SNN110518 - Excavation of a Bronze Age and early Iron Age landscape at Harlestone Quarry, Northamptonshire 2007-2014

Between 2007 and 2014 four areas were excavated in advance of ironstone extraction at Harlestone Quarry, in addition to an area excavated in 2006. A total of 4.1ha of a Bronze Age to early Iron Age landscape has been examined. A single pit and residual charcoal from the pit alignment have been radiocarbon dated to the early Bronze Age. A curvilinear ditch perhaps forming part of a large enclosure, is considered most likely to date to the late Bronze Age, perhaps shortly before a scatter of pits containing pottery, hearth debris and pyramidal loomweights. One pit has been radiocarbon dated to the late Bronze Age. A length of 199m of a pit alignment, comprising rectangular pits, has also been examined, but is undated. A loose cluster of pits contained a possible four-post structure and an outlying pit has been radiocarbon dated to the end of the early Iron Age.