By B. Stallyhrass. 419 



A start was made by cutting sections across all four ditches, and 

 across the rampart also on the north and east sides. The result 

 of these excavations was puzzling. In the north section half of a 

 chert nodule was discovered, the battered edges of which bore 

 witness to its use as a strike-a-light. In the west section a flint 

 core was discovered. In the north section alone was any pottery 

 found. Two of tiie pieces were thin grey ware, such as had been 

 discovered on the Withy Beds site. The four other pieces were 

 of brown or reddish-brown ware, mixed with quartz gravel or flint 

 chips ; but two of these pieces, from the size and quantity of the 

 gravel, resembled the earlier P.ronze Age or later Norman pottery 

 rather than that of the Koman period. A piece of ground 6ft. 

 square in the middle of the two lines of stone was uncovered, but 

 undisturbed sandy rock was reached at 9in., and only one chert 

 flake was found. 



The results being thus imsatisfactory, it was determined to clear 

 the whole of the eastern ditch down to the bottoni. It was taken 

 out in spits about 9in. deep. Nothing was found in the first spit: 

 in the second were ten pieces of brown Eomano-British pottery, 

 eleven of grey, three iron nails, a flint " borer," three pieces of 

 fossil wood, and three of iron pyrites. The third yielded live pieces 

 of brown, nine of grey, one of red ware (unglazed), four pieces of 

 fossil wood, and one of iron pyrites, Of the brown ware one was 

 " extra-gravelly." So far the finds seemed to suggest a camp of 

 Bronze Age construction, used in Eoman times, and the impression 

 was deepened when in the fourth and bottom spit a bronze serpent 

 ring was discovered. But this idea was overthrown when a piece 

 of Samian ware with fine red glaze was discovered lying on the 

 original bottom, which was of clay at this point and contained a 

 number of snail shells. Brown and grey Eomano-British pottery 

 lying likewise on the bottom went to prove that the construction 

 of the camp must be assigned to the Eoman age. 



The scarcity of the remains, however, failing to give complete 

 satisfaction it was decided to clear the north ditch down to a point 

 where a trackway crossed over it into the camp. The second spit 

 yielded some pottery, a horse's shoe and bit, and a piece of iron 



