Seabed Prehistory: Area 240

Location of Area 240 (click to enlarge)Wessex Archaeology has been commissioned to undertake a detailed and far reaching study in aggregate licence Area 240, which is situated approximately 8 miles east of Great Yarmouth in Norfolk. The project, entitled Seabed Prehistory: Site Evaluation Techniques (Area 240), builds on the work of Wessex Archaeology’s Seabed Prehistory project.

The Area 240 project, which is funded by the Aggregate Levy Sustainability Fund (ALSF) through English Heritage, was launched in response to the discovery in February 2008 of 75 flint tools and associated faunal remains amongst aggregate from dredging licence Area 240. The exact age of the tools is still being investigated though they are believed to have been made and deposited during the Devensian Ice Age, which began about 110,000 years ago. These finds represent one of the most significant discoveries of Palaeolithic material from the North Sea as the quality and quantity of the artefacts suggests that a number of them had lain undisturbed since their deposition.

Prior to this discovery, experts believed that deposits of this date had been destroyed or disturbed by glaciation and subsequent sea level rise. The discoveries from Area 240 suggest that in some areas at least some of this earlier material still survives under the sea.

This project will fully investigate Area 240 in order to test, develop and refine techniques for exploring our submerged prehistory, which can then be applied to other sites and in other areas. By employing these techniques in the future we can hope to locate, explore and protect further sites of Palaeolithic significance in our waters, prior to the start of aggregate dredging.

Looking towards Lowestoft from Area 240