NHER 52377 (Cropmark and Earthwork record) - Cropmarks of possible Iron Age-Roman multi ditched boundary or trackway

October 2009. Norfolk NMP.
A fragmentary possible multi-ditched boundary or trackway is visible as cropmarks on aerial photographs (S1)-(S2), stretching northwest-southeast from TG 1611 1681 to TG 1629 1669. The ditches are fragmentary and difficult to be certain of, but it is possible to make out three parallel ditches running for at least 20m in the extreme north-west of the site.
Multi-period finds (NHER 33090, 33092) from the area include a Bronze Age axehead and prehistoric flint implements. An Iron Age (or late Bronze Age to Iron Age) date for other multi-ditched boundary features in Norfolk, like those at Gimmingham (NHER 31746) and Earsham (NHER 11676), has been postulated on the basis of their parallels elsewhere in the country, and excavation at Scottow (NHER 36729) has demonstrated that one ditch in a multi-ditched boundary pre-dated a Roman road.
However, this feature runs perpendicular to several possible Iron Age to Roman linear field boundaries (NHER 52376, 52379, 52382 and 52384) and parallel to a second possible trackway (NHER 52380), approximately 650m to the south, indicating that it may be a part of an Iron Age to Roman field system, similar to that recorded in the Broadland area of Norfolk (NHER 6096).
It should also be noted that the possible trackway runs parallel to the Felthorpe/Taverham parish boundary, approximately 300m to the south-west, and may therefore be medieval to post medieval in origin.
Several linear features are also visible to the south of this possible trackway (S2), centred on TG 1611 1666, and they also appear to be cut by the linear boundary above (NHER 52376). At least one of these features is on the same alignment as the trackway, and they have therefore been included with this phase, however they are only visible on one photograph, and it is possible that they relate to geological, rather than archaeological features.
E. Bales (NMP), October 2009.