Undated well, Beckingham Road (EHER 11530)

An undated well found which contained a horses skull. The fill also contained twigs, some grass or straw and the remains of beetles. When the feature was first discovered it was reported that small fragments of red fired clay 'possibly like Roman tile' had been present but these had been removed by local children.

1978. Salvage excavation. Well found in the gravel pit, and horses skull. <1> A machine operator for Hall Aggregates reported the discovery in this pit of a deposit of black earth with worked wood and a horses skull. A subrectangular area of dark grey clay, 1.5 x 1.3m with slightly convex sides, was visible, cut into the gravel. The top was 1.8m below the original ground surface. No other remains were seen in what survived of the area around but aerial photographs of the field show two subrectangular enclosures towards the north-west corner and a boundary ditch running north-south across the field (see EHER 11524). It has been suggested that the feature was a shallow well cut into the gravel. Insufficient timbers survived to form shoring and none of these were around or beneath the horses skull. Mr Carey (machine operator) reported that small fragments of red fired clay 'possibly like Roman tile' had been present when he first discovered the feature but these had been removed by local children. No other datable evidence was found when the feature was excavated. The fill also contained twigs, some grass or straw and the remains of beetles. A knot of plaited cord was found near the eastern corner of the feature. <2> See also <3>. Site Assessment: Features destroyed by gravel extraction in 1978. <1>