EDO4330 - Dorchester By-pass, Flagstones; watching brief

A watching brief was maintained during the topsoil stripping for the construction of the Dorchester By-pass, by Wessex Archaeology, in 1987-1988. In the area of Flagstones, which was the site of an earlier large scale area excavation (1), further observations were carried out during stripping and other groundworks in advance of the by-pass construction. In the northern part of the area, large areas were stripped on either side of the road line for machine storage, etc. These areas were poorly stripped but a number of linear field boundary ditches were observed and planned, but not excavated. These features have been incorporated with the results of the excavations and published together (1). In the area to the south,the gardens of Flagstones house, further features were exposed planned and excavated during topsoil stripping and after the demolition of the house. These included further parts of the Flagstones central ring-ditch, the Iron Age enclosure ditch and an Iron Age pit. These results were all incorporated with the results of the excavations and published together (1).