#ThrowbackThursday Garrison Excavation

This #ThrowbackThursday, we are looking at the Garrison Area E investigations which consisted of two evaluations in 2004 and 2011, and an excavation in 2013. Area E was located where St John’s Green School (Abbeyfield site) is now🏡

The site unveiled the remains of a Roman cemetery from the 1st century. Evidence of this included a high-status bustum. A bustum is a type of burial where the body is burnt on a pyre over a shallow pit, and once the burning was finished, the remains were buried in the pit which became a grave. This bustum contained oil lamps and a Vespasian coin, dating the bustum to AD 70🪔

The cemetery continued to be be used in the mid-late 2ndcentury, when it may have been associated with a farmstead building🐄🐖🐑 This building became seemingly abandoned by the 3rdcentury, but the cemetery likely remained in use with at least two inhumations being associated with this time period👀

In the late 2nd-early 3rd century, this land was characterised by a very large sand and gravel quarry pit which cut through earlier features. This quarry was then later cut by several large pits containing domestic rubbish and building material contemporary to that of the Romanised farmstead building. This likely indicates the final phase/abandonment.

In addition to the exciting Roman remains, the site also showed evidence of the Neolithic/Bronze Age in the form of residual flints/sherds, as well as evidence of much later Civil War siege works in the form of a ditch running roughly NEE-SWW⚔️

Written by CAT Staff Gabby

Image: EF62 bustum, pre-excavation and fully-excavated. The stake-holes are presumably the remains of a wooden structure to support the fuel and body.