NHER 42191 (Monument record) - Possible former medieval extraction pit

November 2005. Norfolk NMP.
A sub-circular cut feature is visible as a vegetation mark and low earthwork on aerial photographs (S1), (S2), (S3) and (S4), centred at TG 4703 2260. Its relatively regular shape and distinct edges suggest that it is the product of human activity, probably an extraction pit created by the exploitation of clay or peat deposits. (A more extensive area of probable former extraction, NHER 42156, has been mapped approximately 180m to the northwest). Any such extraction presumably took place during the medieval period, prior to the rise in relative water levels that brought to an end large-scale extraction of this type, although the pit could represent a shallower working dating to the post medieval period. Alternatively, it might instead be a pond or a naturally formed pool, or may have formed over a geological anomaly. A trackway which skirts its northern edge has the fresh appearance of a modern feature on some of the 1940s aerial photographs, e.g. (S5), and consequently has not been mapped.
S. Tremlett (NMP), 29 November 2005.