EDO591 - Proposed borehole, valley of the South Winterbourne near West Stafford; excavation 1994

Evaluation of the proposed site of a borehole revealed evidence of the probable use or settlement of the area in the Neolithic, with good preservation of possible occupation deposits. Excavation of the site was required as a condition of planning permission. All topsoil stripping was carried out under archaeological supervision using an excavator with a wide, toothless bucket. Along the line of the access road this revealed a colluvial deposit with no archaeological features; no further archaeological work was carried out on this part of the site. Colluvium was also revealed over much of the rest of the site, potentially masking archaeological features which would be destroyed by construction of the drilling platform. It was therefore removed by machine from the western and southern part of the main site to reveal the underlying archaeology. The deposit became deeper to the north-east, but was not removed as it lay outside the area where terracing was proposed; archaeological deposits here would remain sealed and protected by the colluvium. A narrow trench was excavated by machine through colluvial deposits on the east side of the site where a platform for water tanks would be constructed. All the archaeological features revealed beneath the colluvium, and those in the northern part of the site that lay directly beneath the topsoil, were excavated and recorded.