Bronze Age ring ditch, Ardleigh Ring Ditch Three, Ardleigh (EHER 82010)

Ring ditch three was excavated in quadrants in 1961 by F.H. Erith and Colchester Archaeological Group. Three unurned and twenty-three urned cremation burials were recovered. The bottom 21 inches of the ditch appear to have silted up in the Bronze Age and it is thought that the barrow was deliberately levelled perhaps during the Roman period.

Ardleigh ring ditch three was first seen as a circular crop-mark first from the air during the drought of June 1959. The ring ditch was excavated using the same quadrant method used for ring ditch one and two. The trench in the N.E. quadrant revealed six burial urns (Nos. l - 6) and one free burial (No. 11). When excavating to natural level a further four burial urns were encountered in the N.E. quadrant (Nos. 7 – 10). Nothing was found in the S.E. quadrant. The other two quadrants were then similarly excavated and five burial urns (Nos. 42 - 16) and a free burial (No. 24) were discovered in the N.W. quadrant and one burial urn (no. 17) was right against the north side of the S.W, quadrant. Sections of the north-south and east-west diameters were drawn, after which the baulks were dismantled, revealing a further five burials urns (Nos. l8, 19, 20, 22 and 23), one free burial (No. 5) and two pits of wood ash nine feet equidistant from the centre. Finally the central square (4 feet, by 4 feet) was taken down and a very large urn in the exact centre was revealed as the Primary burial. (No. 21). This was a bucket urn, 15 - 16 inches in diameter. It had two “pie-crust" applied cordons, one at the shoulder, and the other, five inches lower, at the waist. The urn was inverted and the base had been damaged by ploughing. It contained the cremated bones of a teenager and a child with milk teeth. The Secondary burials included twenty--one cremations in urns and three cremations not in urns. Besides the burial urns, there were finds of over 140 sherds, mostly in the infilling of the ditch. One sherd was identified as Iron Age A, a dozen or so as Iron Age C, and about a score of the Roman period up to 100 A.D. The remainder were of the Bronze age and similar in texture to the majority of the urns in the barrow. The bottom 21 inches of the ditch appear to have silted up in the Bronze Age and it may have been deliberately levelled in the Roman period. At this depth and slightly above, sherds of Iron Age and Roman periods were found. The fact that remains of Secondary burials were found in the infilling of the ditch shows that there must have been a mound to the barrow, and that urns had been placed in this mounded part. It must also show that the barrow was deliberately levelled. <1> <2>