Series: Thames Valley Landscapes Monographs

The minster church at Eynsham, Oxfordshire, was founded in the seventh or eighth century and refounded in 1005 as a Benedictine abbey. The excavations carried out by Oxford Archaeology revealed substantial remains of the abbey, tracing its history from its foundation until the Dissolution in 1538--9. The excavated precinct buildings included part of the Great Cloister, refectory, kitchens, cellars, domestic range and latrines. A programme of geophysical survey was carried out in addition to the main excavation in order to study as much as possible of the abbey's inner and outer wards, and to place the excavations in their wider context. The recovery of archaeological evidence at the site, combined with a study of documentary sources, has provided a rare opportunity to study in depth the development and economy of a major religious house from its origins through to its demise. This volume is the final report on the excavations. It includes chapters on the stratigraphy of the site, the building materials, the small finds, animal and botanical remains, human skeletons, and a comprehensive discussion of the sequence of occupation at the site, from the Anglo-Saxon through the medieval and post-medieval periods. Also includes French and German summaries.

Excavations by Oxford Archaeology on the sites of the Environment Agency's Maidenhead, Windsor and Eton Flood Alleviation Scheme and the Eton College Rowing Course gave archaeologists the opportunity to examine a landscape within the middle Thames valley. Of particular interest was the Anglo-Saxon and early medieval period, when the Thames was both a communication route and a political boundary, and evidence from which had previously been poor. Large-scale field evaluation identified what was first considered to be extensive Saxon settlement. Excavation produced an exceptional site of Anglo-Saxon date, suggesting occupation and activity unlike that from any existing 'type site'. Exotic finds indicated wealth and high status, and trade contacts with London and other parts of middle Saxon England. The excavations have also shed light on the medieval settlement pattern.

The Upper Thames Valley has one of the highest concentrations of cursuses in Britain. In the 1980s the Oxford Archaeological Unit along with the Abingdon Area Archaeological and Historical Society had the opportunity to investigate one of these sites at Drayton. This site has produced significant results for understanding of the date, construction and use of cursus monuments on the lowland river gravels of Britain. The volume reports on the excavations at Drayton, and includes an account of small-scale excavations undertaken at the Lechlade cursus by OAU and Lance and Faith Vatcher. It also includes specialist reports on the worked flint, stone axe, utilised stone, pottery (Neolithic through to Anglo-Saxon), fired clay, tiles and other finds, animal bone, palaeo-environmental studies, radiocarbon determinations, archaeomagnetic dating, tree-throw hole stratigraphy, labour requirements for construction of the Drayton North cursus, supporting environmental data, and a gazetteer of known cursus and related monuments in the Upper Thames Valley.

Report on Phase 1 of extensive excavations of a development site south-west of Reading, Berkshire, which located Neolithic, Late Bronze Age and Roman settlement and activity. This is one of the first sites whose discovery, excavation and publication were completely funded by the developer as a result of the local authority's archaeological policy. The Neolithic activity is characterised by pits, postholes and flintwork, with a notable absence of pottery. The specialised forms of artefacts point to resource-specific activity rather than normal domestic activity. A cattle burial, common on ceremonial sites, was found. Two of the four Late Bronze Age settlement foci were excavated, revealing the largest number of LBA round houses so far discovered in the south of England. Semi-circular segmented buildings, four- and six-post structures and two-post supports were also found. One area showed a high degree of organisation, with paired houses apparently arranged in line, a large open space and an activity/storage area. A line of flax retting pits flanked a trackway. Extensive associated field systems were partially examined. Further investigations are beginning to demonstrate the density of LBA sites in the Kennet valley. For the Roman period lst-century AD enclosures were partially examined, although the principal areas of occupation were not uncovered. Other features of 2nd- to 4th-century date were part of enclosures and linear boundaries, probably field systems, and peripheral activities associated with another site to the west. There are specialist reports on the artefacts:\\bold{} `The prehistoric pottery' (63--82), by Melanie `Insect Remains from two Late Bronze Age waterlogged features' (112--16), by Mark Robinson.

This report documents the discovery, excavation and preservation of a Norman moated stone manor house found in 1984 at the Mount House, Witney. The trial excavations that were made in advance of housing development, revealed groups of buildings surrounded by a curtain wall and moat. Further excavations in the north-west and south-east parts of the complex uncovered a massive and well-preserved tower and attached range of the first half of the twelfth century which was progressively enlarged by a chapel, a central pier, a raised terrace and a garderobe block. The buildings were further modified in the later medieval period. Coins in robber trenches indicate that some buildings were demolished during the English Civil War, though others were maintained. The remains were systematically demolished in the mid-eighteenth century to make way for a new house. The site remained in the ownership of the Bishops of Winchester until 1862; the present house was built c 1904. The site was purchased by Oxfordshire County Council in 1993, and the tower is now on display to the public. Includes French and German summaries.

