Late Bronze Age to Early Iron Age post holes and pits, 42 London Road (EHER 7768)

Trial excavations here in 1973 recorded a complex of intersecting post holes and shallow depressions in the southernmost trench. Both trenches produced Late Bronze Age to Early Iron Age pottery sherds.

1973. Trial trenching. Several sherds of coarse, hand-made flint-gritted pottery were found in the northernmost of two trial trenches and were probably Late Bronze Age to Early Iron Age. This trench had been disturbed by late and post medieval gravel quarrying (see EHER 7771). The southern trench was more productive, and the evaluation recorded two distinct phases of features: Late Bronze Age to Early Iron Age and Late Iron Age. The features in this trench comprised a complex of intersecting post holes and shallow depressions, confined by modern disturbance to the western end of the trench. Most of the post holes belonged to the later phase, whilst features from the earlier phase produced flint-gritted sherds similar to those from the northern trench. The features were filled with a buried soil (into which Roman features had been cut, see EHER 7769) which contained Late Bronze-Early Iron Age hand-made flint-gritted sherds and Late Iron Age pottery (also hand-made, and possibly flint-gritted). The lower fills, which had the soil as their final infilling, contained only typical Late Bronze-Early Iron Age pottery. The prehistoric finds may indicate fortification of the plateau at this time and, as at Witham, part of this may have been included in the Saxon burh (EHER 7766). <1> <2> October 1976. Field survey. The site of the 1973 excavations was indicated by a teacher at Mount View, a Franciscan Convent, at TL 8461 0715. The site is now covered by a school playground. No further finds have been reported. <3> Two, 2m by roughly 16m, trial trenches in an area north of London Road and east of Dykes Chase, Maldon located a complex of Late Bronze Age-Early Iron Age pits and post holes. <4> Limited trial excavation in advance of forthcoming redevelopment located the tail of a rampart, north-south aligned immediately to the west of West Chase. The rampart contained Iron Age pottery no later than the 2nd century. There was no indication of any late Saxon occupation. <5> Site Assessment: Prehistoric features and finds may indicate fortification of the plateau at this time and, as at Witham, part of this may have been reused in the later burh. <1> Original HER entry merged with NRHE data import.