SNN108334 - Stanion Roman Villa April to July 2010: Assessment and Updated Project Design

Between April and July 2010 Northamptonshire Archaeology undertook an archaeological excavation as part of a proposed development of a waste recycling facility. The excavation revealed a Late Iron Age boundary and three early Roman roundhouses. These were superceded by a Roman villa together with ancillary structures, which included a post-built aisled barn with drying oven, two further drying ovens, stone-lined wells and water cistern. The main buildings were clearly a continuation of the corridor wing excavated to the west in 2002. To the east of the buildings there was a possible metalworking area focused around a stone-built roundhouse. A droveway defined by parallel ditches led to a partially metalled ford over the Harpers Brook. The villa, the processing area and perhaps the droveway appears to have gone out of use by the late 3rd century, when a series of ditches, some utilised for animal stock control were created, and an oven was inserted into the demolition deposits of one of the villa buildings. The site appears to have been abandoned in the 4th century AD. During the medieval period the site was unoccupied; but a small amount of medieval pottery recovered from the building rubble suggests post-Conquest robbing of the villa for building stone. Medieval cultivation was shown by remnants of ridge and furrow field cultivation. Most recently the archaeological deposits were truncated by two phases of tree cultivation, which was visible as a series of circular pits aligned across the site from east to west. There were also ceramic land drains and two large stone lined drains.