Archaeological Watching Brief on the River Itchen West Bank on Ground Investigations associated with the Itchen Flood Alleviation Scheme, Southampton (SOU 1671)
Southampton City Council Archaeology Unit, 2016. https://doi.org/10.5284/1039939. How to cite using this DOI
Data copyright © Southampton City Council Archaeology Unit unless otherwise stated
This work is licensed under the ADS Terms of Use and Access.
Primary contact
Dr
Andy
Russel
Archaeology Unit Manager, Ancient Monuments Officer, and War Memorials Officer
Southampton City Council Archaeology Unit
18 Melbourne Street
Southampton
SO14 5FB
Tel: +44 (0) 2380 832022
Resource identifiers
- ADS Collection: 2375
- DOI:https://doi.org/10.5284/1039939
- How to cite using this DOI
Introduction
The Archaeology Unit of Southampton City Council carried out a watching brief on ground investigations on the west bank of the River Itchen in November 2014.
Most of the investigations took place in areas that had been river bed or foreshore until recently. Gravels and silts, deposited by the River Itchen, were encountered and in the northern part of the site, peaty layers were observed.
Two soil investigations took place on dry land within the area of Middle Saxon Hamwic, north of SOU 13, where a Middle Saxon church and cemetery were excavated. No Saxon archaeology was encountered.
Industrial activity and shipbuilding was located at Ocean Quay where 800mm of organic clay contained fragments of a sizeable wooden vessel, ash and nails. This would-be activity was associated with the early phases of the Belvidere Ship Yard, marked on the 1806 Ordnance Survey drawing as a wharf with a building.
Deposits of the 19th and 20th centuries were present in all the investigations. A few finds, including Verwood pottery and brick fragments, may have been post-medieval finds that had found their way into the mud at an earlier date. The thickness of the reclamation layers, up to 3.4m, would have had the potential to bury wrecks and other material abandoned on the foreshore.
The soil investigations have shown that the deposits in this area contain the history of the Itchen area covering a period of perhaps 10,000 years.
