More information : SK 964 536. An earthwork site at Welbourn, surveyed for the S Lincs Archaeol Unit by V Ancliffe in 1980, may represent either shrinkage of Medieval Welbourn or else the lost hamlet of Sapperton (see SK 95 SE 6), for which documentary evidence is at present lacking. The earthworks incorporate the suggested site of a mill mound. (1)
The Medieval settlement remains referred to by the previous authorities were seen as earthworks and mapped from good quality air photographs. Some of the earthworks have been ploughed and are now visible as cropmarks. The most coherent remains are visible to the south of the present village of Welbourn. The remains of tofts are visible as ditch defined rectilinear conjoined enclosures centred at SK 9629 5356. Within one of the tofts a circular embanked enclosure, 3m in diameter, is faintly visible centred at SK 9626 5348. A possible enclosure, measuring 10m by 5m, is centred at SK 9628 5353. The windmill mound referred to by the previous authority is clearly visible as a mound, 25m in diameter, centred at SK 9632 5359. The mound has a depression in the top where the mill building or structure stood. Croft boundaries associated with the tofts also visible attached to the tofts. Ridge and furrow was visible on the 1940s air photographs adjacent to the tofts and surrounding the mill mound. It is not clear from the later photography if this still survives as earthworks. More fragments of toft or croft boundaries are visible to the west and east of the present village, as cropmarks, centred at SK 9647 5381, SK 9644 5399, SK 9663 5431, SK 9687 5415, and SK 9679 5456. Two small blocks of ridge and furrow are centred at SK 9632 5363 and SK 9655 5429. Parts of a Medieval field system of ridge and furrow, which may have once surrounded the Medieval settlement, are recorded in SK 95 SE 28. (Morph No. LI.866.3.1-12)
This description is based on data from the RCHME MORPH2 database. (2) |