Untitled - Council for British Archaeology

way by means of a wide causeway (not excaveted but revealed by magnetometer
survey). In its final phase of occupation the enclosure was incorporeted
into a. much larger unit and_two sides of the original ditched area
recut to a depth of 2m.
Several other minor sites were obeerved and recorded during the course
of road construction. Excavation work is now complete and the report under
preparation.
- Deserted
Medieval Village of Thorpe, Earls Barton
This eettlement lies on gravel'on the edge of .the river Nene about
one mile southeast of Earls Barton.' Itbee been assumed.that this is the'
site of1.14idthorpe as recorded in Domeeday,Book', bUt'reOent documentary Y.
work (eee references) has caet doubt on-this association : -Therefore., beyond
the. fact' that the earthworks.are,of.a
ieknown-Of the
site. The remains of the site lie 6m either side of a 'lane leading down
to the river'. This lane was the main street of the village and a series
of-rectangular earthworks; Assumed to be building platforms, abut this
lane.
'The site wae na within the road corridor iiself,.but was to be af-
-fected by'the cUtting of a large. pipetrenèh to take water from the road
drainage ditches to the river. Under:the guidance of Claire Halpin the
corridor of this pipe trench was machine scraped then excavated by hand
to record the uppermost levels prior'to_protecting them 'frain"disturbance
by machinery and to yield some evidence about the nature'of the site. Although
the width 6f-the pipe trench. corridor (10m) prevented the recovery
of a complete ground plan of any structure, parts of house frontages,
yard surfaces and an oven wereexposed.' The pottery has been analysed
with the aid of the Northampton DevelopmentCorporation series (from
Northampton sites) and was found to 'consist of two main fabrics,-Lyveden
and Potterspury. Unfortunately both these kiln sites. have a long period
of production (Lyveden c.1100 to 1400, Potterspury c.1250 - 1500 AD) and
due to the limited amount of stratified deposits which were excavated
this yields little.clearly datable information. .However, with the cooperation
of the contrictor the fundamental objective of minimising the
destruction of structures within the site has been achieved by manouvering
the pipe-trench to avoid any house-platforms or deeply stratified
areas,
Iron Age Enclosure, Great Doddington (Figure 8)
'This site was first identified from aerial ph6tographs a decade ago
and appeared as a large ditch enclosing c. 1 hectare (2.4 acres) around .
one ring ditch and'oyerlaying another. The site is situated on the spur
of the limestone ridge to the north of Doddington:village. The road line
cuts away almost half the occupied area as known from the air. Magnetometer
survey was attempted, but was unsuccessful. On the gravel areas
to the west the results had been very accurate in predicting the presence
and even depth of features, but at Doddington magnetometer prospecting
failed even to identify the large ditchknown from the'air. The reason
for this is in doubt - different solid geology may have been responsibie
though it may have been due simply to a malfunction of the machine. It.
was decided to'remove the-overburden'by rie6hiné in the-erea t6 be des:-'
troyed by the road and having re6orded the site in plan and'iesessed'the-
-26-