Monument record MDO37222 - Iron Age 'Durotrigian' burial (7104) on Southdown Ridge, Weymouth

An uncoffined inhumation burial recorded during excavations in 2008-2009 in advance of construction of the Weymouth Relief Road, one of nineteen excavated in the area of an Iron Age settlement. The crouched burial of an adolescent of uncertain sex.

A roughly oval grave cut 1.40m long, 0.62m wide and 0.13m deep, aligned north-south with the head to the north. The body lay crouched on the left side, facing east and with the hands under the knees.

The skeleton was an adolescent around 12-14 years of age of uncertain sex, but three blue glass beads found near the neck suggest that it may have been female. Examination of the bones revealed evidence of septic arthritis in the left hip and possibly poor nutrition.

The beads are of a type that reached England as early as the 6th century BC, and continued in use throughout the Iron Age. Small pieces of residual early Iron Age pottery and fragments of animal bone were also found in the filling of the grave.

<1> Brown, L, Hayden, C and Score, D, 2014, 'Down to Weymouth town by Ridgeway'. Prehistoric, Roman and later sites along the Weymouth Relief Road, 189 (Monograph). SDO14013.

Record last edited

Jun 29 2015 11:09AM