Publications for sale

Looking for our technical site reports? Visit our reports section.

All publications listed are available for purchase from Wessex Archaeology, at the cost shown, this is inclusive of postage and packing. Many of the publications can also be purchased from Oxbow Books. Free copies are whilst stocks last, and are available to UK addresses only.

London Gateway: Maritime Archaeology in the Thames Estuary

Posted Thu, 04/18/2013 - 11:32

923

By Antony Firth,
Niall Callan, Graham Scott, Toby Gane and Stephanie Arnott
ISBN 978-1-874350-61-3
 
Price £15 buy online via Oxbow books
 
The DP World London Gateway Port, on the north bank of the Thames, is a major development of a new container terminal. Its construction has been accompanied by a major dredging scheme that has increased the depth of sections of the approach channel over a length of c. 100km, from the outer reaches of the Thames to the new terminal. From its beginning, this scheme included careful consideration of the archaeological consequences of dredging in such a historically-important estuary.
 
Over the course of a decade, investigations by Wessex Archaeology have provided a new perspective on the historic environment of the Thames, and explored innovative archaeological approaches and methodologies for addressing marine developments of this type and scale.
 
This volume sets out the challenges, results and history of these investigations, and the context and constraints encountered. The results contribute to our knowledge of maritime archaeology in the Thames Estuary and to the wider practice of marine development-led archaeology.
 
A companion volume on the terrestrial investigations conducted by Oxford Archaeology is presented in London Gateway: Iron Age and Roman Salt Making in the Thames Estuary. Excavations at Stanford Wharf Nature Reserve, Essex.

Renewing the Past: Unearthing the history of the Olympic Park site

Posted Mon, 04/30/2012 - 13:40

429 Renewing the Past

By Andrew B. Powell
ISBN 978-1-874350-60-6

£4.95 Buy online via Oxbow Books

Archaeologists have unearthed prehistoric settlements, a medieval millstream and a Victorian riverboat, and they have traced the area’s industrial heritage. As the landscape changed over time, so did the lives of the people who lived and worked here. Now the site of the 2012 Games has changed again, renewing and building on the past to create a legacy for the future.

By River, Fields and Factories: The Making of the Lower Lea Valley Archaeological and cultural heritage investigations on the site of the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games

Posted Mon, 04/30/2012 - 13:31

428 By River, Fields and Factories

By Andrew B. Powell
ISBN 978-1-874350-59-0

Available summer 2012
 
£30.00 Buy online via Oxbow Books

The results from the investigations were varied in terms of their complexity, date and importance. They revealed the residues of everyday lives from early prehistory to the 21st century, environmental evidence for the repeated transformation of the valley landscape, and built structures relating to infrastructure developments and the area’s industrial heritage. Important amongst the archaeological remains was the evidence for Neolithic riverside activity and Bronze Age and Iron Age settlement and farming. Also of significance was a waterlogged boat abandoned in a river channel next to a 19th century mill, and the complex post-medieval and Victorian archaeology at Temple Mills.

Settling the Ebbsfleet Valley, Volumes 1-4

Posted Fri, 02/03/2012 - 15:17
Each of the four volumes has an individual ISBN and price. The ISBN for all four volumes is 978-0-9545970-7-8, at a reduced price of £90.00.

Volume 1: The Sites

368 Volume I: The Sites

Settling the Ebbsfleet Valley
High Speed 1 Excavations at Springhead and Northfleet, Kent
The Late Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Medieval Landscape
 
By Phil Andrews, Edward Biddulph, and Alan Hardy

ISBN 978-0-9545970-3-0

£30.00 Buy online via Oxbow Books
 
This volume, the first of four, describes the results of excavations at Springhead and Northfleet in the Ebbsfleet Valley, Kent, undertaken in advance of construction of High Speed 1 (formerly the Channel Tunnel Rail Link).
 
The Roman ‘small town’ or roadside settlement at Springhead (Vagniacis) developed from modest Late Iron Age origins into a religious centre almost unique within Roman Britain, probably attracting pilgrims from a wide area. In addition to the previously known and excavated temples, a major mid-2nd century AD sanctuary complex including a temple, ancillary buildings and a ritual shaft, has been discovered, focused on the springs and pool (reconstructed above) at the head of the valley where the Ebbsfleet rises.
 
Another temple, along with a range of timber buildings, were also recorded; these included an aisled barn, a blacksmith’s forge, a bakery, and a possible brewing complex within individual properties lining Watling Street and the riverside branch road leading to Northfleet villa. As well as the major Pepper Hill cemetery to the south of the town (and reported under Section 1 of High Speed 1), three smaller cemeteries were also identified on the periphery of Springhead.
 
