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Site Details

Romano-British enclosure (Rochester and Byrness)

(NY 82609686) A sub-rectangular enclosure visible on aerial photographs. (1)

The remains now consist of a stony bank, average width 3m and maximum height 0.6m, forming the north and west sides of the enclosure - the other sides having been destroyed during afforestation.
Internally there are the fragmentary remains of a slight, stony bank forming a sub-division in the north-west angle.
Although fragmentary its construction suggests a domestic enclosure probably a continuation of the Romano-British occupation of the ridge to the north-west (NY 89 NW 24 and 25). Sketch-survey at 1:2500. (2)

A rectilinear enclosure of possible Iron Age / Roman date (potentially a settlement) is visible as broad, denuded earthworks on lidar imagery (mapped as part of a PhD project at the University of York, in collaboration with the Historic England aerial investigation and mapping team), though its survival is unclear on the latest 2016 aerial imagery due to modern forestry land-use. The banks are 3m in width to north and south, with the eastern and western perimeters distorted by later land-use and thus 6m wide. The broad outline of the enclosure measures c.44m east-west by c.34m north-south. There are also hints of earthworks, heavily denuded within the interior, though these are too ephemeral to map.

An enclosure, identified from 1940s RAF vertical photography and confirmed on the ground by archaeologists, who gave it a Roman date, is recorded in the Historic Environment Record (no. 8101). A second HER record (no. 8139) is recorded within the same plantation of modern woodland, of which no separate trace is visible from aerial sources ' this may be the same site. It is unclear whether these settlements are definitively the same as the denuded rectilinear enclosure visible on lidar. (3)

Supposed Roman-British enclosure recorded here on HER. Slight earthworks visible on lidar imagery, but not enough to enable any analysis of the form of the site. (4)
N8101
Roman (43 to 410)
Iron Age (800BC to 43AD)
FIELD OBSERVATION (VISUAL ASSESSMENT), Ordnance Survey Archaeology Division Field Investigation 1970; D Smith
AERIAL INVESTIGATION AND MAPPING, Redesdale Lidar Landscapes project ; Oracle Heritage Services
AERIAL INVESTIGATION AND MAPPING, Northern Frontiers ; Department of Archaeology, York University


Source of Reference
Local History of Rochester and Byrness

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Please note that this information has been compiled from a number of different sources. Durham County Council and Northumberland County Council can accept no responsibility for any inaccuracy contained therein. If you wish to use/copy any of the images, please ensure that you read the Copyright information provided.

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