SNN111503 - Sulgrave (Northamptonshire), Evaluation

In response to an application for Scheduled Monument consent on part of the site of Sulgrave Castle, Northants a small evaluation exercise was carried out at HBMC(E)s request by the Northamptonshire County Council Archaeological Unit in late March 1987. SMC was being sought for the construction of a house on that part of the site (currently a well-tended garden), fronting Park Lane, immediately south-west of the castle earthwork, in an area which it was considered could have formed part of a castle bailey. The evaluation comprised the excavation of a single 20x2m east-west orientated trench. Although part of the trench could not be fully excavated because of the presence of the roots of a listed lime tree, it revealed a succession of modern layers, up to 1.4m deep, overlying the 'natural' marl. The earliest layers dated to the 19/20th centuries and though some late Saxon and medieval pottery was retrieved there was no evidence for the survival of stratigraphy of these dates.