NHER 26476 (Find Spot record) - Multi-period finds and environmental analysis, Norwich Riverside Development

1998. Watching Brief. Contexts 1-16.
Intensive observation of trenching and ground clearance in advance of the redevelopment of Riverside. Much of the site coincides with the railway yards NHER 13571.
A sequence of peat deposits, associated with an extensive former channel of the River Wensum and containing valuable information about vegetation change and human impact on the landscape from as early as 8000BP, was sampled. An assessment of the results has outlined a history of environmental change and development for the site environs extending back to Mesolithic times.
It is suggested that a heavily forested later Mesolithic landscape gave way, during the Neolithic period, to a more open environment, probably as a direct result of the impact of early agriculturalists. During the Bronze Age the environment at the sample site became progressively more open and there are indications that cultivated soils were present in the locality, although it is unlikely that the landscape became completely treeless. During the Iron Age the woodland was thinned further and animal husbandy, as well as arable farming, might have been carried out on the vicinity.
Finds recovered include:
Prehistoric worked flints, including some of possible Early Neolithic date.
Roman, Middle Saxon and medieval sherds.
See report (S1) for further details. The results of this work are also summarised in (S2) and (S3). See also press cutting (S4).
The associated archive has been deposited with the Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2013.317).
Ruth Fillery-Travis (NLA), 19th March 2007. Amended by P. Watkins (HES), 26 March 2015 and 17 May 2019.

See NIAS survey on fiche of works formerly on site.