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<< Our Photo Pages >> Old Sodbury - Hillfort in England in Gloucestershire

Submitted by 4clydesdale7 on Saturday, 18 October 2003  Page Views: 34333

Iron Age and Later PrehistorySite Name: Old Sodbury Alternative Name: Sodbury Camp, Soppa's Camp
Country: England County: Gloucestershire Type: Hillfort
Nearest Town: Chipping Sodbury
Map Ref: ST76088258  Landranger Map Number: 172
Latitude: 51.541606N  Longitude: 2.346303W
Condition:
5Perfect
4Almost Perfect
3Reasonable but with some damage
2Ruined but still recognisable as an ancient site
1Pretty much destroyed, possibly visible as crop marks
0No data.
-1Completely destroyed
4 Ambience:
5Superb
4Good
3Ordinary
2Not Good
1Awful
0No data.
3 Access:
5Can be driven to, probably with disabled access
4Short walk on a footpath
3Requiring a bit more of a walk
2A long walk
1In the middle of nowhere, a nightmare to find
0No data.
4 Accuracy:
5co-ordinates taken by GPS or official recorded co-ordinates
4co-ordinates scaled from a detailed map
3co-ordinates scaled from a bad map
2co-ordinates of the nearest village
1co-ordinates of the nearest town
0no data
5

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I have visited· I would like to visit

TheCaptain visited on 31st Jul 2020 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 3 Access: 4 Friday afternoon 10k walk, north from Old Sodbury along the Cotswold Edge through two ancient forts, past three old churches and lots of big houses to Horton Court. Back over fields through Little Sodbury. Stopped for a pint at the Dog afterwards.

4clydesdale7 visited on 24th Aug 2011 - their rating: Cond: 3 Amb: 4 Access: 3 I am uncomfortable with the suggestion that this could be pre-Roman

TheWhiteRider visited on 21st Jun 2010 - their rating: Cond: 4 Amb: 3 Access: 4



Average ratings for this site from all visit loggers: Condition: 3.67 Ambience: 3.33 Access: 3.67

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : View east between the fortifications from the outer bank of Old Sodbury Camp (Vote or comment on this photo)
Old Sodbury hillfort is an impressive Bronze to Iron age encampment atop the Cotswold Ridge, alongside the A46 road. The fort is approx. 11acres in size and is made up of a double set of ditches and ramparts.

It's location is a mystery due to it's relative difficulty in access and lack of fresh water supplies locally, but is thought to be connected with the much ruined Horton hill fort nearby.

Local legend claims the Romans refortified the camp after the invasion, and it was almost certainly utillised during the wars of the roses.

Old Sodbury hillfort is private property, but two foot paths run through and across the site. Please stick to these paths, and be wary of grazing live stock. As it is a private monument, metal detecting is strictly not allowed.

See also Horton Hillfort, Chipping Sodbury, and Grickstone Mehir.
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Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by Thorgrim : The internal banks and ditches are rectangular with rounded corners, very like the layout of Roman forts. This suggests that a Roman fort has been added to an earlier one. (1 comment - Vote or comment on this photo)

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by Thorgrim : Iron Age in origin, but referred to as " the Roman fort" by the locals. The level ramparts and rectangular ground plan suggest that the Romans refortified an earlier fort. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by camperman : Old Sodbury Camp taken from the south east corner showing its roughly rectangular shape and widely spaced double ramparts and ditches. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by camperman : The south east corner looking north showing the wide spaced ramparts. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by camperman : The inner ditch running west to the escarpment edge. (Vote or comment on this photo)

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by camperman : A view from the east showing the causewayed entrance.

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by camperman : The fort viewed from the south west showing the steep Cotswold escarpment on the wooded western side where there is a single bank and berm crowning the slope.

