Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane Princes Risborough Buckinghamshire Archaeological Evaluation for Environmental Dimension Partnership (EDP) on behalf of Bloor Homes Ltd CA Project: 660938 CA Report: 18076 May 2018 Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane Princes Risborough Buckinghamshire Archaeological Evaluation CA Project: 660938 CA Report: 18076 Document Control Grid Revision Date Author Checked by Status Reasons for Approved revision by A 16/02/2018 AA JS-J Draft For comment MPH B 01/03/2018 AA MPH Revision For issue MPH C 17/05/2018 AA MPH Final For issue MPH This report is confidential to the client. Cotswold Archaeology accepts no responsibility or liability to any third party to whom this report, or any part of it, is made known. Any such party relies upon this report entirely at their own risk. No part of this report may be reproduced by any means without permission. © Cotswold Archaeology Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane, Princes Risborough, Buckinghamshire: Archaeological Evaluation © Cotswold Archaeology CONTENTS 1. INTRODUCTION ................................................................................................ 3 2. ARCHAEOLOGICAL BACKGROUND ................................................................ 4 3. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES ................................................................................... 6 4. METHODOLOGY ............................................................................................... 6 5. RESULTS (FIGS 2 - 14) ..................................................................................... 7 6. THE FINDS ........................................................................................................ 12 7. THE BIOLOGICAL EVIDENCE .......................................................................... 14 8. DISCUSSION ..................................................................................................... 17 9. CA PROJECT TEAM .......................................................................................... 19 10. REFERENCES ................................................................................................... 19 APPENDIX A: CONTEXT DESCRIPTIONS ................................................................... 21 APPENDIX B: THE FINDS ............................................................................................. 35 APPENDIX C: THE PALAEOENVIRONMENTAL EVIDENCE ....................................... 37 APPENDIX D: OASIS REPORT FORM .......................................................................... 39 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS Fig. 1 Site location plan (1:25,000) Fig. 2 Trench location plan showing archaeological features and geophysical survey results (1:2,000) Fig. 3 Plan of trenches 90-95, showing archaeological features (1:500) Fig. 4 Trench 95, section and photographs (1:20) Fig. 5 Trench 93, section and photographs (1:20) Fig. 6 Trench 92, section and photograph (1:20) Fig. 7 Trench 86; plan, section and photograph (1:20) Fig. 8 Trench 87; plan, section and photograph (1:20) Fig. 9 Trench 76, photographs Fig. 10 Trench 77, photograph Fig. 11-14 Trenches 67, 80, 81 and 85, photographs 1 Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane, Princes Risborough, Buckinghamshire: Archaeological Evaluation © Cotswold Archaeology SUMMARY Project Name: Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane Location: Princes Risborough, Buckinghamshire NGR: 480623 204456 Type: Evaluation Date: 03-19 January 2018 Location of Archive: Buckinghamshire county museum Accession Number: TBC Site Code: LRM17 An archaeological evaluation was undertaken by Cotswold Archaeology in January 2018 on Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane, Buckinghamshire. Twenty nine trenches were excavated within a series of discrete fields. The evaluation exposed elements of a substantial rectangular enclosure toward the centre of the site, which had been identified initially in the preceding geophysical survey. Recovered artefacts associated with this enclosure comprised Middle to Late Iron Age pottery and associated animal bone. Elsewhere, a number of archaeological features not identified by preceding geophysical survey were also exposed and evaluated. Principally archaeological features encountered across the site comprised ditches, pits and the remains of former ridge and furrow agricultural practices; dated from the late prehistoric to post-medieval period. These included a ditch in trench 93 at the north-east end of the site from which a single heavily abraded fragment of Roman box flue tile was recovered. It is highly unlikely, however, that this artefact could be indicative of former settlement within the bounds of the site. It is likely that the later prehistoric enclosure identified toward the centre of the site represents an element of a distribution of rural, agricultural stock enclosures set within the wider landscape. Ditches and pits to the north-east and south-west of this enclosure could also have a contemporaneous association with the agricultural exploitation of the landscape. Palaeobotanical and mollusc evidence is indicative of a predominantly woodland margin and well-established downland environment, and animal bone remains perhaps indicate stock management and disposal more so than domestic butchery and processing or cooking. 