NHER 27586 (Monument record) - Post medieval/modern oyster beds or extraction pits in Breydon Water

September 2005. Norfolk NMP.
A group of possible oyster beds or extraction pits is visible as earthworks on aerial photographs (S1)- (S2), ranged along the eastern edge of Breydon Water between TG 5163 0845 and TG 5167 0818. The interlinked pits are notably elongated, contrasting with the possible shellfish beds identified on the southern bank of Breydon Water (NHER 27633 and 27634) and elsewhere in Norfolk (for example NHER 1460; (S3)) which are more rectangular. There seems little reason, however, to suppose that these pits could not have been used for farming shellfish. Alternatively, they might be extractive pits of some kind, perhaps resulting from the collection of clay for use in sea or flood defences. The latter interpretation has been put forward for a complex of pits at Sutton in Lincolnshire, although their identification as evaporation tanks belonging to a ‘sunworks’ salt-making site has also been suggested (see Grady 1998 (S4)). The pits are likely to be post medieval or even modern in date, as it seems unlikely that older features would have survived for long as earthworks in such a location.

The pits are sited on a strip of saltmarsh where they would be periodically filled with salt water. They have been largely mapped from aerial photographs taken in 1965 (S2), on which they are most clearly visible. Further details, such as the edges of individual pits, are visible on photographs taken in 1955 (S1), which were taken under drier conditions. The pits are linked to the natural creeks (not mapped) which run across the area. Further pits may be visible to the north of the mapped features but these cannot be distinguished with any certainty from natural creeks and pools and consequently have not been mapped. The pits are visible on the most recent consulted aerial photographs of the site taken in 1989 (S5) but were not identified during the Norfolk Rapid Coastal Zone Assessment Survey, perhaps due to adverse ground conditions.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 8 September 2005.