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Summary - not yet available

Monument Types

• CREMATION CEMETERY (Roman - 50 AD to 409 AD)
• MIXED CEMETERY (Roman - 50 AD to 409 AD)

Full description

A large cremation cemetery, excavated piecemeal over many years and now presumed destroyed by roadworks and building. By 1900 <1> 'a good deal of Roman pottery' had been found on the rising ground NW of the church (one of these pots may be a face-urn in Cambridge <8>). This was c.1890, when the slope in the grounds of The Grange was terraced and a tennis court constructed. From 1908 to c.1939 various owners of The Grange discovered hundreds of vessels on the slope, terraced for tennis courts and the garden <2-5>. Few burial groups were recorded; the vessels went to Hertford, Verulamium, Letchworth, and Stevenage Museums, and Welwyn School. Another 400, representing nearly 100 burial groups, were excavated in 1967 when a cutting was made for the link road from Singlers Bridge to the bypass <6>. The burials date from the beginning of the Roman period to the change to inhumation in the 3rd century; some 3rd-4th century inhumations were apparently present. Several glass vessels were found, but the graves were not rich and only a very few had any goods other than domestic pottery, often damaged. The main discoveries are usefully listed by <7>. They presumably also relate to the burials at Welwyn Hall [6522, 9615], which may be part of the same cemetery. See also [4445].

<1> Andrews, R T, 1905, Roman remains in Welwyn and neighbourhood; Trans East Herts Archaeol Soc 3/1, 28-35, - p30 (Article in serial). SHT9147.

<2> Mayes, A, 1908, A Romano-British cemetery at Welwyn; Trans East Herts Archaeol Soc 4/1, 117-18 (Article in serial). SHT1008.

<3> Kindersley, G M, 1922, Roman remains at Welwyn; Antiquaries Journal 2, 24-6 (Article in serial). SHT3794.

<4> Westell, W Percival, 1930, The Romano-British cemetery at The Grange, Welwyn, Herts; Trans St Albans & Herts Archit & Archaeol Soc for 1930, 37-55 (Article in serial). SHT11916.

<5> Holmes, John, 1950-1, Some pottery from the Roman cemetery at Welwyn Grange; Trans East Herts Archaeol Soc (1950-51), 1-8 (Article in serial). SHT5395.

<6> Rook, A G, 1973, Excavations at the Grange Romano-British cemetery, Welwyn, 1967; Herts Archaeology 3, 1-30 (Article in serial). SHT10523.

<7> Rook, Tony, 1986, The Roman villa site at Dicket Mead, Lockleys, Welwyn; Hertfordshire Archaeology 9 (1983-6), 79-175, - p107, no.4 (Article in serial). SHT6327.

<8> Clarke, L C G, 1926, Prehistoric and Romano-British objects from England in the University Museum of Archaeology and of Ethnology, Cambridge; Antiquaries Journal 6, 175-80, Pl. XXXII fig.1 (face urn), & p179 (Article in serial). SHT6458.

<9> Westell, W Percival, 1926, Roman and pre-Roman antiquities in Letchworth Museum; Trans East Herts Archaeol Soc 7/3, 258-81, - p278-9 (Article in serial). SHT10769.

Sources and further reading

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