SNN116601 - Cotton 'Henge' to Craft: Neolithic to Anglo-Saxon remains at Warth Park, Raunds, Northamptonshire

Between 2013 and 2018, the construction of a new industrial park - Warth Park - afforded Oxford Archaeology the opportunity to investigate 19ha of land on the western edge of Raunds, Northamptonshire. The site was dominated by an early Neolithic monumental ditched enclosure, recorded in the local Historic Environment Record as Cotton 'Henge'. Notably, a Bronze Age barrow was apparently sited at the centre of this earlier enclosure and subsequently became incorporated into a field system. A dense area of settlement remains dating to the early to middle Iron Age transition followed, providing numerous examples of grain storage pits and four-post 'granaries'. Subsequent Romano-British activity included stone-lined wells and substantial assemblages of artefacts and ecofacts, amongst which was a carved wooden arm which may have functioned as a votive object. Anglo-Saxon sunken-featured buildings extended across the site. Overall, the remains found at Warth Park have demonstrated that this area has been utilised and settled for around five millenia, set within a widely exploited and managed landscape.