University of Birmingham Archaeological and Environmental Investigations of a Late Glacial and Holocene river valley sequence on the River Soar, at Croft, Leicestershire Smith, David; Roseff, R; Bevan, L; Brown, AG; Butler, S; Hughes, G; Monokton, A DOI: 10.1191/0959683605hl806rp Document Version Early version, also known as pre-print Citation for published version (Harvard): Smith, D, Roseff, R, Bevan, L, Brown, AG, Butler, S, Hughes, G & Monokton, A 2005, 'Archaeological and Environmental Investigations of a Late Glacial and Holocene river valley sequence on the River Soar, at Croft, Leicestershire', The Holocene, vol. 15, pp. 353-377. https://doi.org/10.1191/0959683605hl806rp Link to publication on Research at Birmingham portal General rights Unless a licence is specified above, all rights (including copyright and moral rights) in this document are retained by the authors and/or the copyright holders. 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Take down policy While the University of Birmingham exercises care and attention in making items available there are rare occasions when an item has been uploaded in error or has been deemed to be commercially or otherwise sensitive. If you believe that this is the case for this document, please contact [email protected] providing details and we will remove access to the work immediately and investigate. Download date: 25. Sep. 2021 The Holocene http://hol.sagepub.com Archaeological and environmental investigations of a Lateglacial and Holocene river sedimentary sequence on the River Soar at Croft, Leicestershire, UK David N. Smith, Rebecca Roseff, Lynne Bevan, Anthony G. Brown, Simon Butler, Gwylim Hughes and Angela Monckton The Holocene 2005; 15; 353 DOI: 10.1191/0959683605hl806rp The online version of this article can be found at: http://hol.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/15/3/353 Published by: http://www.sagepublications.com Additional services and information for The Holocene can be found at: Email Alerts: http://hol.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts Subscriptions: http://hol.sagepub.com/subscriptions Reprints: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav Permissions: http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav Downloaded from http://hol.sagepub.com at University of Birmingham on May 2, 2007 © 2005 SAGE Publications. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use or unauthorized distribution. The Holocene 15,3 (2005) pp. 353- 377 Archaeological and environmental investigations of a Lateglacial and Holocene river sedimentary sequence on the River Soar at Croft, Leicestershire, UK David N. Smith,'* Rebecca Roseff,2 Lynne Bevan,3 Anthony G. Brown,4 Simon Butler,5 Gwylim Hughes6 and Angela Monckton7 (1Department of Ancient History and Archaeology, The University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK; 2Hereford Archaeology, Hereford County Council, Conservation and Environmental Planning, PO Box 3, Leominster HR6 8LU, UK, 3Birmingham University Field Archaeology Unit, The University of Birmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham BJ5 2TT2 UK; 4Department of Geography, Amory Building, Rennes Drive, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4RJ, UK; 5Department of Geography, The University ofBirmingham, Edgbaston, Birmingham BJ5 2TT, UK; 6Gwynedd Archaeological Trust, Craig Beuno, Garth Road, Bangor, Gwynedd LL57 2R7j UK; Universit ofLeicester Archaeology Services, University of Leicester, University Road, Leicester LEJ 7RH, UK) Received 9 September 2002; revised manuscript accepted 10 April 2004 Abstract: The sediments, stratigraphy and archaeology of several sections through Lateglacial and Holocene deposits associated with the past course of the Thurlston Brook at Croft, Leicestershire, UK are outlined. The results of pollen, plant macrofossil and insect analyses from these deposits are presented and this information is used to provide a detailed reconstruction of changing river conditions and human land use at this location during the Holocene. Despite the presence of hiatuses in the record seen at Croft, and other sites of this scale, with accurate work and clear dating controls it is possible to 'stitch' together continuous detailed sequences. The general pattern of Holocene landscape and fluvial change appears to A echo that seen in the Trent valley region and nationally. It is suggested that small headwater catchments HOLOCENE such as at Croft have the potential to provide detailed and sensitive records of Holocene events comparable RESEARCH with those from 'standard' sediment sequences. PAPER Key words: Environmental archaeology, sediments, pollen, plant macrofossils, palaeoentomology, alluviation, river valley