Monument record 758/1/11 - Former Conduit and Settling Tank Associated with Vale Royal Abbey

<1> Lancaster University Archaeological Unit, 1997, Vale Royal Golf Course and Housing Developments, Cheshire: Archaeological Evaluation Report, R2167 (Client Report). SCH4048.

An archaeological evaluation was undertaken in 1996 at Vale Royal Abbey in advance of development of a proposed new housing development and 18 hole golf course. The first phase of assessment comprised a documentary study and identification survey (source 2); the second phase involved magnetometer and resistivity surveys (source 3). The results of the first two stages then informed the position of trial trenches in the third stage of work. The trenches were positioned to investigate areas of greatest proposed disturbance, areas of archaeological potential, and control areas where no archaeological resource had been identified.

In trenches 4 and 18, the remains of a filled-in watercourse were recorded. Trench 18 was intended to investigate the 'conduit head' itself as shown on an estate map dating to 1616 (see source 2). A substantial build-up of peat in this area provided evidence of a water source, albeit clogged and boggy. From the spring, the water was channelled to the north-east, where it was again recorded in trench 4 (channel 60). This channel is clearly artificial, replacing a shallower and more nebulous natural watercourse. Preliminary field observation and geophysical survey both suggest that the channel was stone-lined, and possibly capped, as a number of large, dressed sandstone blocks were noted in this area. The geophysical survey (see source 3) identified a strong and clearly defined high resistance anomaly which appears to mark the line of the channel and may suggest that the stone conduit survives intact in places. The watercourse could be traced as far as trench 2, where two wall foundations defining the corner of a structure were recorded and are thought to represent the remains of a settling tank. Beyond trench 2 the line of the watercourse is lost, but a path shown on the 1616 estate map and a later map of 1872, follows the postulated line of the conduit which may have continued to exist as a boggy watercourse, in which peat formed, long after the conduit was disrupted and robbed of its stone lining.

<2> Lancaster University Archaeological Unit, 1995, Vale Royal Golf Course, Cheshire: Phase 1 Archaeological Evaluation Interim Report, R2124 (Client Report). SCH4087.

<3> Geophysical Surveys of Bradford, 1996, Vale Royal Golf Course: Report on Geophysical Survey, 2125 (Client Report). SCH4086.