ENN109848 - Land off Park Farm Way, 2020 (Excavation)

{1} MOLA was appointed by RPS to undertake an archaeological excavation and strip, map and sample on land off Park Farm Way, Wellingborough, Northamptonshire in advance of a proposed residential development. The excavation followed on from previous work, including geophysical survey and two phases of trial trench evaluation. Three additional areas of strip, map and sample were opened to the north and east of the main site. The site comprised a late Iron Age to early Roman rural settlement, with animal husbandry probably forming its primary function. This settlement was short lived, likely lasting from 50BC to AD100 at the broadest, but displayed at least three stratigraphic phases of development. The late Iron Age site was dominated by large, enclosed fields defined by five interconnecting linear boundary ditches, with a number of short gullies projecting from either side forming possible smaller plots. Within this landscape a smaller sub-rectangular enclosure was established, in addition to a segment of ring ditch that may have been part of a roundhouse, with at least two shorter ditches and several associated pits. The small enclosure underwent two later phases of renewal in the later Iron Age and early Roman periods. In the later Iron Age period, the extensive field boundaries went out of use and a large D-shaped enclosure was established. The southern side of the D-shaped enclosure was not well-defined and possibly had a hedge as its boundary. An elongated hourglass-shaped auxiliary enclosure was appended to the western side of the D-shaped enclosure, with an entrance between the two enclosures. A smaller subrectangular enclosure was also located in the centre of the D-shaped enclosure and an L-shaped gully was positioned close to the northwestern edge that may be a structural feature. A scatter of pits also lay across the eastern part of the D-shaped enclosure; these predominantly contained Iron Age pottery and animal bone but also yielded charred plant remains. All the enclosures were redeveloped in the late Iron Age/early Roman transition period. The site was abandoned by the end of the 1st century AD.