Rivenhall: Essex Archaeological News, Autumn 1973

Essex Archaeological News, Autumn 1973 (No 44)

RIVENHALL.

The training excavation at Rivenhall this year was during the month of August, and this year the dig has moved away from the church itself to the North East corner of the church yard.

This is the corner nearest to the Roman aisled barn, and the Villa, which are in the field beyond the church yard hedge.

The ground level in this corner is significantly raised above that of the field to the North, inferring that the Northern hedge is an old boundary, and that some redeposition has occurred in the church yard area.

Warwick was sure that the corner had been added to the medieval church yard, and excavation has shown this to be so since a boundary ditch follows a drop off in level and cuts off much of the corner.

Excavation has revealed the omnipresent Roman 'cobbled level, and a robbed Roman wall trench associated with the higher levels of the church yard. Above, and reaching down to this Roman gravelly level are Saxon burials, puzzling since here they are so far from the church proper.

The number and density seems high, and these cannot have been covered with much more than a foot of soil, which is typical of early burials.

Below the burials, where the ground appears to form a shelf, there is a medieval level, possibly a house site, where a discrete defined area is covered with gravel make-up. This level contains a varied collection of pottery and oyster shells which seem to have been used as part of the make-up.

Coins, however do not feature as make-up, and these together with a gilt hinged cross ornament, have led Warwick to believe this may be the site of a rectory, associated with the church, and adjacent in medieval times.