EDO5491 - 1 West Hill, Charminster; observations and recording 2000

Observations and recording during the building of an extension to 1 West Hill, a site next to St Mary’s Church churchyard. The ground is flat and lies at a level of 63m above Ordnance Datum, while the underlying geology is mapped as alluvium over Upper Chalk. Fieldwork took place on 4th-11th September and on the 14th December 2000. Groundworks consisted of footing trenches excavated by mechanical excavator fitted with a toothed bucket. The locations of all the archaeological features encountered were planned using taped measurements from existing property boundaries. Where human bones were encountered, the exposed parts of the skeletons were recorded and lifted, then immediately reburied within their original grave cut. Work recorded eleven, possibly twelve, burials which continued beneath the property and churchyard boundary wall, and may belong to a former cemetery to the Saxon Minster.