EDO5062 - Sherborne Old Castle, Castleton; excavations 1973 to 1976

P R White conducted excavations for the Department of the Environment at Sherborne Old Castle between 1973 and 1976. The work demonstrated '... that the buildings of Bishop Roger of Salisbury are not the earliest on the site. In addition to the undercroft of a small stone building beneath the area now occupied by the central courtyard of Roger’s complex, a rock-cut ditch with an outer earthen bank passes between the buildings to the W. (14th century) courtyard and then turns to run beneath the 12th century keep. Beneath the inner tail of the bank burials were made in rock-cut graves on an E. and W. axis. The bank and ditch may have enclosed the top of the original knoll before it was remodelled into a plateau for the 12th century bailey.’ (1). Excavations continued in 1976 on the north gateway (2) Pottery from these excavations were subsequently analysied by Harrison and Williams (3).