NHER 36451 (Monument record) - Site of irregularly shaped enclosure, perhaps of Iron Age to Roman date

OF THE CROPMARKS DESCRIBED BELOW, ONLY THE D-SHAPED ENCLOSURE IS STILL RECORDED UNDER THIS NUMBER. THE REMAINDER ARE NOW RECORDED AS PART OF NHER 50802.

14 June 1996. NLA air photography.
Cropmarks of an enclosure, slightly D-shaped, with 2 entrances or gaps in the ditch/cropmark.
This feature looks like a Late Iron Age/Roman enclosure. Running across it are two linear features, which appear to form a narrow trackway.
To the west are several rectilinear enclosure elements, these are likely to relate to old field boundaries, several phases appear to be represented.
S. Massey (NLA), 7 August 2001.

19 June 1996. NLA air photography.
Mature cropmark development reveals a broad trackway running diagonally across the field. Linears join this feature at a perpendicular angle. It appears to be a track in between fields. It does not seem to be related to the D-shaped enclosure, nor that in NHER 17223.
S. massey (NLA), 10 August 2001.

January 2008. Norfolk NMP.
Of the cropmarks described above, only the D-shaped enclosure is still recorded under this number. The remainder are now recorded as part of NHER 50802.

Three sides of an irregularly shaped enclosure, the ‘D-shaped’ enclosure described above, is visible as cropmarks on aerial photographs (S1)-(S5), centred at TG 2612 1460. It forms part of a complex area of multi-period cropmarks (NHER 50802), for most of which a later prehistoric to Roman date can be postulated. The enclosure is undated, but finds ranging from the Neolithic to the post medieval period have been recovered from its vicinity (e.g. NHER 41875 and 41879). Its function is also unknown. The enclosure’s northwest edge appears to form one side of or lie within part of a trackway, which terminates a short distance to its southwest. The trackway is probably a southwestern continuation of one seen to the northeast, where it lies adjacent to a second, larger enclosure (NHER 50600). In their relationship with this trackway, both enclosures are reminiscent of the small, rectilinear enclosures found attached to field boundaries and trackways in an extensive group of coaxial field systems of probable Iron Age and/or Roman date identified over large areas of the uplands of Norfolk’s Broads zone (Albone et al. 2007 (S6)). The enclosure described here is also similar to possible Iron Age to Roman date settlement sites mapped in Lincolnshire (S7). A similar date is therefore plausible, both enclosures either being contemporary, or constructed in sequence. Other elements of the multi-phase cropmarks visible in this and surrounding fields may also be contemporary with the enclosure, including some possible field boundaries that appear to respect its southwestern side. Others slight it, but whether they represent earlier land divisions or later phases of activity and enclosure is not clear.

The enclosure has an irregular, possibly D-shaped plan, but without its eastern side it is difficult to characterise. A linear ditch visible to its east could be part of it, but its straightness, tone and orientation do not look quite right. Its known extent measures 53m by 53m. The gap in the ditch circuit on its northwest side is probably a genuine entrance.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 25 January 2008.