CBA SMA\SMA 1998.PDF - Council for British Archaeology

Oxfordshire
Fig 8. Bampton, Thatched Cottage garden: reconstruction of sunken-feature-building, seen from the north-east.
UNIVEFtSITY OF OXFORD
Hillforts of the Ridgeway Project: excavations at
Segsbury Camp 1997
Gary Lock and Chris Gosden
Introduction
Excavations continued for a second season at Segsbury
Camp (SU385844, Oxon SAM 209, also known as
Letcombe Castle) over four weelcs in July 1997. These are
part of the Hillforts of the Ridgeway Project which is
designed to excavate a number of major sites along the
Ridgeway between Liddington Castle in the west and
Segsbury in the east and to set these in the context of a
changing landscape represented by smaller sites, linear
ditches and well-preserved field systems (Lock and Gosden
1997a; 1997b). The present report is an interim one, based
mainly on the results of field recording, as post-excavation
work is in progress
The excavations provide training for both undergraduate
students reading the BA in Archaeology and Anthropology
at the University of Oxford and students on the Department
for Continuing Education Adult Summer School. We were
also aided by a number of local volunteers, many of whom
have dug with us in previous seasons. The emphasis on good
quality training inevitably slowed the pace of work, but it
was still possible to achieve the aims of the excavation in
full.
The Excavations
Alum
As with last year's work, the aims were to establish the
character and dating of the construction and occupation of
the hillfort in the light of existing work in the area. With the
recent publication of the excavations at Liddington Castle
(Hirst, et al 1997), together with Rams Hill (Bradley and
Ellison, 1975; Needham and Ambers 1994) and White
Horse Hill (Lock and Gosden 1997a; Miles and Palmer
1995), this area of the Berkshire Downs has increasing
potential for detailed landscape study. Our research
concerns concepts of cultural landscapes and especially
notions of prehistoric history and their enduring impact on
the physical landscape (Gosden and Lock 1998).
A more site specific aim was the continuing work in
conjunction with the Ancient Monuments Laboratory
(AML) of English Heritage as groundproofing of their
magnetometer surveys. This is part of the Wessex Hillforts
Geophysical Survey Project (Payne 1997) which is having
remarkable success in providing information on the interiors
of hillforts.
The final arrangement of trenches for the two seasons of
work at Segsbury is shown in Fig 9. Trenches 2 and 3 were
completed in 1996, Trench 1 was nearly completed in 1996
and partly re-opened and finished in 1997, Trenches 4, 5,6
and 7 were started and completed in 1997. All trenches
except for 7 were positioned to investigate specific
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