EDO4378 - Handel House, Dorset County Museum, High West Street, Dorchester; excavation 1965

In August 1964 an exploratory excavation was made by volunteers from the DNHAS in the garden at the rear of Handel House where the proposed extension to the museum was to be built. Two 8ft squares were dug to natural chalk. The ground had been much disturbed to a depth of nearly 4ft. Below this layer in square 1 the remains of two floors of a building were found, one 6ins below the other and composed of puddled chalk on flint and stone. They were bounded by a wall running E-W across the trench, with cobbles on the north side of it, above a possible drain. Pottery from the drain suggested a 17th century date for the building. In square 2 a very small area of a floor was uncovered, possibly of four phases although 19th century disturbance obscured the evidence. Two patches on the site, above the natural clay, contained purely Roman material.