#ThrowbackThursday Garrison Napier Road

Today for #ThrowbackThursday we are discussing excavations carried out in 2011-2013 at the eastern end of Napier Road, Colchester when land to the north and south was being redeveloped for two new car parks and a footpath

Five cremations and forty inhumations were excavated, all from a part of a large mid-late Roman cemetery area. Some of the graves from the north car park shared distinct alignments, which might suggest socially-related groups, and an unusual line of intercutting burials on the southern edge of the site may mark the boundary for one of these groups. To the south, one of the cremations had been placed at the centre of a ring-ditch. This was located close to another site where several other Roman ring-ditch burials had been excavated back in the early 2000s

Investigations for the footpath revealed evidence of the Roman circus, such as traces of the circus stands (cavea), and a terret was also discovered. A terret is a metal loop found on a horse harness used to guide the reins and prevent them becoming tangled

To learn more about this site, please check out CAT Report 652 at http://cat.essex.ac.uk/reports