15-17 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich - IAS5502

Suffolk County Council Archaeological Service, 2015. https://doi.org/10.5284/1034361. How to cite using this DOI

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Suffolk County Council Archaeological Service (2015) 15-17 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich - IAS5502 [data-set]. York: Archaeology Data Service [distributor] https://doi.org/10.5284/1034361

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Primary contact

Suffolk County Council Archaeological Service
Bury Resource Centre
Hollow Road
Bury St Edmunds
IP32 7AY

Resource identifiers

Digital Object Identifiers

Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) are persistent identifiers which can be used to consistently and accurately reference digital objects and/or content. The DOIs provide a way for the ADS resources to be cited in a similar fashion to traditional scholarly materials. More information on DOIs at the ADS can be found on our help page.

Citing this DOI

The updated Crossref DOI Display guidelines recommend that DOIs should be displayed in the following format:

https://doi.org/10.5284/1034361
Sample Citation for this DOI

Suffolk County Council Archaeological Service (2015) 15-17 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich - IAS5502 [data-set]. York: Archaeology Data Service [distributor] https://doi.org/10.5284/1034361

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Introduction

15-17 Lower Brook Street, Ipswich - IAS5502

Circumstances of excavation

Following planning permission being granted for an office development on this large site, south of the junction of Lower Brook Street and Rosemary Lane, permission was granted by Landlink Properties Ltd for prior excavation. The excavation was undertaken by the Suffolk Archaeological Unit during the summer of 1975.

Site constraints

Funding was only available for the partial excavation of the site and the depth of excavation from the existing ground surface was restricted by the developer. The decision was therefore taken to excavate the area of the former bowling green, on the north half of the site, to the rear of the existing buildings, because it had been terraced into the natural slope and deposits would be less deep. Documentary evidence also suggested that the cemetery belonging to the medieval chapel of Saint Edmund de Pountenay lay in this area.

Following the demolition of 15 Lower Brook Street, the building contractor allowed a small excavation (Area 0598), of limited depth and duration, on the street frontage. The time constraints meant that the top 1.8m had to be excavated by machine under supervision. At a depth of 1.8m, excavation was continued by hand for a further 20-30cm and a series of features isolated and excavated. Natural was not reached in the trench.

Site summary

The earliest features recorded on site largely consisted of pits dating between 600-850 though there was also evidence of buildings fronting Lower Brook Street. The evidence for building 0618, in area 0598, comprised a gravel floor (0618) with a hearth (0613) associated with a single sherd of Ipswich ware. The hearth had an ash layer (0615) and a vitrified centre (0612) implying that it was industrial rather than domestic.

Seven pits were dated to the Early Late Saxon period (ELS: c.850-900) on the main site and one pit in area 0598. In addition, on the main site, one well (0280) was certainly ELS and one (0390) was either ELS or MLS. The Middle Late Saxon period (MLS: c.900-1000) was represented by one building (0370) and one pit (0164) belonged to this period plus some disarticulated human bone in an otherwise undated pit (0524).

Three boundary ditches (0057, 0070, 0071), a building (0737), three pits (0350, 0384, 0367) and three isolated post holes (0212, 0214, 0342) belonged to the Early Medieval period (EMED: c.1000-1200) on the main site with a further three pits in area 0598

Two small, shallow pits on the main site (0248, 0430) are LMED in date and probably belong to the 13th century just predating the cemetery on the main area. The mechanical excavation of area 0598, on the Lower Brook Street frontage, cut through a series of clay floors of buildings (such as 0600, with burnt patches) associated with LMED glazed pottery.

The remains of some 106 articulated human skeletons were excavated in various states of completeness on the main site. Almost all were supine, orientated with heads to the west. The arms were usually placed by their sides, but the hands were occasionally together across the pelvis. It seems unlikely that many burials had been lost through the terracing of the site for the bowling green in the 19th century, as it was necessary to strip off up to 80cm from the area by machine before burials started to appear in significant numbers. Burials were denser at the west end of the excavation, nearer the presumed chapel site, under 15 Lower Brook Street, and as many as four superimposed burials were encountered in this area. The watching brief carried out during the contractor’s ground works on the site allowed the extent of the cemetery to be plotted with reasonable accuracy.

Further information can be found in the Site Summary which can be accessed by selecting the 'Reports' tab on the 'Downloads' page.


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