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Summary

Fifth to ninth-century enclosed settlement

Monument Types

• BOUNDARY BANK (Sub Roman to Middle Saxon - 410 AD to 869 AD)
• DITCH (Sub Roman to Middle Saxon - 410 AD to 869 AD)
• SETTLEMENT (Sub Roman to Middle Saxon - 410 AD to 869 AD)
• INHUMATION (Middle Saxon to Late Saxon - 550 AD to 1065 AD)

Associated Events

• Evaluation of land at Pollards Way/Priors Hill, Pirton, 2015 (Ref: AS1740)
• Magnetometer survey of land at Priors Hill, Pirton, 2015 (Ref: AS1740)

Protected Status

• Scheduled Ancient Monument: Anglo-Saxon settlement and probable prehistoric ring ditches, west of Pirton village

Full description

An enclosed Anglo-Saxon settlement, with excavated evidence of occupation from the 5th to the 9th centuries. Sites of this early date are rare, and the enclosed form of this settlement is also unusual <1>.
The field is on chalk, on a north-facing slope at the east end of the Chiltern Hills. The NW edge of the field is bounded by a bank that stands about 0.25m high on its south-east side, but falls away to the north-west down a steep slope about 1.5m high. Its slight appearance on the south side of the boundary is due to a build-up of colluvium behind the bank, to an estimated depth of up to 1m. Pottery brought up by animal burrowing dates this boundary to the mid-Saxon period. At the west corner of the field the bank turns to the south-east, following the line of the hedge and merging into the hedge-bank that defines the south-west boundary of the field, along Priors Hill. An outer ditch may lie to the west of the hedge. There is also a slight bank marking the north-east boundary of the field.

Geophysical survey in 2015 <2> revealed two ring ditches [31109] and linear features, including one running north-eastwards from the field boundary with Priors Hill, roughly equidistant between, and parallel to, the north-west and south-east field boundaries, and marking a slight change of slope. Subsequent evaluation <3> revealed this to be a ditch, which may define the south side of an enclosed area. Parallel to this feature was probable medieval ridge and furrow, and similar linear features were identified at the north-east end of the field running at right-angles to these.

The settlement seems to have been enclosed from the beginning. The majority of pottery found in pits, post-holes and ditches across the site can be dated to the 5th-7th or 9th century, and pottery of the earlier period was found in five of the seven trenches cut across the south-west to north-east ditch. No pottery was found that could be dated to the late Saxon or Saxo-Norman period. Most of the post-holes were clustered together at the east of the site, and are likely to represent post-built houses and other structures. To the north-east was a cluster of pits, several of which contained the larger pottery assemblages. Within this group of pits was the grave of an older adult male: a sample of his bone was radiocarbon dated to between AD 775 and 970 <1, 3>.

<1> Scheduled Monument description, May 2016 (Scheduling record). SHT9990.

<2> Baker, Matthew, Egan, Sam, & Summers, John, 2015, Land at Pollards Way/Priors Hill, Pirton, Hertfordshire: a geophysical survey, RNO 3821 (Report). SHT18067.

<3> Bull, Kerrie, 2015, Land at Pollards Way/Priors Hill, Pirton, Hertfordshire: trial trench evaluation, RNO 3609 (Report). SHT17796.

Sources and further reading

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