SNN112261 - Archaeological Excavations on land at Pineham Zone H, Northamptonshire September 2015 to May 2016

MOLA was commissioned to undertake a programme of archaeological mitigation work on land at Pineham Zone H, Northamptonshire. The earliest activity is represented by residual worked flint. A middle Neolithic post pit structure was found and four separate lengths of Bronze Age pit alignment were recorded, three of which were aligned from a boundary ditch which was redefined and maintained into the Iron Age. The Iron Age activity represented part of a small farmstead area comprising a series of enclosures and field system. A ring ditch was located within an enclosure with two large wells placed at the north-west corner. In the area of the boundary ditch was a pair of crouched late Iron Age inhumation burials. The late Iron Age settlement was replaced in the 1st century AD by a large Roman enclosure and fields defined by ditches on a different alignment, which extended the settlement to the north. In the northern part of the enclosure were a well and a child burial. A Saxon barrow was found to the south of the site, defined by a continuous ditch. There were no surviving internal features or burials within the ring ditch, but situated adjacent to it were seven inhumations, all but one of which were in shallow graves and one grave contained a knife and spearhead dated to the 6th to 7th century AD. Between the 5th and 9th centuries a field system comprising a set of conjoined ditched enclosures or plots was constructed on the north-facing ridge line.