New camp, maybe?

[John1]

so this is a shot from Google earth,


[attachment=3929]aerial3.jpg[/attachment]
it looks kind of "playing card" shape,

EH suggests it's probable an iron Age univallate fort;
http://www.pastscape.org/hob.aspx?hob_id...perpage=10

So could really it be a Roman camp?

[Nathan Ross]

Doubtful, I'd say - the shape's about right, if on the narrow side (defined by the topography, of course). Size looks to be about 850x450ft, which is small but not unknown for a marching camp. The first problem, though, is the siting - why put a marching camp on top of a narrow hill spur like this? There's a perfectly good level site a mile north west, close to a stream, where a much larger camp could easily be placed with water supply.

Secondly, the description by 'Baker' (?) mentions that the vallum was 'built of 2 outer walls of stone, each c 3' thick. Between these is soil...Inside the wall, near the scoria, was a large iron spoon and the socket of a spear'. Roman marching camps didn't have stone walls - so this would be a more permanent fortification. If the 'spoon' and 'spear' were found inside the wall (rather than 'inside' the boundary - it's a little unclear!), they presumably predate the construction. The 'Roman coins' mentioned by Stukely would provide some date, if they could be traced - but Roman coins would still be in circulation in post-Roman Britain, so don't necessarily prove an actual Roman presence or occupation.

It looks, then, like an iron-age fortification, perhaps reused in post-Roman times. At a push it could be a Roman fort - it's rather large, but a good defensive site, as proven by the nearby motte and bailey castle, so rather like the Restormel site in Cornwall there could have been a Roman military installation of some sort here. But I don't think this is the site you're looking for...

[John1]

spoon and spear were found at the bottom of the north facing ditches.
Total area 2.4 ha, nearest equivalents in Welfare and Swan are Burnhead, Seatsides, Burington and Greenforge (4)

The Knight paper can be found here;
http://archlib.britarch.net/tfiles/1244409271/689.pdf

[Robert Vermaat]

It looks, then, like an iron-age fortification, perhaps reused in post-Roman times.

Would one not expect roundhouses inside, not rectangular structures?

[Vindex]

The other information and sources suggests iron working and "ring ditches".

Just becasue it is a Roman "playing card" shape of possible earlier Iron Age occupation (whatever that means...the Iron Age did not stop in AD43 just as the Romans did not all leave in 410AD!) does not mean that it was overtly defensive in nature. If it were a foundary site one assumes it would have a level of protection; but it could just as easily be a very large workshop.

It has clearly been a large enough structure to have dictated the later road patterns, however.