Dixon's
Bank, Middlesbrough
The
building of large new housing estates on the southern
outskirts of Middlesbrough has helped to paint
a fascinating picture of life in the Iron Age
and Romano-British periods.
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In the
late 1980s Middlesbrough Borough Council set about
designing a large new housing development. This
was planned on the outskirts of the town to provide
several new neighbourhoods in the Marton and Coulby
Newham areas.
MAP
REFERENCES NZ 525 142 & NZ 528 145
Archaeologists
had always presumed that this area was fairly
sterile in terms of past history as it consists
of low-lying land with heavy clay soils. In fact
it was thought that this part of the Tees Valley
would have been densely wooded throughout prehistory
and not particularly desirable for settlers.
This
picture began to change when, in 1988, Roger Inman,
a local amateur archaeologist, reported finds
of Romano-British pottery in fields at Dixons
Bank, Marton and Bonnygrove Farm, Coulby Newham.
As these areas were earmarked for development,
archaeological evaluations were organised to find
out more about these curious scatters of pottery.
The
evaluations at each site demonstrated that there
were substantial remains of Romano-British and
earlier Iron Age settlements. This meant that
the sites needed to be fully excavated before
development could commence.
The
first site to be investigated in this way was
Bonnygrove Farm. This was dug in the winter months
of 1993 with archaeologists from Tees Archaeology
working till dusk on Christmas Eve to get the
site finished. The winter conditions of frost
and thaw meant that for much of the time the site
was either frozen solid or its surface became
an almost unworkable slime.
The
excavations at Bonnygrove Farm revealed a number
of substantial ditches. These seemed to form a
large enclosure in which a small settlement was
established. Unfortunately there was only a thin
topsoil at the site and this meant that the plough
had destroyed all but the most substantial features.
The
finds from the excavation showed that cereal farming
was the main activity carried out. Parts of three
quern stones were found which show that flour
was hand milled at the settlement. The ditches
themselves contained environmental evidence in
the form of carbonised seeds and cereal grains
from spelt wheat and barley. Pottery found within
the ditches could be accurately dated giving an
occupation date of between 100AD and 300AD.
Nearly
ten years went by before the site at Dixons Bank
was excavated by Oxford Archaeology North with
project management by the Brigantia Archaeological
Practice. Again the excavation took place in the
difficult winter months of 2002.
The
Dixons Bank site was very much better preserved.
Fragile remains had been protected beneath a build
up of soil, washed down the hill slope which the
settlement had occupied. A geophysical survey
of the site by West Yorkshire Archaeological Service
revealed a complex system of ditches and pits
forming a series of enclosures and route ways.
The excavation found evidence of timber roundhouses
which had been repaired and rebuilt on several
occasions.
Amongst
the most interesting finds were two human graves.
One of these graves was found beneath a roundhouse.
It is possible that the people who built the house
knew about the grave and built the house over
it on purpose for its ritual significance.
The
finds from this site included Iron Age, Romano-British
and Roman imported pottery. There was also a Roman
style brooch found early in the excavation. The
evidence from this site suggests that a farmstead
was sited here from at least 200BC. This flourished
in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD but after this
there was a shift of emphasis from settlement
to stock husbandry. Overlying the roundhouses
and small enclosures was a series of large linked
enclosures which seemed to be connected by a droveway
for guiding herds of cattle or sheep.
These
two excavations have been unusual in that they
have given a rare opportunity for a large investigation
to take place on an ancient site in the heart
of what is today a very urban area.
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