More information : SE 7923 7163. Site of mosaic and apsidal building (`town house' of some importance) laying E-W, with workshops to S and oven building (bakery ?) to N. main Roman Road, 7 layers of metal 6 ft in thickness to w side. Shops and workrooms to NW and latrine building to SW of road. Area dug by M.O.W - D Smith and P Holman 1949-52. (Unpublished report - photos by R.H.H.)". (1)
Excavation prior to building in Orchard Field, SE of the fort, resulted in the discovery of the road from the SE gate to the ford across the R Derwent. West of the road a series of rectangular buildings of an average size of 25 by 40 ft stood hardly a foot apart and appeared to be workshops or store-houses; most of the pottery, including much local ware, and coins are of the second half of the third and the first half of the fourth century. On the east of the road the floors and walls of buildings extended along the fort's SE rampart, but the most elaborate structure, found some 150ft south of the fort, measured 90 by 30 ft, from SW to NE, and consisted of a courtyard (50 by 20 ft.) on the SW with two stokeholes for the hypocausts heating the three adjoining rooms on the NE, the most westerly of which ended in a wide apse 15ft. in diameter provided with six wall flues. The central room had a good, but much damaged, mosaic floor. The courtyard had an 8 ft. entrance on the south and a massive portico in non-local stone on the street frontage. Towards the end of the fourth century the larger stokehole had been blocked and the portico replaced by meaner work. Continued trenching the following year (1950) in Orchard Field showed that the buildings of the Vicus did not extend more than 200 feet east of the main road and that the greater part of the remains were of the fourth century, though successive stone re-building could be traced back to the early second century, Hadrianic and Antonine material being relatively more common than in the fort itself, which at this period was lightly garrisoned. One mid-second century structure contained circular baking ovens. The impressive portico of the house facing the main road found in 1949 proved to be merely a facade, the entrance being through two 6ft. doorways which opened on to a narrow alleyway on the SE and opposite another house of similar style. The pottery showed that the house was occupied in the first three-quarters of the fourth century only. A late or post-Roman ditch from the south-east fort gate towards the ford had disturbed all levels, especially near the street frontage of the houses. Quantities of Flavian pottery from the pre-fort camp were found everywhere and extend beyond the limits of the vicus. (2-3) Excavations at SE 792 716, south of Orchard Field, revealed two roads (partly exposed in 1949-52) fronted by early 4th century stone buildings, running down to the river bank (4). Below, a complex of superimposed wood and stone buildings extended from 1st-4th century (5); overlaying the corner of the rampart and ditch of a military camp pre-dating Malton fort (SE 77 SE 5)(4). A late 4th century defensive ditch was also traced cutting through the easterly road and buildings (5). (4-5) |