ENN109916 - Northampton Road, Rushden, 2018 (Desk Based Assessment)

An archaeological desk-based heritage assessment was conducted on land at Northampton Road, Rushden, Northamptonshire. The site occupies a south facing hillside overlooking Sidney Brook on the north-west side of Rushden, on the south side of Northampton Road. There are no Scheduled Monuments, Listed Buildings, Registered Parks and Gardens or Registered Battlefields within the 500m Historic Environment Record (HER) search radius of the site. Neolithic flint debitage has been found close to the south-east of the site and Bronze Age barrows and an Iron Age settlement lie at a distance to the south-west. An inhumation burial and pottery dating to the Roman period were discovered close to the south-east of the site and further Roman pottery and a coin have been found nearby. Medieval ridge and furrow survives close to the south and south-east of the site. Although the presence of ridge and furrow is not known on the side itself, the land is likely to have been under cultivation during the medieval period. During the rapid expansion of Rushden in the post-medieval and modern periods, the site was part of the urban recreational landscape of the town and was enjoyed for its picturesque setting through picnics and cricket. Cartographic evidence suggests that by 1950, the eastern part of the site had been partially truncated by a sand quarry and the central area had been landscaped and transformed into gardens.