Oxoniensia 64

This paper is a revised version of the text delivered at the lecture -- presenting an attempt to define the principal characteristics of the Roman period of the Oxford region.

1935 excavations reviewed after the death of Radford in 1998.

Features previously noted on aerial photographs were exposed during gravel extraction in the period 1970 to 1984. These features all lay on first terrace gravels bordering the River Thames and included hut gullies, pits, ditches and enclosures of MIA/LIA date. There was limited evidence of EIA activity. The results indicate the gradual shifting along the gravel terrace of a small farmstead. The site continued to be inhabited into early Roman times when a trackway and a ditched field system were laid out. Many IA and Roman artefacts were recovered including locally manufactured ceramics, loomweights, animal bones (including two complete pig burials), two human burials and metalwork including smithing slag, a coin of Tasciovanus and a Late Iron Age bow brooch. Grain storage pits indicate that cereals were grown and processed locally and the bones of domesticated animals suggest animal husbandry. It is thought that the site was unoccupied but still farmed in the later Roman period. There are notes on

Between August 1997 and February 1998 a watching brief identified two new RB sites. Site 1 was located east of West Hagbourne and comprised pits within a rectilinear enclosure, measuring at least 45m across. Pottery of late first- or early-second-century to later fourth-century date was recovered. Site 2 was located approximately 60m to the north-west of Zulu Farm, where four features, possibly part of a settlement, were identified. One of these features produced a first-century pottery assemblage. Other discoveries identified along the pipeline comprised unstratified pottery of RB and later date, a single RB ditch, and an undated feature. Notes concern:

Revealed evidence relating to medieval properties fronting onto High Street, and a substantial ditch and the probable remains of a medieval building on the alignment of Longwall Street. Notes comprise:

1997 excavations exposed medieval and post-medieval buildings on the northern frontage of the street.

Reports a site that also contained a number of important post-medieval standing structures, including the Oxford Military College buildings (1876-96) designed by T G Jackson and H G W Drinkwater and structures built by Williams Morris following his acquisition of the site for car production in 1912. Whilst the Jackson buildings were to be retained in forthcoming development, several others, including one which incorporated the former north wall of the manor house, were to be demolished. Excavations and measured building surveys were carried out on the manor house remains and a photographic record made of the standing structures.