Gillingham Jewels: Grange Farm Excavations
An archaeological excavation was undertaken by Pre-Construct Archaeology Limited at Grange Farm outside Gillingham, ending in April 2006. Six months of extensive work revealed an unexpected depth of archaeology, producing a wealth of finds and information, predominantly from the Roman period. The investigation was undertaken on behalf of Taylor Woodrow and Persimmon (South East) Homes with the assistance of Duncan Hawkins, CgMs Consulting, and was supervised by Guy Seddon. An initial evaluation of 51 trenches across the site found
Images of some of the finds from the Grange Farm Excavation.
An archaeological excavation was undertaken by Pre-Construct Archaeology Limited at Grange Farm outside Gillingham, ending in April 2006. Six months of extensive work revealed an unexpected depth of archaeology, producing a wealth of finds and information, predominantly from the Roman period. The investigation was undertaken on behalf of Taylor Woodrow and Persimmon (South East) Homes with the assistance of Duncan Hawkins, CgMs Consulting, and was supervised by Guy Seddon. An initial evaluation of 51 trenches across the site found 10 ditches and few pits dating to the Late Iron Age through to the end of Roman Britain. This suggested a small agricultural settlement, possibly centered on the site of the medieval Grench Manor, which lies at the heart of the area of excavation.
However, as the excavations expanded beyond the area of the original evaluation into additional land, it was discovered that despite the severe ploughing, the site had concentrations of unusually well-preserved archaeology surviving in discrete locations. One of the earliest features was a north-south aligned Roman road crossing the entirety of the site, probably linking to the nearby Watling Street with the Medway coast. In places, the lower layers of the road and its side ditches survived intact, but in other places it had been entirely ploughed away. Towards the north of the site, the road seemed to be lined with quarry pits, presumably for easy transport of the local brick earth.
To the west of the road were a series of early Romano-British rectilinear enclosures demarcated by large boundary ditches. These are thought to have been filled in around the 3rd century, being replaced with masonry walls, running along the same alignments. However, in some places there seems to have been a major phase of rebuilding on the site with beam-like timber framed buildings with stone post pads and cobbled flooring erected to the east of the roadway. The roadway itself was also slightly diverted as its old course had to be re-routed, running to the east around the new building complex and back west onto its original course.
To the west of the roadway, in a commanding position, lay a 3rd century mausoleum containing a teenage girl in a lead coffin. Two gold necklaces were found overlaying the grave but no other grave goods were found in the skeleton. The masonry walls had been entirely robbed out and the presence of further human remains in the backfill suggest the building may once have contained more than one burial.
After the abandonment of the road and buildings, a considerable thickness of a Roman ‘dark earth’ built up over the remains of these features and survived later ploughing. This soil produced large quantities of pottery, building materials and domestic rubbish, together with a particular wealth of coins, tools, small finds, ornaments and weapons, with the help of local metal detectorists working in cooperation.
Whether this concentration of finds is due to the intensity of occupation in the immediate area or because it was protected by the re-cutting/terracing is as yet unclear. While over most of the site the natural brick earth lay close to the surface, the depth of archaeology in this built-up commercial area was up to 2m! The building complex was delineated into southern and western sides by impressive flint walls, the foundations of which survived with the use of the hilliest slope. That these walls must have been visually grand could be imagined when one of the corners was found to have collapsed, preserving the pattern of the tiled column, pier decoration.
The Roman structures were systematically later robbed of building materials, evident in the almost total removal of the mausoleum foundations and the re-use of Roman building materials within the fabric of the surviving medieval elements of Grench Manor.
Peter Moore
Pre-Construct Archaeology Limited
Roman artifact from the excavation site.