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Wickham House Blog – Day #8 (11th April 2025)

Part of a series of bulletins from the BAS excavations at Wickham House

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Attendees: Karen, Sarah, Geoff, Nick, Nigel and Keith

Work to remove the topsoil in Trench 2A was continued by Sarah, Karen and Nigel as shown in Figures 1 and 2. The high-resolution earth resistance survey predicted linear N-S aligned features, which are starting to appear as shown in Figure 2.

Figure 1. Karen, Nigel and Sarah removing the topsoil from Trench 2A.
Figure 2. Linear N-S aligned features within Trench 2A.

Trench 1A was cleaned and planning begun with an addition of five contexts being identified as shown in Figure 3 and were planned as shown in Figure 4. More work will be required next week to complete the recording of these features before work can begin to excavate the ditch in section. The context thought to represent the upper fill of the ditch contained a number of pieces of slag and bloom suggesting iron production taking place nearby.

Figure 3. Trench 1A revealing a number of contexts to be investigated further.
Figure 4. Planning of Trench 1A whilst Geoff and Nick excavate Trench 1B.

In Trench 1B Nick and Geoff revealed the same surface as in Trench 1A and discovered a number of pieces of Roman period pottery as shown in Figure 5. This surface of Trench 1B will need to be cleaned and planned next week so that context can be identified and recorded. 

Figure 5. Pottery sherds discovered in Trench 1B in Day #8 by Nick and Geoff.