Croydon APA 1.3: Farthing Down
The Farthing Down Archaeological Priority Area covers the entirety of the Farthing Down Scheduled Monument and areas on its western and eastern sides. The North Downs have produced multiple prehistoric features and finds and was clearly an active prehistoric landscape. Farthing Down is no exception and finds dating from all prehistoric periods have been found in the APA.
Farthing Down is particularly noteworthy for the Iron Age/Romano British field system and Saxon burial grounds that are located there. The APA is classified as Tier 1 because it covers the site of a Scheduled Monument and adjacent archaeological remains directly associated with it.
Farthing Down is a flat topped ridge that projects from the North Downs with relatively steep slopes on its western, northern and eastern sides. Prehistoric finds include flints from the Mesolithic and Neolithic periods, pottery fragments dating from between the Bronze Age and Roman periods and a number of tools such as axes and a razor.
No trace of a prehistoric settlement has been found on Farthing Down but it is possible that some sort of settlement was located nearby. A path that is thought to have originally been a prehistoric trackway running from north to south along the top of the Down is closely followed by the modern road. The finds do suggest that some form of activity was taking place but it is not clear if the activity related to settlement or other activity alongside the trackway.
The chalk on Farthing Down is overlaid by a light free draining soil which would have made the area suitable for early agriculture. A field system has been identified along the summit of Farthing Down on either side of the trackway which is typical of the Romano-British period. Earth banks projecting from either side of the trackway created enclosures that were presumably used for farming and some of these banks are still identifiable. The large amount of pottery dating from between the 1st century BC and mid-2nd century AD has led to the conclusion that this was the period when the field system was in use. No contemporary settlement associated with the field system has been identified on Farthing Down but one may have been located nearby and it is possible that the fields were farmed by more than one community.
A number of Saxon burial mounds are located on Farthing Down in three distinct clusters from north to south along the trackway which are identified on modern maps as tumuli. The northernmost group of barrows is situated near the top of the northern slope of the Down and has the largest amount of barrows. Another smaller group of barrows is located approximately 400m to the south while two isolated barrows are located 350m further south.
Excavations during the 1870s examined 16 barrows while a survey in 1931 counted 14 identifiable barrows which varied in diameter between 3.7m and 12.2m and none were more than 0.6m high. However, a survey in 2011 found there to be a total of 15 visible barrows (nine in the northern group, four in the central group and two in the southern group). It is difficult to account for this discrepancy which makes it difficult to state precisely how many barrows there once were.
However, due to the relatively low height of the barrows it is possible that some were not noticed during earlier surveys or the intrusions of previous excavations may have made them less visible within the landscape. A number of excavations have taken place since the 18th century and all the barrows appear to have been investigated at some point. Little is known about the first excavation that took place in the 18th century but it appears that one or two of the barrows were opened and the skeletal remains were removed. A far more thorough excavation took place in the 1870s.
During this excavation 16 of the barrows were excavated and a number of skeletons and grave goods were found which included silver pins, a knife blade, an iron spear, a bucket, a gold medallion, a bronze buckle and a drinking cup with bronze fillets. One barrow contained the skeleton of a 6ft 5in man, an iron sword and an impressive iron shield boss which appeared to indicate that the person was someone of importance. Most of the human remains were left in the barrows while the grave goods were sent to the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford and helped to date the barrows to the 7th century.
The impressive nature of the grave goods and relatively low number of barrows may indicate that only people of high rank within the local community were being buried on Farthing Down. The location of the nearest Saxon settlement is not known but it is possible that is was in the area now known as Old Coulsdon to the east which is mentioned in a charter dating from the late 7th or early 8thcentury. Another grave, which had not been placed in a barrow, was found unexpectedly in 1939 by workmen digging a cable trench. An excavation in 1948 found that it was one of a series of six graves located approximately 60ft from the nearest barrow. Three of the graves contained young children who were approximately two years old and a small iron spear was found in one of the children’s graves.
