Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

A short length of curving, possibly right-angled ditch was exposed on the southern edge of excavations at Springhead, close to and possibly associated with the road running towards the ritual pools. It continued beyond the limits of excavation to the south east and may have formed part of a large enclosure. It was a maximum of 2m wide but only 0.75m deep with steeply sloping sides and a flat base. The ditch had been re cut, the fill or the earlier ditch contained mid-late 1st century pottery while the later recut contained early 2nd century pottery. (location accurate to the nearest 1m based on available information)

Monument Types

• DITCH (Roman - 75 AD? to 125 AD?)

Associated Finds

• SHERD (Roman - 75 AD? to 175 AD?)

Full description

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A short length of curving, possibly right-angled ditch was exposed on the southern edge of excavations at Springhead. It continued beyond the limits of excavation to the south east and truncated by a modern road cutting to the south-west. It was a maximum of 2m wide but only 0.75m deep with steeply sloping sides and a flat base. The ditch had been re cut, the fill or the earlier ditch contained mid-late 1st century pottery while the later recut contained early 2nd century pottery. It has been tentatively suggested that the ditch may have been the northern corner of an early enclosure further elements of which were identified on previous excavations. If the various recorded ditch sections were part of the same feature, then this would provide an estimated north-west to south-east length of 160 m for the postulated enclosure, the eastern corner (its form uncertain) apparently crossed by Watling Street and now lying beneath the A2; the north-east to south-west dimension remains unknown. (1-2)

<1> Oxford Wessex Archaeology Joint Venture, 2010, Settling the Ebbsfleet Valley. CTRL Excavations at Springhead and Northfleet, Kent. The Late Iron Age, Roman, Saxon, and Medieval Landscape (Unpublished document). SKE31245.

<2> Wessex Archaeology, 2003, Channel Tunel Rail Link Archaeological works at Springhead Roman Town (ARC SPH00): interim fieldwork report (Unpublished document). SKE31600.

Sources and further reading

Related records