Downstream at Northfleet, a large part of a Roman villa complex, including the Ebbsfleet waterfront, a detached bath-house, and much of the agricultural surroundings, was investigated. Saxon remains throughout the Ebbsfleet Valley included sunken-featured buildings belonging to possibly three separate settlements, two inhumation cemeteries, and most significantly, at Northfleet the preserved remains of the earliest recorded horizontal-wheeled tidal water mill in Britain, its construction tree-ring dated to the end of the 7th century AD.

 

Volume 2: Late Iron Age to Roman Finds Reports

369 Volume 2: Late Iron Age to
Roman Finds Reports

Settling the Ebbsfleet Valley
High Speed 1 Excavations at Springhead and Northfleet, Kent
The Late Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Medieval Landscape
 
By Edward Biddulph, Rachael Seager Smith, and Jörn Schuster

ISBN 978-0-9545970-4-7
£30.00 Buy online via Oxbow Books
 
This volume, the second of four, presents specialist reports on the Late Iron Age and Roman artefacts recovered from Springhead and Northfleet.
 
These include over 2 tonnes of pottery, 1756 coins and tokens, over 2500 other metal small finds (many possibly votive objects recovered from the Ebbsfleet at Springhead) and 3000 nails. The metal finds include items of personal adornment and dress, household utensils and furniture, objects for weighing and measuring, pieces of toilet or medical equipment, tools associated with manufacture and agriculture, military equipment, and religious objects, including two lead Fortuna figurines. Quantities of iron slag, ceramic building material, wall plaster and woodwork, 95 rotary querns, and at least two pipeclay Venus figurines, along with glass, leather shoes, and objects of bone are also reported.
 
The finds assemblage from Springhead in particular emphasises the juxtaposition of ritual and domestic life in a small but important roadside settlement (partly reconstructed above) on Watling Street, on the route between the coast and London. Although the main building of the Northfleet villa complex, originally investigated in the early 20th century, was avoided by the route of High Speed 1, high-status finds recovered from elsewhere in the estate, such as a seal-box, marble flooring and fragments of an imported theatrical mask provide further evidence that the villa was occupied by members of the local elite.
 
Collectively the substantial High Speed 1 finds assemblage helps paint a vivid picture of domestic, economic and religious life, and death, for both town and country dwellers within the Ebbsfleet Valley during the Romano-British period.

 

Volume 3: Late Iron Age to Roman Human Remains and Environmental Reports

370 Volume 3: Late Iron Age to Roman
Human Remains and Environmental
Reports

Settling the Ebbsfleet Valley
High Speed 1 Excavations at Springhead and Northfleet, Kent
The Late Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Medieval Landscape
 
By Catherine Barnett, Jacqueline I McKinley, Elizabeth Stafford, Jessica M Grimm, and Chris J Stevens

ISBN 978-0-9545970-5-4
£30.00 Buy online via Oxbow Books
 
The detailed specialist reports in this volume, the third of four, present analyses of the Late Iron Age and Roman human bone and animal bone assemblages recovered during the reported excavations, as well as environmental remains and dating evidence relating to contemporary landscape, subsistence and economy.
 
A single cremation burial and at least 48 inhumation burials were recorded at Springhead, with a single inhumation burial of a neonate also recovered from within the Northfleet villa complex. Whole or partial skulls appear to have been both deliberately placed and redeposited in a variety of features, including a ‘ritual shaft’ at Springhead. Over 68,000 fragments of animal bone were recovered, including many complete animal skeletons. At Springhead the assemblage is dominated by sheep/goat whilst cattle are more important at the Northfleet villa.
 
The environmental evidence for Roman subsistence and economy is presented in reports on charred plant remains, wood charcoal, and marine shell. Of particular note is the evidence for brewing on an almost industrial scale at the villa, with a malting oven (reconstructed above), a barn and three brewing tanks discovered – the largest of which could hold up to 16,000 pints alone, supplying not only the villa’s need but almost certainly also for trade further afield. Environmental sequences and remains relating to the development of the wider Roman landscape of the Ebbsfleet Valley were also recovered from a range of locations.

 

Volume 4: Saxon and Later Finds and Environmental Reports

371 Volume 4: Saxon and Later Finds
and Environmental Reports

Settling the Ebbsfleet Valley
High Speed 1 Excavations at Springhead and Northfleet, Kent
The Late Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Medieval Landscape
 
By Phil Andrews, Lorraine Mepham, Jörn Schuster, and Chris J Stevens

ISBN 978-0-9545970-6-1
£25.00 Buy online via Oxbow Books
 
The detailed specialist reports in this volume, the fourth of four, cover all the Saxon and later finds recovered during the excavations, as well as human bone and animal bone, environmental remains and dating evidence relating to contemporary landscape, subsistence and economy.
 
