Earliest feature
One of the earliest features encountered was a pit containing a deliberately buried skull of an aurochs, the now extinct ancestor of the ox.
Bronze age barrows
Towards the northern end of the site, a total
of seven Bronze Age barrows, or burial mounds, were revealed. Although
heavily damaged by later ploughing, one barrow still contained a cremation
urn.
The barrow cemetery remained an important feature in the landscape for
over a thousand years and both cremations and inhumations continued to
be placed in, or near, the barrow ditches in the late Iron Age and early
Roman period. Evidence of late Iron Age and early Roman occupation includes
a roundhouse, two trackways or roads, and field boundary ditches. A range
of late Iron Age and early Roman coinage was also found.
A medieval hospital
Remains of an enclosure ditch and cemetery are thought to be part of the Hospital of St Mary Magdalene, established around AD1200 for the care of those sick and dying of leprosy.
Bomb craters
The latest evidence consisted of a series of large bomb craters and two German Luftwaffe incendiary bombs, left over from the Second World War. The British Army kindly removed these.
