1984 and 1987. The results of the excavations have been published as a Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society Monograph; (DNHAS Monograph 15). The numbers in square brackets below refer to the context and feature numbers used in the published report.

The Iron Age early enclosure system comprised a number of shallow, sometimes irregular ditches and gullies. Some were stratigraphically earlier than the Early Roman D-shaped enclosure or earlier than the Early Bronze Age upper fills of the long barrow ditches. They also respected the area of the Bronze Age double ring ditch suggesting that it was still extant as an earthwork and landscape feature at this time. Finds mainly consisted of flint debitage and heavily abraded early Roman pottery from the uppermost layers. Not all of the individual lengths of ditch are contemporaneous, some are cut by others but not all features can be linked into one stratigraphic sequence. The individual ditch sections do appear however, to combine to form one larger system of enclosure. Two basic phases of development of this early ditch system have been recognised. The earliest phase is composed of two main elements, a large L-shaped ditch system in the centre of the site and a smaller complex in the MW corner of the site.

The major element of this first phase of boundary ditches was a long L-shaped ditch made up of several shorter sections of ditch, which presumably formed two sides of a large enclosure, though no traces of the other sides of this postulated enclosure were found. The southern side comprised of a single length of ditch [3476] which cut the south ditch [1998] of the long barrow [2000] and terminated about 16m east of the double ring-ditch [2300]. It was fairly shallow with a rounded profile and no signs of re-cutting or cleaning out. The western side of the enclosure consisted of two lengths of ditch [3666/3679] and [2457], with two causeways or entrances between them. Ditch [3666] was oriented at right angles to [3476] with an 8m gap between them. A further ditch [2660/1948] extended at right angles to the southern end of [3666] in a NE direction with a hooked terminal at the NE end. This cut the north ditch [1999] of long barrow [2000].

In the NW corner of the site was an L-shaped ditch [3854/3895] which appears to form two sides of a square or rectangle 14m in extant length. The eastern side of this enclosure was recut by another short length of ditch [3884].

Two other sections of ditch may belong to this first phase of enclosure; ditch [4008] may represent a remodelling of the corner of the large L-shaped enclosure, and ditch [1272] which ran parallel to and about 11m south of the southern side of the enclosure.

The ditches of this system were allowed to silt up before an extensive remodelling took place in the digging of new ditches which largely followed the lines of the earlier ones but with a slightly altered orientation. The southern side was formed by the roughly ESE-WNE ditch [3477/3460/3474/1263] (hereafter ditch [3474]), which turned NE just 5m away from the double ring-ditch [2300] and terminated on the line of the earlier ditch [2660]. There was an 8m wide causeway or entrance at this point and then the line of the ditch was continued to the NE by ditch [3234]. The eastern end of ditch [3474] was cut by ditch [2850/2862/2876/1288] which presumably represents a recut. It continued eastwards out of the excavated area.

About 11m south of ditch [3474] was another ditch [3209/1271] which appeared to cut the earlier ditch [1272] and was traced eastwards beyond the excavated area as a geophysical anomaly running parallel to ditch [3474].

Along the western side of the site, about 40m west of the enclosure was a ditch [3865] which ran parallel to ditches [3234] and [3477] and cut across the earlier L-shaped ditch [3881/3895] in the NW corner of the site. It continued southward to stop only 8m short of ditch [1600] of the double ring-ditch [2300].

The overall impression is one of a system of NE-SW aligned rectilinear enclosures with a double-ditched drove running in an approximately E-W direction from the double ring-ditch along the southern boundary of the site.

<1> Davies, S M, Bellamy, P S , Heaton, M J , and Woodward, P J, 2002, Excavations at Alington Avenue, Fordington, Dorchester, Dorset, 1984-87 (Monograph). SDO9565.

Record last edited

Aug 29 2024 12:32PM