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : Old Sodbury Camp seen from the south, having walked up the higher version of the Cotswold Way from Old Sodbury

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : View from within the fortifications of Old Sodbury camp

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : View northwards across the inside of the camp from the southern banks

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : Looking west along the top of the inner bank at the southern side

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : Composite panorama of Old Sodbury Camp from the northwestern corner

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : Within the ramparts of Old Sodbury Camp at the northwestern corner

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by TheCaptain : From a noticeboard at the Camp

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by 4clydesdale7 : The earthworks at the top of the Cotswold Scarp 200m N of the Roman Camp but immediately to the W of the N half of the 'British Camp' suggested by Witts

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by 4clydesdale7 : Looking N along the E side outer bank of the Roman Camp - nearest is the later entrance (from which the other photo was taken) - just beyond is the earlier entrance built by the Romans but beyond that is the N extension of the outer E bank which Witts considered might have been built to connect with a bank built 'by the British'

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by 4clydesdale7 : The staggered entrance (but not the earliest) to the Roman Camp

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by 4clydesdale7 : The outer ditch and bank to the SE of the Roman Camp looking in the direction of the Cross Hands

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by 4clydesdale7 : The NW outside bank and inner ditch of the Roman Camp near to a foot entrance leaving access to a local spring

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by mishkin : North entrance, second outer bank by farm. Cotswold Way entrance through small gate, walking from the church.

Old Sodbury
Old Sodbury submitted by mishkin : Interior of fort; the "romanised" neatness of the bank is evident compared to earlier untidy outer iron age banks.

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Nearby sites listing. In the following links * = Image available
 1.6km E 82° The Grickstone* Standing Stone (Menhir) (ST77698281)
 1.8km N 11° Horton Camp* Hillfort (ST76438436)
 2.3km ENE 72° Grickstone Farm* Chambered Tomb (ST78278327)
 2.8km WSW 253° Chipping Sodbury Stone Circle* Modern Stone Circle etc (ST73398176)
 4.4km N 9° Hawkesbury Well Holy Well or Sacred Spring (ST7677586931)
 4.7km N 9° Hawkesbury Knoll* Long Barrow (ST76838722)
 4.9km SSE 157° Tormarton 1* Long Barrow (ST77957805)
 5.1km SSE 157° Fox Covert NW* Chambered Tomb (ST78087791)
 5.7km S 172° West Littleton Down* Round Barrow(s) (ST769769)
 5.7km S 188° Dyrham and Hinton Chambered Tomb (ST75307689)
 5.9km E 86° Giant's Caves* Chambered Cairn (ST81998297)
 6.0km E 87° Luckington II* Chambered Tomb (ST82108284)
 6.2km SSW 198° Dyrham Camp* Hillfort (ST741767)
 6.3km NNE 32° Starveall* Chambered Tomb (ST79408792)
 6.6km NNE 32° Upper Kilcott Round Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (ST79638819)
 6.9km NE 42° Tump Barn Round Barrow* Round Barrow(s) (ST80758770)
 7.8km NE 51° Didmarton Cross* Ancient Cross (ST8223887460)
 7.9km NE 51° St Lawrences Well* Holy Well or Sacred Spring (ST82258749)
 7.9km NNE 32° Nan Tow's Tump* Round Barrow(s) (ST80288932)
 8.0km W 276° Iron Acton Churchyard Cross* Ancient Cross (ST6807583467)
 8.1km ESE 120° Lugbury* Chambered Tomb (ST83097856)
 8.2km ENE 75° Hancock's Well Holy Well or Sacred Spring (ST8403684687)
 8.4km ESE 113° Castle Coombe Cursus (ST838793)
 8.8km ESE 112° Castle Coombe Cursus (ST842792)
 9.4km NE 40° Parkwood Farm* Round Barrow(s) (ST822897)
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"Old Sodbury" | Login/Create an Account | 6 News and Comments
  
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Re: Old Sodbury by 4clydesdale7 on Thursday, 25 August 2011
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If Witts is correct where have all the Earthworks gone from the field to the North of the Roman Camp? Other than those shown at the top of the Scarp in my photo (which do not seem to have been repeated to the West of the Roman Camp which would have been logical) (and the Romans built nothing to the West) where did all the other British (earlier) built Western banks and ditch go? They are just not there now.
[ Reply to This ]
    Re: Old Sodbury by h_fenton on Thursday, 25 August 2011
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    try here, you need to click on the '+' signs to expand the headings: http://www.pastscape.org.uk/hob.aspx?hob_id=205135

    to search sites I normally use the map search on pastscape: http://www.pastscape.org.uk/MapSearch.aspx

    note of caution, monument descriptions on Pastscape may contradict each other as they show different peoples interpretations over a period of time.
    [ Reply to This ]
      Re: Old Sodbury by 4clydesdale7 on Thursday, 25 August 2011
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      Pastscape only uses the words 'Iron Age' once in all its five page description of Sodbury Camp and that is under the heading Monument Type on page 5 - it also makes no reference (most unusually for Pastscape) to Witts or BGAS under the heading Sources - hence my research was devoted to seeing where the idea that it was 'an Iron Age Camp' came from - I could find nothing earlier than Witts paper to BGAS one year after he had stated in his epic work that it was Roman built (not altered)
      [ Reply to This ]

