Land South of Tull Way, Thatcham, West Berkshire - Post-excavation Assessment

Wessex Archaeology

Wessex Archaeology was commissioned to undertake archaeological mitigation works comprising a strip, map and sample excavation and eight evaluation trenches on a parcel of land covering 4.4 hectares centred on NGR 450186 167837 (SU 5010 6820), at land south of Tull Way, Thatcham, Newbury, West Berkshire, RG18 3BX.

Eight additional evaluation trenches and the south-eastern excavation area contained no archaeological artefacts or significant features. The south-western and northern excavation areas both contained pits and ditches which predominantly dated to the early Romano-British period. The ditches were all likely to be field boundaries, with the possibility that some of them were flanking ditches for trackways. The pits were predominantly small refuse pits.

Artefacts have been found dating from the Mesolithic to the post-medieval periods, but apart from those dating to the early Romano-British period these are all considered to either be residual, or date features from later periods. The environmental evidence predominantly consisted of evidence for domestic plant processing in the Romano-British period, with one sample possibly containing post-Roman material.

The archaeological features, artefacts and environmental evidence were all of potentially local and regional importance as they could improve our understanding of Romano-British field systems, pottery production and crop processing.