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Summary

Archaeological features comprise a small pit and a posthole dating to the Post Roman period.

Location

Protected Status: none recorded

Other References/Statuses: none recorded

Monument Type(s) and Dates

• ARCHAEOLOGICAL FEATURE (Post Roman - 410 AD to 700 AD)

Full description

Rohan, N. + Morris, B., 15/08/2014, Land off Tiverton Road, Cullompton (Report - Excavation). SDV359363.

Excavation undertaken in advance of a proposed housing development.

The archaeological features comprise a small pit and a posthole.

The charcoal-rich fill of pit [2581] was radiocarbon dated to 414-543 calAD. It is also possible some of the later elements of Linear Group <007> continued in use into the fifth century. They join a small but growing number of sites in Devon dated to the early medieval period, but with a few notable exceptions (e.g. Bantham, Reed et al. 2011; Mothercombe, Turner & Gerrard 2004, Turner & Roskams 2005; High Peak, Pollard 1966), these sites have produced datable charcoal from only single isolated features and nothing else. One of those sites lies just to the north of Cullompton at Willand Road, where a pit was radiocarbon dated to 530-660 calAD (Hood 2010). Excavations at the Bestwell Quarry site in Poole Harbour identified hundreds of charcoal-rich pits, assumed at the time to be Prehistoric but subsequently radiocarbon-dated to the post-Roman period (see Ladle 2012, 80-9). This would imply these are not random features but part of a wider phenomenon that has yet to be explored or explained.

Single radiocarbon dates defy generalisation, but it does at least indicate that there was some activity in the local area following the end of the Roman period. The plant macrofossil analysis (Appendix 15) demonstrated the presence of a series of different wheat and barley varieties, as well as the corresponding weed species present within arable fields, which would indicate arable cultivation in the immediate area continued unabated. The curious fact that multiple cereal and weed species were present in the sample, but not chaff or other processing waste, implies this was a structured deposition of material, rather than the casual disposal of waste material.

The first documentary reference to Cullompton comes in c.880 AD, so it is unlikely the land around the town was ever completely abandoned. The fact that Linear Group <007> is roughly parallel to historic field boundaries hints at continuity without being conclusive.

Ordnance Survey, 2016, MasterMap (Cartographic). SDV359352.

Sources / Further Reading

Associated Monuments: none recorded

Associated Finds

• FDV6091 - CEREAL GRAIN (Post Roman - 410 AD to 700 AD)
• FDV6089 - WASTE DEPOSIT (Post Roman - 410 AD to 700 AD)

Associated Events

• EDV6902 - Evaluation, Land off Tiverton Road, Cullompton (Ref: 140815)

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