by Hugh Thompson
A second year of excavations was carried out at Oldbury from 27 July to 16 August 1984 and comprised a main trench by the northeast gate and further examination of the magnetic anomalies of the fort's interior.
The main trench, 3 m wide and 24 m long, was excavated as a direct comparison with the 1938 (size -1) defenses excavation which lay 11.5 m to the north. Similar features were encountered: a massive rampart placed on a "raft" of sandstone rubble and composed of sand at the front and heavy rubble to the rear, which was defined by a kerb. The pre-rampart ground surface was identified as a greyish sand and stone surface flecked with charcoal; a barbed-and-tanged flint arrowhead was found at this level. Two major differences from the 1938 section were the survival of the rampart height to 2.7 m as opposed to 1.2 m and the interpretation of the stone revetment; in 1938, the revetment was regarded as a secondary feature (Belgic refortification) but the recent evidence of easily eroded sand at the rampart front suggests a requirement for some form of early revetment. A new solitary feature immediately behind the revetment was a post-pit 0.3 m in diameter and 0.6 m into the pre-rampart ground surface; it lay close to the north face of the trench and is interpreted as one of widely spaced marker posts rather than an earlier palisade.
The inner face of the ditch was located 3 m in advance of the revetment. It was cut 2.4 m through layers of hard brown and soft yellow sandstone to a flat bed of greyish-white sandstone. Where the outer face would have been expected, a make-up of clay, brick, and stone constituting a possible trackway was found.
A newly-discovered feature - a post-pit in the prerampart ground surface behind the revetment.
An extension trench 1.2 m wide and 20 m long investigated a possible outer bank beyond the trackway. The flat bed of sandstone extended 6 m where it encountered a disturbed area of sand-filled pits, to at least 1.8 m depth, interspersed with flaggy sandstone dumps lying at differing angles. This area suggests extensive quarrying had occurred (and possibly at the hill fort defenses); Roman pottery from the disturbed fill extended from mid IC to late 3C. This quarrying interpretation discounts the 1938 view of outer defenses.
A completed section through the rampart, viewed from the outside defences, looking west.
Dating evidence for the main defenses comprises a small group of possible Bronze Age heavily flint-gritted sherds at the original surface beneath the rampart tail and Iron Age sherds from the tail; two Roman sherds of the 2nd and 3rd centuries respectively, located at the rampart top at a 1.8 m depth may be indicative of further stone robbing.
The defenses are interpreted as a single bank and ditch of one period and, on the 1983 evidence, dated to the second to first century BC.
Further investigation of two magnetic anomalies located in 1983 was made. Trench 3 was extended and, with the 1983 evidence of iron-smelting, a pair of iron furnaces of uncertain date is surmised. Trench 9 was extended to a 6 m square and the 1983 hearth and gully, thought to be a hut site, were relocated. The gully developed into a linear feature, probably contemporary with the hearth, and the pottery from the dark fill was of 150-50 BC.
Three radiocarbon dates (5570 half-life) are now available for 1983:
1. BM-2290. Charcoal from hearth beneath main rampart. 360 BC +/- 50
2. BM-2291. Charcoal from hearth in Trench 8 (a magnetic anomaly) - no associated finds. 110 AD +/- 40
3. BM-2292. Charcoal from Trench 9 (described above). 40 AD +/- 80
The date for 1, although earlier than the suggested hillfort construction, is evidence for earlier hilltop activity. 2 is later than the hillfort period and may represent known local Roman activity. 3 is later than the pottery would suggest but is acceptable within one (+/-80) or two (+/-160) standard deviations.
