Margetts Pit, Margetts Lane, Burham, Kent - Post-excavation Assessment

Wessex Archaeology

The excavation uncovered evidence for activity dating from the Neolithic until the early Romano-British period. Much of this activity could be dated with some confidence on the basis of the associated finds and stratigraphy. This activity includes the establishment of a prehistoric field system with associated settlement activity, probably in the Middle Bronze Age, and the expansion of occupation, with accompanying cremation and inhumation burials, and an extensive arrangement of postholes, in the Late Bronze Age.

A substantial shale working industry, manufacturing bracelets, occurred on the Site, spanning the Late Bronze Age and Early Iron Age, its early date giving it regional and national importance. Activity continued through the Middle Iron Age, although apparently on a reduced scale, although the Iron Age saw the possible reorganisation of the landscape in the form of ditches cutting across the earlier field system. This culminated in the construction during the Late Iron Age of a subrectangular double-ditched enclosure which continued to be used into the early Romano-British period.