Site Event/Activity record ECH4310 - Roman Gardens, Souters Lane, Chester: an Archaeological Watching Brief

The watching brief revealed a landscape which had formed over the past 2000 years. The landscaping of the southern portions of the development plot revealed evidence for the accumulation of waste material from the Roman period up until at least the seventeenth century (1). Some of the sandstone rubble that made up this refuse tip may have been masonry waste from the Roman and medieval periods. Within the central part of the development plot, land surfaces dating to the late seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were revealed buried below the modern landscape. Adjacent to the City Wall, the survival of possible Roman deposits were also revealed to lie close to the modern land surface, although there is a possibility that these deposits may be later and lie within the medieval city defensive ditch. The programme of works and landscaping in the northern portion of the development plot revealed clay pipe deposits and the intact remains of a building associated with an eighteenth to early twentieth century clay pipe manufacturer (1).