Another grave was excavated in 1949 which contained the bodies of a young man, a boy who was approximately 12 years old and a middle aged woman who appeared to have been thrown into the grave after the other two burials had been laid there. Objects found from all these graves included pins, beads, a comb, shears, iron knives and a miniature spear which helped to date the graves to the mid-7th century which makes them contemporaneous with the barrows. The fact that these burials had not been placed in barrows suggests that the occupants may have been of a different social status.
The 1948/1949 excavations also re-examined four of the barrows that had been excavated in the 1870s and found the skeleton of a child that had not been found during the earlier excavations. Little activity appears to have taken place on Farthing Down during the medieval and post medieval periods and on the Rocque map of Surrey from the 1760s it is shown as an open area presumably used for grazing. It therefore retains a historic landscape that has seen little change since at least the medieval period.
During the Second World War 24 anti-glider trenches were cut across Farthing Down in order to prevent enemy aircraft from landing there. A large quantity of late Iron Age and early Roman pottery fragments were found in these trenches, which helped to date the field system, and two late Neolithic or early Bronze Age flint axes were also found.
Excavations in 2005 and 2006 recovered Mesolithic or early Neolithic flint flakes and pottery fragments dating to between the late Bronze Age and early Roman periods.
Farthing Down is an area of open downland which represents a significant survival of historic rural landscape on the outskirts of London. The field system and Saxon burials justify its status as a Scheduled Monument and as a Tier 1 Archaeological Priority Area. The Celtic field system demonstrates how local people were farming the land in the late prehistoric and early Roman period while the Saxon burials reflect the beliefs and burial customs of the local community during the 7th century.
The barrows and the unmarked burials show that Farthing Down had become a commemorative site in the Anglo-Saxon period and was part of a network of cemeteries along the Wandle Valley along with sites at Cane Hill, Croydon, Beddington, and Mitcham. Differences in the orientation of the burials and the presence of grave goods may reflect the pagan or Christian beliefs of the local population. The graves may mark a cross over period in beliefs where important people, such as the man buried with the iron sword and shield boss were still being buried with grave goods even if they were Christian. The 7th century was a period when Christianity was being re-introduced to the South-East of England and the Farthing Down burials may reflect a transitional period of conflicting beliefs.
The chance find of an unmarked Saxon burial in 1939 demonstrated that non barrow burials were present on Farthing Down and more may still be present. If more Saxon burials with associated grave goods were found in the future they would further enhance our knowledge of the people buried there and their associated customs and beliefs.
The Second World War remains are illustrative of anti-invasion precautions used to counter potential airborne landings that were anticipated as part of a German invasion using new blitzkrieg tactics.
References
An Analysis and List of Surrey Barrows, L. V. Grinsell, Surrey Archaeological Collections, Vol. 42, 1934
Celtic Agriculture in Surrey, B. Hope-Taylor, Surrey Archaeological Collections, Vol. 50, 1949
Excavations on Farthing Down, B. Hope-Taylor, The Archaeological News Letter, Vol. 2 No. 10, 1950
A Gazetteer of Early Anglo-Saxon Burial Sites, A. Meaney, George Allen & Unwin Ltd, 1964
Anglo-Saxon Surrey, J. Morris, Surrey Archaeological Collections, Vol. 56, 1959
Village Histories 5. Coulsdon, I. Scales (ed.), The Bourne Society, 2000
Notices of an Anglo-Saxon Cemetery at Farthing Down, Coulsdon, Surrey, J. Wickham Flower, Surrey Archaeological Collections, Vol. 6, 1874
Farthing Downs & New Hill, Coulsdon, London Borough of Croydon, Heritage Conservation Plan, Wessex Archaeology, 2011
Source: https://www.croydon.gov.uk/sites/default/files/articles/downloads/archaeological-priority-pt2.pdf
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