Monument record MDO18248 - Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester; Later Roman structure 1607

The remains of a probable later Roman stone-built rectangular building was found in Trench 1, during the 1989 excavations at Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester. This building was oriented roughly E-W and only a small part of it was within the excavated area. It was probably a replacement of the early Roman structure 1602. It comprised the remains of a wall robbing trench and part of a mortared flint footing defining the northern wall of a building. Within the building were occupation deposits containing 3rd-4th century AD pottery. An infant burial lay adjacent to the wall trench and was probably associated with this building. A deposit of wall plaster, probably debris from the stone robbing overlay this building.

Found during the excavations carried out by Wessex Archaeology in 1989 in the proposed Wessex Court retail development area between Charles Street, Acland Road, and South Walks, Dorchester (1) (2) (3) (4). The numbers in square brackets below are context and feature numbers used in the report and archive (1) (4).

This structure was found in the southern part of Trench 1, immediately south of Structure 1606 and was on almost the same line as Early Roman Structure 1602 and is probably a replacement of it. It comprised of a stone wall foundation [568] and a robbed wall trench [536] which defined the north wall of the structure. The surviving wall footings [568] comprised mortared flint nodules 0.5m wide and five courses high and were found in the eastern part of the trench, largely cut into the top of one of the Neolithic post-pits, so probably represent the remains of a reinforcement of the footings. An infant burial [604] was found just to the south of the robbed wall footing and is probably associated with this building.

No definite made floor was found but the area to the south of the wall was covered by two general occupation deposits containing large quantities of 3rd/4th century AD pottery. Overlying these layers was a spread of collapsed wall plaster [584] which may have been deposited during the stone robbing operations, presumably during the medieval period.

National Monuments Record, NMR Monument Record, SY 69 SE 386 (Index). SDO9937.

<1> Davies, S M and Farwell, D, 1989, Excavations at Charles Street (Wessex Court), Dorchester: Interim report on Stage 1, 25th May-3rd July and Stage 2, 25th July-12th September 1989 (Unpublished document). SDO9408.

<2> Adam, N J, Butterworth, C A, Davies, S M, and Farwell, D E, 1992, Excavations at Wessex Court , Charles Street, Dorchester, Dorset, 1989 (Unpublished document). SDO9409.

<3> Davies, S M and Farwell, D E, 1989, 'Charles Street, Dorchester, Wessex Court Development', Proceedings of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society (Article in serial). SDO9414.

<4> Wessex Archaeology, 1989-1990, Wessex Court, Charles Street, Dorchester (Excavation archive). SDO9878.

Record last edited

Aug 22 2024 7:28PM