Monument record MDO8734 - Sainsbury's car park, Christchurch (site W6); late Saxon town defences

Excavation in Sainsbury’s car park, Christchurch, during 1981 (site W6), revealed evidence for the late Saxon town defences. This comprised a round bottomed ditch [14] equivalent to ditch 1 at sites X2 & W23, approximately 4m wide and 1.5m deep, cut into the natural gravel. This contained ten sherds of probably 10th century pottery. Associated with and 4m inside the ditch was an extant bank [38] 1.5m high and composed of sand and gravel. It appeared to be a natural dune formation utilised as the town defensive bank.

Wessex Archaeological Committee conducted an excavation in Sainsbury’s car park, Christchurch, during 1981(site W6) in order to investigate the late Saxon and medieval town defences. The results were subsequently published in PDNHAS volume 105 (Davies 1983).

The excavation revealed evidence for the late Saxon town defences. This comprised a round bottomed ditch [14] equivalent to ditch 1 at sites X2 & W23, approximately 4m wide at the top and 1.5m deep, cut into the natural gravel. The top levels had been severely truncated by modern disturbance. The fill, probably natural silting, comprised sand or sand and gravel layers, difficult to distinguish from one another during excavation. As a result the ditch was excavated in shallow spits and the entire fill wet sieved in order to find good dating evidence. The main evidence was ten sherds of probably 10th century pottery from layer [9] found by manual retrieval.

Associated with and 4m inside the ditch was an extant bank [38] 1.5m high and composed of sand and gravel layers and the bottom was heavily iron panned. A medieval pit [30] had been cut into the bank. Both its appearance and total lack of finds from the bank suggested it was a natural sand bar accumulated over the gravels of the promontory, utilised as the town defensive bank.

Davies, S M, 1983, Excavations at Christchurch, Dorset, 1981 to 1983; Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society, 25-7 (Article in serial). SWX4065.

Record last edited

Oct 29 2024 4:14PM