NHER 62596 (Monument record) - Potentially Early Bronze Age, post-medieval and undated features

October 2013. Trial Trenching.
Evaluation of site on proposed route of new road at Postwick Hub.
The four trenches excavated revealed only a small number of potentially archaeologically significant features. These included a relatively shallow discrete feature with a partially heat-affected base and a dark fill containing ash and charcoal. This was interpreted as a fire pit or heath of possible prehistoric date but may also have been associated with some form of marginal industrial activity such as charcoal production. The one other feature regarded as potentially prehistoric in date was a poorly-defined pit or natural feature with a charcoal-flecked fill that contained also contained fragments of burnt flint. Environmental samples taken from these features produced charcoal but little else in the way of plant macrofossils.
Other remains included a possible north-to-south aligned ditch and a large amorphous hollow, both of which produced finds of post-medieval date. A number of features interpreted as natural solution hollows (‘sinkholes’) were also investigated, the upper portions of which produced a range of presumably mostly residual finds including prehistoric worked flints, burnt flints, undated iron metal-working debris and a post-medieval lead cloth seal.
Unstratified finds recovered from the trenches included several other prehistoric worked flints (one possibly a re-worked Late Upper Palaeolithic or Mesolithic piece), a single abraded sherd of Roman pottery and a post-medieval suspension hook.
See report (S1) for further details.
The archive associated with this work has been deposited with the Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2017.212).
P. Watkins (HES), 3 April 2018. Amended 19 May 2019.

April-June 2014. Strip Map and Sample Excavation.
Excavation of two relatively small areas prior to construction of new road hub at Postwick (Areas 5 and 6).
The southern area (Area 6) revealed a notable group of probable prehistoric features comprising a curving gulley filled with burnt flint and a large potentially contemporary adjacent pit. It is suggested that the larger feature may have acted as a water source, with a central rectangular pit perhaps acting as some form of trough. These features are therefore similar to those often encountered beneath or near prehistoric burnt flint mounds. Such an interpretation is supported by the small number of finds recovered, with both the pit and the gully producing single sherds of grog-tempered Early Bronze Age pottery.
The other features identified in this excavation area included several undated possible pits and gully fragments and a large pit that produced a single sherd of medieval pottery.

The northern area (Area 5) revealed three small undated pits and a single north-to-south aligned post-medieval ditch. Although this ditch does not correspond with any boundary shown on 19th-century maps of the site it is likely that it was had previously continued the line of an extant field boundary to the west of Heath Farm, that now starts approximately 150m to the north.
See report (S2) for further details. Published article and archive report awaited.
The archive associated with this work has been deposited with the Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2017.248).
P. Watkins (HES), 3 April 2018. Amended 19 May 2019.