SDO16998 - Land south of The Paddock Garden, Old Market Place, Sherborne, Dorset. Archaeological monitoring and arecording

‘Context One Heritage & Archaeology carried out archaeological monitoring and recording relating to the construction of a new gallery and arts facility as part of the Paddock Project, on land to the south of The Paddock Garden, Old Market Place, Sherborne, Dorset. The project was commissioned by PGP on behalf of their client, Sherborne Arts Trust. The Site itself is within an area of recorded medieval activity relating to the spread of Newland medieval borough as documented through historic map regression and documentary sources. Sherborne itself has Saxon origins with earlier Roman and prehistoric roots. Despite this potential, no features were identified during monitoring of pre-construction investigative works and only a few sherds of residual medieval pottery were recovered from modern made ground. Instead, the results appear to corroborate the conclusions from a previous evaluation that encompassed the Site, confirming evidence of extensive ground disturbance from the 18th century and/ or modern landscaping and terracing, resulting in the deposition of deep soil accumulations. The previous archaeological evaluation also identified a single very truncated medieval post- hole beneath this soil, cutting the natural sediments. Medieval features found to the north of the Site were also cut into this same natural, reinforcing the likelihood that archaeology may survive within this horizon. However, the benefits of searching for any such remains should be balanced against the very low frequency of medieval material culture and the deep truncation across the Site. On this basis, there is little archaeological merit in continued monitoring of the development groundworks.’