Re: Old Sodbury by 4clydesdale7 on Thursday, 25 August 2011
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Visiting Sodbury Camp (formerly Soppa's Camp) and Horton Camp (an Iron Age promontory fort) on the same day because they are about 1.5km apart makes me ask questions - for example - why are two similar forts/camps so close together and on the same ridge? - what function does one perform that the other cannot? - did one become redundant? - was one found to be impracticable? - in design they are centuries apart Horton being the earlier by far - the age of Sodbury has not been confirmed by dedicated excavation - the locals always regarded it as Roman rather than Iron Age -

So where does the notion that it could be Iron Age come from? - the earliest reference I can find that suggests it could be pre-Roman is not so long ago - in his Handbook of Gloucestershire (publ 1883), Witts makes no mention of Sodbury being anything but Roman - Ancient Camp No. 92; but in his paper delivered to the Bris. & Glos. Arch. Soc. published in the Transactions for 1884 Vol 8 having carried out a recent site visit he seems to be the first (at page 75) to venture the opinion that Sodbury forms the 'southern half' of a much bigger (x2) earlier British Camp - he even illustrates this with a plan - has he (most unusually) made an error?

Draw up a fence and allow me to sit on it - there are some earthworks showing today to the North of the Roman camp (see photo) but they are (in the main) above the Western Cotswold Scarp - they are not the pillow mounds shown on the OS map which are some 300m further west and 80m+ lower down the scarp - the other earthworks referred to by Witts do not seem to have left much evidence (he saw a single bank/ditch and suspected the former presence of two watch towers) - but there is stronger evidence at the NE outer ditch/bank of the Roman half, of an extension to the N -

Sodbury is much bigger than Horton - some 12 acres - it helps to cover the N side of the Avon being close to and visible from Dyrham and Freezing Hill Camps - but it affords less protection for the easier routes up the lesser valleys on to the SW Cotswold 'plateau' - it protects the old roman road the Portway (which ran from Glevum/Gloucester to Aquae Sulis/Bath) where Horton was 'on the wrong side of the ridge' - the only items recovered from within Sodbury are a Roman quern and a Roman Coin with a Crossed Hands Motif (hence the name of the hostelry about 1 mile S at the junction of the Portway and the Roman road from the Ridgeway near Oldbury to Malmesbury) - Sodbury has a 'uniform' Roman design (Polybian) and is large enough to accommodate 'three cohorts plus double the number of foot soldiers and allies' - Horton could not have taken so many -

If I had to chose it must be that Sodbury is the Modern Camp the more practicable - the same choice made by the Anglo-Saxons in 577AD before the Battle of Dyrham and King Edward IV before the Battle of Tewkesbury during the War of the Roses in 1471 - the Romans built a new Fort in a better position; they needed to protect an important crossroads and house a small garrison whilst the Celts did not -
[ Reply to This ]
    Re: Old Sodbury by TheCaptain on Thursday, 25 August 2011
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    Very interesting 4clydesdale7, this is something I have often wondered, whenever I pass by. It is not at all like a typical hill or promontary fort, and its rectangular arrangement to me clearly shouts "Roman". But was there anything here before which they adapted? I don't know, and to be honest have never really tried to find out! But it just feels wrong for Iron Age to me.

    [ Reply to This ]

Re: Old Sodbury by Anonymous on Tuesday, 20 February 2007
This is an interesting site with what appear to be defensive fortifications cut into the hillside along towards Old Sodbury. They can be clearly seen from the Cotswold Way footpath. The remains of what may be a road also forms part of the Cotswold Way just after the reservoir. At this point evidence of a field system or similar can also be seen looking downhill towards Chipping Sodbury.
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