NHER 52954 (Find Spot record) - Potentially prehistoric and medieval to post-medieval finds

June 2009. Test Pit.
Excavation of two test pits by local school children as part of the Higher Education Field Academy (HEFA) programme run by Access Cambridge Archaeology.

The first of these test pits (ACL/09/1) was opened at [1]. Due to time constraints excavation was halted at a depth of 0.50m, without natural geological deposits being reached. Finds recovered include:
3 medieval pottery sherds.
3 late medieval/early post-medieval pottery sherds.
13 post-medieval pottery sherds and 1 clay tobacco pipe stem fragment.
14 late post-medieval/modern 'Victorian' pottery sherds.
This test pit also produced a range of other finds that were not subject to specialist examination, the majority of which are either of probable late post-medieval to modern date or inherently undatable. These additional objects include a possible prehistoric worked flint, 41 unidentified ceramic building material fragments, a roof tile fragment, 2 iron nails, 5 metal wire fragments, a perforated metal tag, single fragments of bottle glass and window glass, a piece of burnt stone and 7 animal bone fragments.

The second test pit (ACL/09/2) was opened at [2]. This was excavated to natural geological deposits, which were encountered at a depth of 0.7m. Finds recovered include:
4 medieval pottery sherds.
7 post-medieval pottery sherds.
11 late post-medieval/modern 'Victorian' pottery sherds.
This test pit also produced a range of other finds that were not subject to specialist examination, the majority of which are either of probable late post-medieval to modern date or inherently undatable. These additional objects include 2 possible prehistoric worked flints; 31 unidentified ceramic building material fragments, a curved tile fragment, 3 bottle glass fragments, 5 iron nails and a piece of burnt stone.

For further details, including a wider discussion of the results of the HEFA test pitting surveys undertaken in Acle between 2009 and 2014, see report (S1), which incorporates information from pottery report (S2). See also local press article (S3).
P. Watkins (HES), 7 May 2026.