SDO14005 - 19 St Martins Lane, Wareham, Dorset. Observations and Recording, January 2014

Terrain Archaeology undertook a programme of archaeological observations and recording at 19 St Martins Lane, Wareham, Dorset. Characteristically for this part of Wareham, a thick late medieval or post-medieval topsoil overlay a 0.3-0.4m thick reworked medieval soil containing pottery dating from the 10th/11th to at least the late 13th century. Of uncertain relationship with this soil, but probably originally cutting at least part of its thickness, were the remains of three small truncated 11th - 12th century pits. All three appear to be broadly domestic in character, producing pottery and animal bone, as well as small quantities of smithing slag and hammer scale in two of them. Late medieval finds were absent and only small quantities of pre 18th-19th century post-medieval material were found from the topsoil. The findings from 19 St Martins Lane support a widely held view that Wareham saw sporadic urban expansion from its Late Saxon core throughout the 11th-13th centuries, before suffering significant economic stagnation and urban contraction after the 13th century.