SDO12437 - Practical Archaeology Training Course 2005, Down Farm, Sixpenny Handley, Dorset

This report summarises the results of all the archaeological investigations to date carried out at Home Field, Down Farm, Sixpenny Handley, Dorset (NGR. ST 9980 1461), but concentrates on the results of the 2005 fieldwork. It presents the results of a 2 week excavation run as a practical archaeology course for the general public by Wessex Archaeology. It also summarises the results of environmental analyses of samples taken during Martin Green's (1985/6, 1995) and Wessex Archaeology's (2004) earlier work on the Site. This was the second season of research excavation carried out on the site and comprised three small areas which are extensions to the earlier excavation areas. The excavation occurred between 5th - 20th September 2005. The results from the archaeological investigations at Home Field have highlighted the major period of activity being from the Late Bronze Age into the Middle Iron Age (11th - 7th to 5th - 3rd centuries BC). A small quantity of Beaker period (2600 - 1800 BC) and Romano-British (AD 43 - 410) pottery from the excavations indicates small-scale activity of these dates in the area, though the nature of the activity is difficult to ascertain. The 2004 and 2005 excavations recorded a sub-rectangular banked enclosure, with a short, externally ditched section on the west side, was constructed in the Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age (11th - 7th century BC) and continued in use until the Middle Iron Age (5th - 3rd centuries BC). The palaeoenvironmental evidence indicates that sometime in the Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age the local landscape changed from downland pasture to arable. This change may have been part of the reorganisation of the landscape upon the construction of the settlement enclosure. Internal settlement features included Early (700 - 400 BC) and Middle Iron Age (400 - 100 BC) chalk quarry hollows, a c. 15m diameter Middle Iron Age roundhouse and undated 4-post granary structures. The post-pits of another possible roundhouse entrance of Early Iron Age date were recorded in 2005. The enclosure is possibly associated with an extensive Celtic field system and lynchet running down Gussage Cow Down and across Home Field respectively. The overall evidence from all the fieldwork shows that on-site settlement activities included flint knapping, bronze and iron metalworking, textile manufacture and grain storage. The chalk quarrying may have been for cob wall construction, whitewash (for daub walls) or marling of calcium deficient fields. Animal husbandry included the keeping of cattle, sheep/goat and pig though it is not possible to ascertain the relative importance of each species. Dog remains, possibly domesticated, were also present.