NHER 69152 (Monument record) - Medieval to post-medieval deposits and finds

December 2017. Watching Brief.
Monitoring of groundworks associated with construction of new footbridge.
Two foundation trenches were excavated, one on each side of the River Stiffkey. A stoney deposit containing medieval brick and tile fragments seen at the base of the eastern trench is thought to have been a deliberately-lain consolidation layer. This was sealed by a riverine clay-silt layer that was probably equivalent to a similar deposit seen in the base of the western trench. In the eastern trench this riverine deposit was overlain by material containing peat ash and possible cess that probably represented the limited dumping of domestic waste at the margins of the river. Two conjoining, relatively large and unabraded pottery sherds of 15th- to 16th-century date were recovered from this deposit. A layer containing what appeared to be cess was also noted above the riverine clay-silt in the western trench. In both trenches the dumped material of likely late medieval/early post-medieval date was sealed by a thick, sterile clay-silt deposit, which was in turn overlain by a sequence of chalk-rich recent makeup layers.
Finds recovered from the uppermost deposits included a residual medieval pottery sherd, two late post-medieval/modern pottery sherds, a post-medieval jetton and a piece of undatable copper alloy metalworking waste.
See report (S1) for further details.
An archive associated with this work has been deposited with Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 2024.9).
P. Watkins (HES), 19 May 2025.