Site Event/Activity record ECH3982 - Grafton New Hall: Landscape History and Archaeology

Desk based assessment and limited evaluation to assess the potential impact of the construction of a new hall at Grafton. Filed walking of two freshly ploughed areas 30m x 30m where the roman road Mater comes closest to the site of Roman Bovium. Cobbles from the roman road were present tin the more southerly fieldname the cobble spread was sufficient to plot the direction of the road. Artefacts mostly post ledieval earthernware roofing slate and Vitcorian ceramics. Two highly abraded coarseware fragments of thumbnail size. Posssibly roman. 3 trenches were then stripped to reveal subsoil. 2 trenches acrorss the line of the Roman road and one on the line of the new farm access. Traces of the roman road were revealed in the 2 southern trenches ( A and C)but were severely eroded by ploughing. The road itself is hardly any longer in existence as an archaeological feature. The bulk of the road has been ploughed up and now lies in plough soil. In places cobbles are still extant pushed down into the subsoil, but little exists in situ above the subsoil. Slight side ditches identified in places but these too have been severely truncated by ploughing. Trench A also had some roadside subsoil irregularieties which h could be indicative of archaeological activity immediately adjacent to the the road. Trench C to the west of A only contained evidence of the road. No other archaeology was present. The site of Roman Bovium may just begin at trench A Trench B revealed no archaeological deposits.