Fifth to early 6th century pottery was recovered from the Northfleet Roman villa site, including from demolition layers over the villa buildings, as well as from nine sunken-featured buildings spanning the 5th to 8th centuries, and the area of the late 7th/early 8th century Saxon mill (reconstructed above). The metal small finds derive largely from parts of two late 7th/early 8th century cemeteries, containing at least 30 individuals, and located at Springhead on the brow of Wingfield Bank overlooking the Ebbsfleet Valley. Also recovered were small quantities of smithing slag, ceramic building material, fired clay and daub, and objects of bone.
 
Unusual and comparatively rare finds include a wooden bowl and a very early example of a small wood plane – probably for trimming arrow or spear shafts. In addition, the surface of one of the mill pentroughs had been inscribed with a ‘daisy wheel’ pattern of overlapping and intersecting circles, almost certainly for use as a template to accurately and evenly positioning the horizontal water wheel blades on to a central hub.
 
The animal bone assemblage is largely comprised of domestic animals, indicating mixed farming supplemented by a little hunting; the charred plant remains derive from locally grown crops

An Iron Age Enclosure and Romano-British Features at High Post, near Salisbury

Posted Fri, 02/03/2012 - 14:14

367 High Post front coverBy Andrew B. Powell
ISBN 978-1-874350-57-6
£5.95 Order by post

Archaeological works at High Post near Salisbury have confirmed the presence of an Iron Age hilltop enclosure on the southern margins of Salisbury Plain.

The enclosure was bounded by a deep V-shaped ditch in association with a wide zone suggestive of an internal bank. More significantly, lying beneath the line of the bank was a large spread of mostly articulated animal bone, dating to the Early Iron Age.

The Iron Age occupation of the enclosure was represented by round-houses, pits and post-holes containing evidence of domestic waste.

The enclosure was abandoned during the Middle Iron Age and remained unoccupied until the late Romano-British period. Pits, hearths and post-holes of this period were recorded both within and outside the enclosure. Other features related to this period included a possible shrine and a corn drying oven which appeared to have been utilised into the start of the post Romano-British period.

The Amesbury Archer and the Boscombe Bowmen - Bell Beaker burials at Boscombe Down, Amesbury, Wiltshire

Posted Wed, 09/07/2011 - 11:48

270 The Amesbury Archer and the
Boscombe Bowmen

By A.P. Fitzpatrick
Report 27
ISBN 978-1-874350-54-5
£30 Buy this book from Oxbow Books

Found a few kilometres from Stonehenge, the graves of the Amesbury Archer and the Boscombe Bowmen date to the 24th century BC and are two of the earliest Bell Beaker graves in Britain.

The Boscombe Bowmen grave contained the collective burial of five adult males of Bell Beaker date, a teenager who was probably also male, and one, possibly two, children. The Amesbury Archer was the single burial of a 35–45 year old man who had lived with impaired mobility because of the absence of his left knee cap. Isotope analyses suggest that both graves were those of incomers to Wessex. A third grave, the so-called 'Companion', found close to that of the Amesbury Archer, was that of a 20–25 year old man. A rare trait in their feet shows that the two men were related.

The grave of the Boscombe Bowmen contained objects made of flint, including a group of finely made arrowheads, seven Beakers, an antler pendant, and a boars' tusk. The Amesbury Archer's grave contained an unusually large number and variety of objects, including five Beakers, several caches of flint, 17 barbed and tanged arrowheads, two bracers, three copper knives/daggers, a pair of gold basket ornaments, boar's tusks, and a stone tool for metalworking. The 'Companion' was buried with similar gold ornaments and a boar's tusk but no Beaker. The objects have strong continental connections and the stone metalworking tool or cushion stone in the grave of the Amesbury Archer may explain why his mourners afforded him one of the most well-furnished burials yet found in Europe.

This excavation report contains a series of wide-ranging studies and scientific analyses by an array of experts, and a discussion of the graves within their British and continental European contexts.
 

Prehistoric Activity and a Romano-British Settlement at Poundbury Farm, Dorchester, Dorset

Posted Fri, 07/22/2011 - 12:20

221 Front cover: Poundbury

By Kirsten Egging and Philippa Bradley
ISBN: 978-1-874350-56-9
£25

Archaeological survey and excavation in and around Poundbury Farm, Dorchester has revealed a multi-period landscape with evidence spanning the Neolithic through to the Romano-British period.

