Excavations on Oldbury Hill, Ightham, 1938

EXCAVATIONS ON OLDBURY HILL, IGHTHAM, 1938. 139 on the MU itself. Towards the close of the Early Iron Age, however, the MU was fortified by the erection of a bank and ditch round the summit. Chance finds and excavation have alike failed to prove the existence of any permanent settlement within the area defended. Such settlement there may have been ; but it may be regarded as certain that the camp was primarUy the fortified centre of a considerable scattered Iron Age population m the neighbourhood of Seal Chart and Ightham. It was with the character of the defences themselves and with theh date that the excavations were mainly concerned. The hiU is a site of considerable natural strength. This is not immediately apparent; for to the south and south-west it is overlooked by the slightly higher ground of the main Lower Greensand ridge, of which it is a lateral extension. At the southern end a track leads down from the South Gate across a low saddle to join the main ridge ; but elsewhere the steep, and in places precipitous, slopes form a strong natural defence, of which the builders of the camp made fuh use. OMy towards the north does the hiU slope gently and uniformly from the Mghest point by the South Gate, right down to the valley which lies at the foot of the scarp of the North Downs. Apart from its size (123 acres within the ramparts) the hill was weU suited to the needs of prehistoric defence. In its present form the earthwork, save for the passage of the medieval Sevenoaks-Ightham road above Styant's Bottom, is contmuous from the South Gate, above Seven Wents, right round the western brow of the hiU to the north end of the camp, where it swings eastwards and ends at the point where the stream leaves the camp. Immediately to the east of the stream there is a short gap caused by the dehberate levelling of the rampart in the nineteenth century, after which it runs for some 200 yards slightly south of east across comparatively level ground, and ends sharply on the brow of the steep scarp-slope of the eastern face of the bill, about 120 feet to the east of the origmal north-east gate. Most of the eastern face of the MU has been much damaged by quarrying, and the absence of any certain trace of 13A.