Site Event/Activity record ECH2800 - Excavations at Abbey Green and at No. 1 Abbey Green and the City Wall, Chester 1975 - 1978

Series of excavations carried out in Abbey Green as part of a major redevelopment programme in Chester. The site includes the main green excavated between March 1975 - 1978 and the garden at No. 1 Abbey Green. Initially, the major effort focused on an interval tower and rampart building, in the Retentura of the Roman fortress, and involved a re-examination of Newstead's previous excavation areas (6). The excavation proved particularly significant for remains dating to the first century, the Saxon period and the Civil War, and it is particularly noteworthy that this was one of the first excavations in the city to produce Saxon evidence. The excavation also identified the possible remains of the pre-Flavian (pre-69AD) rampart. This early rampart was then replaced in the Flavian period with a stronger, more substantial construction which itself was replaced in stone by the second century. Later alterations and extensions to the rampart were observed in the third century. A fifth century large timber building was recorded followed by a second timber structure with evidence of bronze working. Quarrying and stone robbing was indicated in the Late Saxon period (1). Fragment of Neolithic flints are also recorded (2). The work in 1977 focused on the study of the rampart buildings, the intervallum road, and the barrack blocks dating from the first to the fourth centuries (7).