Monument record MDO6414 - Roman barrow at Knobs Crook, Woodlands

Site of a Roman barrow excavated in 1959. The barrow is visible as a very low earthwork on lidar imagery and was digitally plotted during the Dorset Stour NMP. Excavations revealed a clay mound proved to be of clay over three pits, two small and one larger, with burnt clay, charcoal, more than 700 fragments of bronze, lumps of solidified molten glass, sherds of Samian, a small quantity of cremated bone and an unburnt disc from a trepanned skull. These finds were all either on top of or inside the pits, and were interpreted as the remains of a cremation which had taken place off site and was then deposited in the large pit inside some sort of wooden container and alongside items such as glass vessels as a funeral deposit, which was then burnt. The mound was constructed after this. The pottery suggested a Flavian date.

A small mound was excavated by the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England in July 1959 (1959 according to the NRHE and PDNHAS but RCHME Inventory says 1958) directed by Peter Fowler. The mound proved to be of clay over three pits; two around 1ft 6in in diameter and 1ft deep, and a larger pit 5ft 8ins long by about 2 feet wide and 9 inches deep, and containing burnt clay, charcoal, and 700 fragments of bronze, lumps of solidified molten glass, sherds of Samian, a small quantity of cremated bone and an unburnt disc from a trepanned skull. These finds were all either on top of or inside the pits, and were interpreted as the remains of a cremation which had taken place off site and was then deposited in the large pit inside some sort of wooden container and alongside items such as glass vessels as a funeral deposit, which was then burnt. The mound was constructed after this. The pottery suggested a Flavian date. <3-4>

Site of a Roman barrow excavated in 1959. The barrow is visible as a very low earthwork on lidar imagery <6> and was digitally plotted during the Dorset Stour NMP. The barrow mound is 14m across and surrounded on its north side by the remains of an outer ditch.

<1> Fowler, P J, 1954, A Roman Barrow at Knob's Crook, Woodlands, Dorset. The Antiquaries Journal, 45 (1), 22-52. doi:10.1017/S0003581500051544 (Article in serial). SDO19457.

<2> Royal Commission on Historic Monuments, 1959, RCHME AF0620961: Knob's Crook, Dorset (Excavation archive). SDO19456.

<3> Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society, 1960, Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society for 1959, 99-100 (Serial). SDO59.

<4> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1963, Monuments Threatened or Destroyed. A Select List: 1956-1962, 15 (Monograph). SDO12558.

‘KNOB’S CROOK [SU 052074] Roman barrow, 22 ft. by 19 ft. by 2 ft. high; 1st century D.D., with primary cremation. Previously unrecorded. Excavated by R.C.H.M. (Dorset Nat. Hist. and Arch. Soc., Procs., 81 (1959), 99).’

<5> Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England), 1975, An Inventory of Historical Monuments in the County of Dorset, Volume V (East), 113 (Monograph). SDO129.

'(18) Roman Burial (05220733), near Knobs Crook, was found in 1959 under a low mound, during excavations by R.C.H.M. The mound, about 20 ft. in diameter and 2 ft. high, lay on the crest of a gentle S. slope of London Clay, about 140 ft. above O.D. It had no ditch and the material for it probably camefrom a shallow and irregular hollow to the W. Under the mound towards its E. edge, a large pit contained burnt clay, oak charcoal, over 700 bronze fragments including parts of a vessel, bosses and part of a plaque with red enamel inlay, iron nails, solidified lumps of molted glass probably all from a triangular flask, sherds of samian ware, a button, a bead and carved objects of steatite, cremated bone and an unburnt bone disc from a trepanned skull. Two similar pits were found, one containing sherds of a rare type of decorated samian (Knorr form 78), and burnt and broken fragments of bronze, glass and iron.
The samian sherds from at least six vessels indicate a date about A.D. 80, and the name Quin[tus] scratched on one sherd may be that of the deceased, probably a Romanized continental who died perhaps as the result of a trepanning operation (Dorset Procs., 81 (1959), 99-100; Ant. J., XLV (1965), 22-52)'.

<6> XX-XXX-2015, Environment Agency DTM Lidar 1m (Aerial Photograph). SDO15442.

<7> National Record of the Historic Environment, 212957 (Digital archive). SDO14739.

Record last edited

Feb 16 2023 4:41PM