A number of pits contained axe manufacturing debris, early Neolithic pottery and environmental remains, including one with an extensive dump of charred grain.

A ring-ditch of probable Early Bronze Age date was recorded, although there was limited evidence for contemporary occupation. Middle and Late Bronze Age field systems, pits, roundhouses, and cremation burials were identified. In keeping with other sites in the area, Iron Age activity was very limited.

In the early Romano-British period a farmstead was established, comprising enclosures, stone-built structures, grain driers, ovens and other features. Early Romano-British Durotrigian graves, as well as middle and late Romano-British graves, were associated with the settlement. One individual was buried in a stone coffin, and there was a single late Romano-British cremation burial.

Visit our Poundbury project website for further information on this site.

Pevensey Castle

Posted Fri, 07/22/2011 - 11:56

220 Front cover: Pevensey Castle, Sussex

By Michael Fulford and Stephen Rippon
ISBN: 978-1-874350-55-2
£20

Survey and excavations undertaken on behalf of English Heritage on the site of the medieval Keep revealed important evidence for its construction, development, repairs and decay between c. 1200 and the 15th century. The Keep was in such a poor state of repair by the late 16th century that it came to be filled with clay and used as an artillery platform against the threat of the Armada. In the Second World War it was refortified once again.

Deep excavation behind and below the eastern wall of the Keep provided new dendrochronological evidence for a late 3rd century construction of the Roman fort wall and for its occupation from the end of the 3rd century and through the late Roman, Anglo-Saxon and Saxo-Norman periods. For the first time in south-east England imports of African Red Slipped Ware are attested in the 5th and the 7th centuries. The finds and environmental chapters include major reports on the Roman to Post-medieval pottery (Timby), the faunal remains (Powell and Serjeantson), the marine molluscs (Somerville) and soil micromorphology (Macphail).

Landscape Evolution in the Middle Thames Valley: Heathrow Terminal 5 Excavations, volume 2

Posted Thu, 04/07/2011 - 13:07

122 Heathrow Terminal 5 Excavations, volume 2by Framework Archaeology
416p, 241 b/w and col illus, 117 col plates, DVD
ISBN-13: 978-0-9554519-2-8
ISBN-10: 0-9554519-2-2
£20
 

Excavations in advance of the construction of Terminal 5 at Heathrow Airport uncovered a complex settlement and farming landscape spanning later Neolithic to Saxon periods. Fragments of Neolithic cursus and a few other structures and pits attest to Neolithic activity before and associated with the Stanwell Cursus complex. By around 1700 BC, the landscape had been apportioned and divided into field systems traversed by double-ditched trackways and incorporating small farmsteads. There seems to have been little activity in the Iron Age until the emergence of a nucleated settlement of roundhouses, four-post structures and livestock enclosures in the Middle Iron Age. This settlement continued in use through to the end of the Roman period, with various modifications and realignments of the accompanying field systems. The remains of an early Saxon settlement were revealed to the north-west of this earlier site and, after a period of apparent abandonment, new fields and stock enclosures were established in the mid-Saxon period; the area remaining as farmland into the 20th century. 

The book is now available to buy from Oxbow Books.

Kentish Sites and Sites of Kent - A miscellany of four archaeological excavations

Posted Tue, 03/16/2010 - 12:16

Kentish Sites and Sites of Kent - front coverKentish Sites and Sites of Kent - front coverby Phil Andrews, Kirsten Egging Dinwiddy, Chris Ellis, Andrew Hutcheson, Christopher Philpotts, Andrew B. Powell and Jörn Schuster
ISBN 978-1-874350-50-7
£10

This volume presents the results of archaeological investigations undertaken at four sites in Kent. The two ‘linear’ schemes: the West Malling and Leybourne Bypass and Weatherlees–Margate–Broadstairs Wastewater Pipeline, provided transects across the landscape revealing settlement and cemetery evidence of Neolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age, Romano-British and Anglo-Saxon date. Two Bronze Age metalwork hoards were also recovered and a variety of World War II features.

Medieval settlement remains included sunken-featured buildings at West Malling, Fulston Manor, and Star Lane, Manston, that appear to belong to a type of building specific to Kent that had combined uses as bakeries, brewhouses, and/or kitchens. A short study of these, their distribution, form and possible functions, is included.

In addition to evidence for Bronze Age occupation, Manston Road, Ramsgate produced Anglo-Saxon settlement evidence with six sunken-featured buildings and a sizeable assemblage of domestic items.

Online specialist reports for the Margate Pipeline excavations mentioned in this volume are available online.

Clients
Southern Water, Kent County Council, Ward Homes, Tesco

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