NHER 68321 (Monument record) - Post-medieval or earlier and undated ditches and undated possible pits

January-February 2024. Trial Trenching.
Evaluation of proposed development site.
The six trenches excavated revealed a number of linear and discrete features, although little in way of dating evidence was recovered.
A north-west to south-east aligned ditch recorded in two trenches and a north-to-south aligned ditch in the south-east corner of the site do though both appear to have coincided with the line of the Cringleford/Hethersett parish boundary – this section of which is unchanged from that shown on tithe maps produced during the 1840s. Several Early Neolithic blade-like flint flakes recovered from one of these ditches were therefore almost certainly residual, particularly as this feature also produced fragments of fuel ash slag or heavily overfired wood/charcoal. Samples taken from the fills of this ditch contained charcoal (predominantly oak) but little else in the way of charred plant macrofossils or other remains.
Two other undated ditches were recorded, one aligned north-west to south-east and the other east-to-west. The latter was potentially a continuation of a one of two similarly-aligned features visible as cropmarks on aerial photographs of the land to the east (part of a group of undated enclosures and/or field boundaries recorded as NHER 9396).
Four small ovoid and sub-circular discrete features were possibly pits, although these all had sterile, unremarkable fills and produced no finds.
No unstratified finds were recovered.
Only a thin topsoil survived across much of the site, which is believed to be the result of its use as a compound during the construction of the Norwich Southern Bypass. There was though no evidence to suggest that archaeological remains had been truncated.
See report (S1) for further details.
P. Watkins (HES), 14 May 2024.