EWENNY PRIORY ARCHAEOLOGICAL WATCHING BRIEF EP 99 Carried out for Caroe and Partners, Architects Casgliad Tirlun Cymru (Welsh Landscape Collection) National Library of Wales Hollinrake Archaeology Co-op Consultant Archaeologists, 12 Bove Town, Glastonbury, Somerset BA6 8JE Telephone: 01458 833332 www.hollinrake.org.uk Report number 271 EWENNY PRIORY ARCHAEOLOGICAL WATCHING BRIEF SUMMARY The excavation of a service trench through the churchyard at Ewenny Priory exposed a feature tentatively identified as a filled-in watercourse, a possible wall foundation and 22 supine burials. The burials lay partially below the present church path which runs up to the North Porch giving rise to a discussion of the date of the path. Pottery of the Romano-British, medieval and post-medieval periods were recovered from in and around the graves. Consideration of the location of Ewenny within the Romano-British settlement pattern suggests the site lies near the place where the major Roman road for South Wales crosses the River Ewenny. An architectural fragment carrying an unusual haut relief suggests the site once ccontained an earlier church. 1.0 INTRODUCTION 1.1 Ewenny Priory is a Scheduled Ancient Monument (no. Gm 190). Renovation and repair to the building requires special sensitivity and expertise and attracts the support and guidance of CADW. Caroe and Partners, an architectural practice specialising in historic buildings, set out the project design and the ground works were carried out by Dimbylow Crump Ltd. under the project manager Gary Perkins. 1.2 As part of the renovation works a new service trench was excavated from west of the North Porch northwards to the road. This trench was nominally 0.45m wide x 0.60m deep and was cut for an electricity mains cable and a waste water pipe. 1.3 Unexpectedly, this trench revealed a series of burials. These were initially recorded by Caroe and Partners resident archaeologist Mr. Jerry Sampson but there were soon too burials many for him to properly deal with and he called in consultant archaeologists C. & N. Hollinrake who completed the recording of the archaeological deposits exposed within the service trench. Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 1 Ewenny Priory EP99 1.4 The archaeological recording was undertaken by C. & N. Hollinrake assisted by the ground workers from Dimbylow Crump on the 18th and 19th of June and the 8th of July 1999. C. & N. Hollinrake also undertook the background research on which this paper is based, except for the study of the church building itself, which was undertaken by Jerry Sampson, who also provided the historical background summarised below. Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 2 Ewenny Priory EP99 2.0 BACKGROUND 2.1 Topography and Soils Figure 1. Location map. The red star marks Ewenney and the red circle indicates Ogmore Castle. http://magic.defra.gov.uk/ 2.1.1 The Ewenny River, a tributary of the Ogmore River, rises on the western slopes of Mynydd y Gaer. The estuary of the Ogmore River and its connected river system must always have been an important factor for transport, communications and defence, an importance reflected in the density of Roman sites along its banks (Figure 2) and the siting of the Norman stronghold of Ogmore Castle near its mouth. Ewenny Priory is situated some 3.5 kilometres up the river from the estuary and small port of Ogmore-by-Sea. Figure 1A shows that the Priory is near to the spot where the Roman road which runs from Cardiff to the north near Bridgend crosses the river. (Grid Ref: SS912 778 ) 2.1.2 The Priory lies on a small area of the Lawford series of Denchworth type soils. These are " seasonally waterlogged slowly permeable soils " with an underlying geology of Jurassic and Cretaceous clay, described as: Slowly permeable seasonally waterlogged clayey soils with similar fine loamy over clayey soils. Some fine loamy over clayey soils with only slight seasonal waterlogging and some slowly permeable calcareous clayey soils. Landslips and associated irregular terrain locally. These soils are best suited for Winter cereals and short term grassland in drier lowlands, dairying on permanent grassland in most districts .1 1 Soil Survey of England and Wales Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 3 Ewenny Priory EP99 2.2 Historical Background (Figure 2) Ewenny Priory e r WALES o m g N O . R y nn 00413M we m Glanwenny . E tiu R en 00401M Av 010 Ewenny 16m Cardiff Priory Cowbridge 00400M line of Roman road (approx.) 90/70 20/70 Flat Holm Steep Holm town BRISTOL CHANNEL hillfort (poss. occupied) villa/farm Roman fort signal station Old Burrow signal station industrial site SOMERSET >150m Combwich 00413M SMR number 2 Location and Roman sites 2 Taken from Glamorgan County History Vol. II, pp. 291 & 294, and Aston and Burrow, 1982, p. 64. Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 4 Ewenny Priory EP99 2.2.1 Roman period (See Figure 2) Between AD55 - 60 the Roman frontier advanced into South Wales, the territory of the Iron Age tribe of the Silures. The first Roman fort was built in Usk in the mid- 50s, probably by the XX Legion moving up from the Severn Valley. 3 The Silures offered stiff resistance and the Romans built another fort in a location which now lies below Cardiff Castle 4. A road connected the fort at Cardiff to the small town at Cowbridge before extending north-west towards the neighborhood of Ewenny. 5 The Sites and Monuments Record identifies the Roman site of Bomium with a nearby Roman fort (00413M Bomium Roman fort SS9045 7815). The name BOMIUM , from the Antonine Itinerary, was thought by Jackson to be a misreading of the name BOVIUM. This would derive from the British bou -, meaning 'cow', and has been identified with the Roman settlement at Cowbridge. 6 Ewenny has been identified with the name Aventio from the Ravenna Cosmography, probably the name of a British river goddess. 7 The British form of the name would be Aventius , deriving from ewyll-ys meaning 'wish, will' suggesting the river is named after its spring source 8 The name suggests this would have been a holy well. 2.2.2 Medieval period This passage is taken largely from the historical digest prepared by Jerry Sampson. Documents attest to the founding of a priory at Ewenny in 1114. It is suggested, however, that an earlier foundation preceded this church on or near to the site, 9 a view 3 Savory, 1984, p. 280. 4 Savory, 1984, p. 277. 5 Savory, 1984, p. 285. 6 Rivet & Smith, 1979, p. 273. 7 Savory, 1984, p. 461. 8 Rivet & Smith, 1979, p. 260-1. 9 Savory 1984, p. 486. Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 5 Ewenny Priory EP99 confirmed by the discovery of 10th and 11th century memorial stones during the building of a new north aisle in 1895. 10 A convent based on the church of a prior and twelve monks was in existence by 1141. The church of St. Michael stands in the corner of a walled defensive circuit built in the twelfth century or later, making it the best example of a defended monastery in Wales 11 . A letter from Gilbert Foliot, abbot of Gloucester (1139-48), to Prior Osbern, prior of Ewenny or Cardigan, provides an insight into these troubled times: "I recommend you to strengthen the locks of your doors and surround your house with a good ditch, and an impregnable wall lest that people which as you say, gazes with shaggy brow and fierce eyes, break into it and destroy with one blow all your labour and sweat...We see, indeed, our own people take little account of the fear of God and reverence for his sanctuary but we hear that they [the Welsh] diligently honour holy places and persons consecrated to God. Because of all these things it is hard for us to be planted by those who hardly care, only to be rooted out by those who honour us."12 The church is almost entirely Norman in date, its original components including a central tower, square east end, a pair of chapels east of each transept, and a nave with north aisle and north porch. 13 The nave served as the parish church whilst the crossing and transepts served the monastery, meaning that the bulk of the church always lay partly outside of the defensive monastic precinct whilst being incorporated within it. 14 The parish of St. Michael was granted to William de Londres, builder of the Norman coastal fortress of Ogmore Castle, some 3.5 kilometres from the Priory at the mouth of the river Ewenny. 15 The priory was founded by his son Maurice. In 1741 the property came into the hands of the Turbervill family who began renovations of the, by then, ruinous buildings in 1800. 16 Baddeley's plan of the church 10 Sampson, p. 1. 11 Sampson ibid. 12 Sampson, ibid., quoting F.G.Cowley, 'The Church from the Norman Conquest to the Beginning of the 14th century' in T.B.Pugh (ed.), Glamorgan County History:III, The Midle Ages,' Cardiff, p. 187-135. 13 Sampson, p. 2. 14 Sampson, ibid. 15 Baddeley, 1913, p. 1. 16 Sampson, p. 3. Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 6 Ewenny Priory EP99 details those parts of the building which had been demolished plus the new north aisle. (Figure 3). 17 Figure 3. Church plan (from Baddeley). Figure 4. Detail of Carter's Plan, 1803 (north is to the bottom of the drawing). 18 17 Baddeley, 1913. Hollinrake Archaeology Co-Op 7 Ewenny Priory EP99 A report on Ewenny mill stream and mill, 29/8/1882 19 , illustrates improvements to the property and the problems that ensued.