2 Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane, Princes Risborough, Buckinghamshire: Archaeological Evaluation © Cotswold Archaeology 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 In January 2018 Cotswold Archaeology (CA) carried out an archaeological evaluation for Bloor Homes and under the direction of Environmental Dimension Partnership Ltd (EDP) on Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane, Princes Risborough, Buckinghamshire (centred at NGR: 80780 04709; Fig. 1). The evaluation was undertaken in advance of the submission of a planning application for the residential development. 1.2 The evaluation was carried out in accordance with a detailed Written Scheme of Investigation (WSI) produced by CA (2017) and approved by Phil Markham, Senior Archaeological Planning Officer for Buckinghamshire County Council (SAPOBCC). The fieldwork also followed the Standard and guidance for Archaeological Field Evaluation (CIfA 2014). It was monitored by Phil Markham and Eliza Alqassar for BCC, including a site visit on 11 January 2018. The site 1.3 The proposed development area is approximately 17.9ha, and comprises a group of four mixed pastoral and arable fields. The site is bounded by Longwick Road to the south-west and Mill Lane to the north-east. The south-eastern limit of the site is formed by the Princes Risborough to Aylesbury railway line, with residential development of Princes Risborough beyond and the north-eastern boundary principally by further agricultural fields. The site lies within a gently undulating landscape between 100 and 110m above Ordnance Datum (aOD). This is set within a broadly flat clay vale extending towards Thame and Oxford to the west, with the town of Princes Risborough being at the base of the western slope of the Chiltern Hills, which lie to the east. 1.4 The underlying bedrock geology of the area is mapped as Upper Greensand formation-siltstone and sandstone, Glauconitic Marl Member-sandstone, and West Melbury Marly Chalk Formation. The only superficial deposits comprise alluvial deposits and small pockets of river terrace sands and gravels along the course of the Mill Brook (British Geological Survey (BGS) 2016. The soils on site are classified in the Soilscape 5 association, as freely draining lime-rich loams (Soilscape 5 Association; LandIS 2016). 3 Land between Longwick Road and Mill Lane, Princes Risborough, Buckinghamshire: Archaeological Evaluation © Cotswold Archaeology 2. ARCHAEOLOGICAL BACKGROUND 2.1 The Archaeological and historical background of the site has been presented in detail in the geophysical survey report prepared by Headland Archaeology (2016) and an archaeological and heritage assessment prepared by EDP (2016). This concluded that there are no designated heritage assets within the site and only two non-designated heritage assets. These comprise a section of the suggested route of an early medieval period charter boundary (MBC7552) and a piece of early Saxon metalwork found by detectorists (MBC13625). The route of the early medieval period boundary passes through the centre area (site) and the Saxon metalwork was found in the eastern part of the site. Prehistoric Period 2.2 The results of the geophysical survey suggest there is some archaeological potential within the site. This comprises the possible remains of a D-shaped (or rectangular) enclosure in the central part of the site. It was also suggested there could be some potential for contemporaneity with the Lower Icknield Way to the north, though this is some distance, c.600m, to the north-west of the site. 2.3 In the wider area the desk-based assessment presented no recorded evidence of early prehistoric activity within 1km of the site and ten records of later prehistoric origin, comprising surface finds of Neolithic flints to the west, of which one is an axe head, found in Alscot (MBC21480) and a Bronze Age barbed and tanged arrowhead in Monks Risborough (MBC21133). Two coins dating to the late Iron Age were also recovered in fields c. 600m distant, by detectorists. Roman Period 2.4 The possible site of a Roman period building was identified in Monks Risborough during a trial trench evaluation (MBC23642), as was a piece of tile (MBC21860); and three coins were found by detectorists c.600m to the east of the site