development, Leicestershire, early Holocene. Introduction lands and, in its upper and middle stretch, flows eastward as far as Newark on Trent. Tributaries such as the Dove, Derwent The River Trent (Figure 1) has the second largest catchment and Sour join the Trent in this mid-section and drain large area in the UK. It drains an area of approximately 7490 km2 areas of the Derbyshire peaks, forming a network of con- and is approximately 149 km long (Ward, 1981). The river rises fluences along a 15 km section of the river. The joint input of from a number of tributaries draining the Staffordshire moor- these tributaries results in the Trent having the highest annual discharge in the UK (82.21 m3/s). Above Newark upon Trent *Author for correspondence (e-mail: [email protected]) ( 2005 Edward Amold (Publishers) Ltd 10.1 191/0959683605hI806rp Downloaded from http://hol.sagepub.com at University of Birmingham on May 2, 2007 © 2005 SAGE Publications. All rights reserved. Not for commercial use or unauthorized distribution. 354 The Holocene 15 (2005) Research aims at Croft The archaeological, sedimentological and palaeoenvironmental work undertaken on the past course of the Thurleston Brook at Croft had a number of clear research aims. Primarily it was hoped that Croft would provide an opportunity to confirm and add detail to the proposed models of fluvial and landscape change suggested for the River Sour (Brown and Keough, 1992; Brown et al., 1994) and the Trent (Knight and Howard, 1994, 1995, 2005). Furthermore, there was a possibility that small catchments such as this would be more sensitive in their response to climate and land-use change. Smaller drainage systems might 'record' events that would be effectively 'blurred' by the depositional and taphonomic problems associated with larger river systems. Croft could also function as a test case to see if information from individual deposits with a wide range of differing dates could be 'stitched' together to form a continuous and logical sequence of events. Though several sites in the Trent catchment, noticeably those around the main confluences, do contain sediment 'pockets' from differing periods, there has been no previous deliberate attempt to link such deposits across time to form a coherent picture. Given the rarity of continuous sequences of Holocene sediments in the Trent valley, because of reworking of bed materials by the river during the Holocene, demonstrating that such an approach is successful is of importance in the region. Lastly, it was hopped that the Figure 1 Location of Croft Quarry, Leicestershire archaeology of the floodplain itself might allow us to see how settlement and the use of the river valley have changed in response to both fluvial and landscape change over time. the river swings northwards and drains, via the River Humber, into the North Sea. The alluvial history of the upper and middle Trent has been Local background investigated in some detail, with the bulk of this work summarized in Knight and Howard (1994, 1995, 2005). The Croft Quarry, Leicestershire, lies approximately 11 km to the Trent appears to follow the same sequence of river develop- southwest of Leicester, UK (Figure 1) and is located to the ment seen in many other lowland catchments in the UK southwest (centred on SP517968) of Thurlaston Brook near to throughout the Holocene (Macklin and Needham, 1992; its confluence with the River Soar (Figures 1 and 2). The site is Macklin, 1999). A relatively short period of braided river 67 m above the Ordnance Datum (OD). Thurlaston Brook's behaviour between c. 9500 and 9000 appears to be replaced by catchment is in the region of c. 56 km2. This is comparable with a floodplain-wide anasotomising river system mainly rework- the upstream catchment of the Soar at 63 km2. The catchments ing gravel and sand substrates until c. 800-300 BC. Channel of both watercourses are low-lying, below 130 m OD. The change is mainly by avulsion during this period. Though there underlying geology is Triassic Mercia Mudstone Group (Bridge do appear to be specific periods of raised flood activity and et al., 1998). This is overlain by glacial sediments belonging to rising water-tables during this period, their impact on both the Wolston glacial Succession (the Oadby till). Though there is river and human activity is not clear (Brown and Keough, debate over the specific age of this deposit, Bridge et al. (1998) 1992; Brown et al., 1994, 2001; Howard et al. 1999). From c. have suggested an association with a late advance ofthe Anglian 800 BC there appears to be widespread deposition of clay ice sheet. Several valleys in the area also contain Devensian sand alluvium in the Trent Valley system (Knight and Howard, and gravel river terrace deposits.