Stone Age finds are unearthed in Wiltshire garden

Submitted by vicky on Thursday, 08 April 2004 Page Views: 2681

An archaeological dig in the gardens of Coombe End House nursing home in London Road, Marlborough, has revealed exciting Stone Age finds that could cause the plans for the site to be modified. Experts unearthed a bucket full of flint chippings showing that Stone Age tools were fashioned on the site.

After years of concern over the future of the home, the only one in Wiltshire still run by Wiltshire County Council, plans have been submitted for a large, new home on the site.

County archaeologists called in Wessex Archaeology to carry out test digs to see if the site contained any interesting historical remains.

Mark Roberts, project manager, said there had been important archaeological finds previously in the area, notably the Marlborough bucket, a leather bucket dating from the Iron Age, which was found in nearby St Margarets Mead in 1807.

Sue Farr, one of the team of three archaeologists who completed the dig on Friday, said there had been a possibility of finding remains of occupation by the Romans, who were present all along the Kennet Valley with their city Cunetio at Mildenhall and a villa at Littlecote.

Ms Farr said they had also been on the look out for traces of medieval pottery that would have been evidence of settlement in this area in the Middle Ages.

Although the dig revealed no trace of Roman or medieval remains, the team were delighted to find evidence that Stone Age man had camped in the area.

Mr Roberts said: There are only 12 other sites in the Kennet Valley where this sort of material has been found."

He said that despite being very old and fragile, the flint chippings that were found at a depth of about 80cm were in good condition.

Mr Roberts said that when the flints were fashioned as tools, implements and weapons between 11,000 and 12,000 years ago, the London Road area would have been a wooded valley.

The Stone Age people were hunter gatherers who had no permanent settlements but moved around the area.

He said they would have worn furs taken from animals they had hunted. They would have been sewn together rather like the clothing made by the Eskimo people, and not just simply thrown over their shoulders or wrapped around them.

However, the flint chippings that were found in the Marlborough excavation revealed no clues as to what tools or weapons they would have been fashioning.

Mr Roberts said that although there are no deposits of flint in the immediate area of Coombe End, they could have been found higher up the valley in the chalk outcrops.

He said a mechanical digger was used to remove the upper layer of soil from the nursing home garden.

Seven exploratory trenches were dug but only one, at the front of the building near the London Road, had revealed any finds.

The flint chippings have been sent to the Wessex Archaeology unit at Salisbury. They will now be examined more closely by Phil Harding, the TV's Time Team star, a member of the Wessex unit, who has been involved in listing all Palaeolithic sites in Britain.

He also regularly demonstrates flint knapping at craft shows.

Mr Harding has a special interest in Marlborough because he formerly attended the town's grammar school and as a youth worked for Pelham Puppets. In 1966 he started his archaeological career on a Bristol University training excavation on Fyfield and Overton Down, near Marlborough.

Source: The Gazette & Herald, Marborough 07/04/2004

Contributor Bio for vicky: Ex Megalithic Portal Editor, Co-author of 'Rock Around the Peak - Megalithic Monuments of the Peak District' and... More

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