Post-medieval field boundary ditches on land West of Fambridge Road (EHER 81666)

Trial trenching in 2017 recorded the remains of post-medieval field boundary ditches which correspond to boundaries indicated on maps from 1799 and 1873. Also recorded was a post-medieval pond shown on a map of 1803, but which had been recently backfilled. An assemblage of ceramic building material (CBM) and undiagnostic coal fragments were not closely datable. The subsequent excavation in the same year did not record any further features of this date and only recovered a small finds assemblage.

August 2017. Trial trenching. An East/West aligned boundary ditch was recorded running through the Northern ends of Trenches 7 and 9. Although the associated post-medieval finds were not closely datable, it was tentatively suggested that the small abraded fragments of ceramic building material (CBM) might pre-date the 18th century. The earliest map with detail on the location of individual field boundaries is Charles Budgen’s Ordnance Surveyor’s Drawing of 1799. This shows that the Southern part of the site had been divided into two narrow East-West fields, with a larger, sub-square field occupying the Northern part of the site. Although there is no boundary shown in the location represented by the ditch in Trenches 7 and 9, it seems likely that this area may once have been sub-divided into smaller fields, especially since a similar pattern can be observed in field to the West on Bugden’s map. It is also possible that other fairly shallow undated ditches could represent earlier elements of the post-medieval field system, although they are also broadly aligned with East/West features of probable prehistoric and Roman date. A pond was recorded in Trench 18, which contained 19th century material within its lowest excavated fill, and is first recorded on Hall’s plan of 1803. Although not depicted on the 1840 Tithe Map, it is shown on all subsequent maps up to and including the 1971 Ordnance Survey. It appears to have been backfilled by the time of the next edition of the OS produced in 1987. A North/South aligned fence line represented by four post holes is likely of late post-medieval date since the associated fills were fairly humic and produced small fragments of coal and CBM. It is possible that this fence relates to a North-South boundary absent from the 1st edition Ordnance Survey (1873) but present on the 2nd edition (1922). Lastly, a single isolated pit to the South of the site in Trench 5 also appears to be of broadly post-medieval date based on a single fragment of tile recovered from its fill. <1> August-December 2017. Archaeological excavation. No clearly post-medieval features were encountered during the excavation, although a small number of possible postholes contained single finds, notably pottery and CBM, of post-medieval date. Scattered undated pits, postholes and tree holes/throws may have been associated with the post-medieval agricultural land use. <2>