Update

Our first trench is now coming to an end and we have made great progress with the ditch. One more day digging and we should be at the base and have a full profile. Meanwhile it continues to produce some great pottery fragments:

Most of the pottery has been very high class and today we also had a bag full of bone, which we will have an expert examine to determine the species.

On 6th September we will have an open day for the villagers and DDCAG members to see the and find out what we have been up to so far. Also the plan for Trench 2!

Last time we were on site we found this:

Answers on a postcard, or here on the blog!?

Saturday dig

Today saw us hot the ditch, where most of the finds have been coming up.

Another fine piece of Black Burnished Ware.

We also started to do the recording of the posthole and pit. Here two Dorset Diggers are drawing a section at 1:10 scale. This gives a measured profile of the posthole before digging out the other half.

It is looking as if there was a substantial building nearby into which much of the material from it, after it was abandoned, was dumped into this ditch. The military base, that the substantial 3m wide ditch surrounded, must have been also long gone when this happened. The building material, pottery and possible painted plaster (found today) indicate a high class building, perhaps a well-to-do farmhouse or even villa.

Ditched Pottery

This lovely piece of Black Burnished Ware came out of the ditch fill this morning. The decoration was a surprise after it was washed.

Here is Ben excavating the pot. We were using a small spade, slicing away the soil rather than using a mattock, otherwise the pot may have been in smaller pieces than we would have hoped.

The pit is now excavated and it has turned out to be a bit boring, being one of those flat bottomed RB possible grain pits with no finds. After recoding we will excavate the other side. The posthole has also been half sectioned and is now finished. So it is only the ditch to excavate now and the top fill is full of building material, undoubtedly from a large nearby building.  

Research article

Here is some research for our site by Richard.

Nether Compton in Antiquity

A short introduction to the area before excavations to be carried out by Dorset Diggers

Richard Hood June 2014

The name Nether Compton is Saxon and means the lower settlement in the valley (Comp as in Coombe).  The village lies in North Dorset close to the Somerset border, where the Trent Brook flows down to the River Yeo. It is first mentioned with Over Compton as Contone in the Doomsday book as held by Sherborne Abbey. Reference to the Victoria History of Dorset, Hutchins History of Dorset and other Dorset histories do not give much information about early Compton, providing more on the Church, interesting buildings and landowners. However there is mention of ‘Lynchets on a SW slope 1 ½ miles NE of the Church with six terraces’ and ‘Lynchets in Home Copse 600 yards S of the Church’. A passing reference to Athuros may relate to nearby South Cadbury and the Arthurian legend of Camelot.

The records of the Dorset Natural History and Archaeological Society mention surface finds of worked flint, Romano-British and mediaeval pottery being made on Charlock Hill one mile to the NE of Nether Compton.   Other similar finds were found SW of Charlock Hill in the parish of Nether Compton, Romano-British finds being found at the marl pit map ref. 61541832.  A child’s skull was excavated from the face of the of the marl pit by Mr C E Bean. Coarse Romano-British pottery along with iron slag was also found indicating possible smelting of local iron bearing ore having taken place.  A hand made bead-rim pottery sherd found in the marl pit indicates pre-Roman activity in conjunction with a settlement site a few hundred yards to the N excavated by Mr J Fowler.  For more details the Society records can be inspected in the Dorset History Centre in Dorchester.

In 1989 a metal detectorist discovered a hoard of 22,670 Roman coins in a field adjacent to Kitton Lane in the parish of Nether Compton. The coins were mainly of bronze and from the time of the Constantine dynasty, 4^th century AD, with the earliest being Aurelian. Following the find, Bath and Camerton Archaeological Society became involved and carried out a geophysical investigation of the area. A detailed report of their findings can be found on a 2011 publication by Mr John Oswin available online as a PDF file.

The findings indicate traces of buildings that may have been a Roman fort and associated buildings. From 2014 onwards Dorset Diggers, an archaeological excavation group, have permission and funding to excavate the fields in the area to reveal what has been indicated by the geophysical survey. Should the excavations  reveal a Roman fort, its date and period of use would be of great interest, and hopefully explaining whether it was an invasion fort of Vespasians 2^nd Agusta Legion on their way to Exeter, or a later fort built to pacify the local Durotriges tribe who had resisted the Roman invasion from nearby South Cadbury hill fort.

These and other questions will be answered on completion of the works to be carried out over the next few years.       

Best in the West

The Western Gazette has an article about our site online, so have a look. I was down a deep hole during this phone interview! The reporter has done a decent job understanding the information I was trying to give her, although using the word 'camp' has overtones of the scouts. With a 3m wide ditch for a defense this was quite a ging-gang-gooley of a camp.