SDO9987 - Middle Farm, Bridport Road, Dorchester. Archaeological Assessment Stage 1

Wessex Archaeology conducted stage 1 of an archaeological assessment (gridded surface artefact collection) of land proposed for housing development at Middle Farm, Poundbury during 1989. Following ploughing the field was allowed to weather for two weeks. The eastern half was ploughed in inclement weather and conditions for the retrieval of artefacts were adversly affected. The collection of artefacts from the surface was made on a 25m grid basis aligned on the national grid. One line along the western edge of each hectare was walked. Distribution plots of chronological groups of pottery wer then made. A total of 3285 artefacts were collected. The largest category of artefact was worked prehistoric flint and flakes dominated this assemblage (91%) with two ar three concentrations in the SW corner and the eastern part of the field. 771 sherds of pottery were collected of which 757 were post-medieval or modern in date, seven were medieval and seven Roman. The majority of the worked flint was Bronze Age in date, although activity is indicated on the site from the earlier Neolithic. The clustering suggests more than one settlement in the immediate vicinity. Reccomendations for stage 2 of the assessment are to excavated a 2.5% sample area of the site in a series of 2m wide machine cut trenches and a small number of hand excavated trenches to act as a control.