EDO4520 - New Fire Escape, Dorset County Museum, Dorchester; observations and recording 1993

Building works behind the Dorset County Museum to construct an external fire-escape to Colliton Street included the machine-excavation of two metre-square footings. These were cleaned, investigated and recorded by the Dorset County Museum. The footings trench closest to the museum cut through 1m of deposits down on to chalk bedrock the other trench three metres to the north was cut to a depth of 0.5m below ground level. A 19th century sewer ran through both trenches. In the northern trench post-medieval construction levels sealed pits with medieval pottery in their upper fills. In the trench closest to the museum the post-medieval construction levels lay directly above a narrow band of Roman occupation deposits at a depth of 0.6m, below this the pre-urban soils were recorded.