The Marsh of time: the saving of Sutton Common
Robert Van de Noort, Henry Chapman, 2010. https://doi.org/10.5284/1000159. How to cite using this DOI
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This work is licensed under the ADS Terms of Use and Access.
Primary contact
Prof
Robert
Van de Noort
Department of Archaeology
University of Exeter
Laver Building
North Park Road
Exeter
EX4 4QE
UK
Tel: 01392 724350
Fax: 01392 724358
Resource identifiers
- ADS Collection: 914
- DOI:https://doi.org/10.5284/1000159
- How to cite using this DOI
Overview
The site at Sutton Common, in South Yorkshire, consists of two multivallate enclosures located on a pair of sand islands in a small floodplain, separated by a relic paleochannel. The site is famous because of the investigations by C.E. Whiting between 1933 and 1935 that discovered waterlogged remains which led to the site being designated a Scheduled Monument. That was not enough to protect the sites however, as in 1980 all of the larger enclosure and part of the smaller one were bulldozed before the work could be stopped. That event destroyed the majority of any stratigraphy in the interior and another disaster occurred in 1982 when the Ministry of Agriculture established a drainage scheme that lowered the water levels by 2m, which investigations between 1987 and 1996 demonstrated were causing the slow death of the waterlogged archaeological remains.
Because of this threat Sutton Common was chosen as a 'Beacon Site', a model for cooperation between English Heritage and nature conservation organisations. In 1997 the area was purchased by the Carstairs Countryside Trust, irrigation channels were blocked and water levels were monitored. Between 1998 and 2003 English Heritage funded an excavation of 20,600m2 of the larger enclosure.
The results of the excavations have been published in the following monograph:
Sutton Common: The Excavation of an Iron Age 'Marsh Fort' edited by Robert Van de Noort, Henry P Chapman and John R Collis. ISBN 978 1 902771