Between 1979 and 1989 the Oxford Archaeological Unit undertook extensive excavations of a late prehistoric and Roman cropmark complex at Claydon Pike and Thornhill Farm, Fairford, Gloucestershire. The excavation of the western element of the complex, Thornhill Farm, forms the subject of this report. The excavations formed part of a co-ordinated archaeological response to the threat posed by gravel extraction during the creation of the Cotswold Water Park. The work at Thornhill Farm involved the excavation of numerous evaluation trenches, four open area excavations and extensive salvage operations over a total area of approximately 40.5 ha. The excavations recovered an unusually complete plan of a highly specialised agricultural unit consisting of a dense palimpsest of paddocks and larger enclosures, which appear to have been designed for the effective control and management of livestock. Environmental evidence confirmed that the immediate landscape was characterised by rough pasture which was grazed by large herbivores including horses and cattle. Ceramic evidence suggests that the earliest enclosures were dug during the Middle Iron Age, and that the site continued to develop and be remodelled along similar lines through to the early Roman period. Evidence for human occupation was recovered in the form of relatively large amounts of domestic waste consisting mainly of pottery, burnt limestone and animal bone. Although a number of roundhouses were revealed, the precise spatial organisation of the settlement proved difficult to discern, largely because of the relatively high degree of truncation and the ephemeral nature of the structural remains. The site was radically reorganised during the early-second century AD when the tightly knit group of paddocks and enclosures which had characterised earlier periods was replaced by a series of newly constructed trackways. Includes French and German summaries, and specialist reports on coins; brooches; copper alloy, silver and iron objects; worked stone; fired clay; bone objects; worked flint; pottery; human remains; faunal remains; plant and invertebrate remains. Also includes

Between 1990 and 1996 the Oxford Archaeological Unit examined sites and landscape features dating from the fifth century AD to the post-medieval period in the ARC (now Hanson Aggregates) gravel extraction pit between Yarnton and Cassington, Oxfordshire. The work formed part of the larger Yarnton-Cassington Archaeological Project. Early Saxon settlement was identified on the edge of an Iron Age and Roman occupation site at Yarnton. Subsequent work revealed the presence of a Middle Saxon settlement immediately to the east. Investigations further afield uncovered evidence for Early and Middle Saxon settlement adjacent to the neighbouring modern hamlet of Worton, and Middle Saxon buildings were uncovered among Iron Age pits and postholes at Cresswell Field. The wider landscape context of these settlements was investigated by fieldwalking, geophysical survey and trenched evaluation, revealing manuring scatters, field boundaries, ploughsoils and trackways. Former river channels on the floodplain provided sources of information for reconstructing the landscape and changes in agricultural practices over time, particularly the presence of pollen and waterlogged macrobotanical and invertebrate remains. Romano-British settlements are present at both Yarnton and Worton. Within this context it has been possible to study the period of transition from the late Roman to the Early Saxon periods. Early Saxon buildings appear to have respected late Roman features, although no obvious traces of sub-Roman activity were recovered and the character of settlement is strikingly different to that of the Roman period. A similar pattern of contiguous but discontinuous occupation emerges from a survey of the sites in the immediate area. Despite the paucity of evidence for habitation through the fifth century the environmental indicators suggest that the land continued to be farmed, though by less intensive methods than those employed in the Roman period. In the Middle Saxon period the character of settlement became less dispersed, with more organised and intensive use of space on habitation sites and a greater diversity of building forms, including timber halls. At the same time, there is evidence of agricultural intensification in the form of increased quantities of charred cereals, a change in crops grown, including new varieties, the presence of horticulture and the importance of flax production. It is suggested that the Middle Saxon evidence represents indications of settlement nucleation and embryonic village development, and the origins of the open field farming system in this area. The dating evidence suggests that these changes began in the eighth century but gathered pace in the ninth. The record of Yarnton can be seen within a trajectory of over five millennia of human activity in the area, the settlement having shifted gradually eastwards from its Iron Age location to that of the Middle Saxon period, then northeastwards towards the medieval village, then further north in the post-medieval period. Contains French and German summaries, and separately authored reports including