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Moor Lane Baschurch, Shropshire

This survey covered about three hectares of a Bronze Age ceremonial landscape, visible from the air as cropmarks caused by the ring-ditches of barrows. No barrows were detected within this particular area but several other interesting features were, including groups of pits and linear ditches.

The area had been heavily ploughed and hence many features were found to be badly truncated, the ditches for example were rarely more than perhaps 0.2m deep. The pits survived to depths of 1m or more and were found to contain burnt soils and charcoal. Some had been recut, indicating reuse while others seemed to be the result of a single phase of activity.

Towards the left edge of the survey a large approximately circular anomaly is visible. Upon excavation this was found to be a pit of almost 5m (!) diameter with several discrete fills. It does not appear to be a silo pit (grain store) and no dateable material was recovered.

Immediately top right of this feature is an arc of smaller intense anomalies. These were found to be caused by pits excavated so close together that they appeared in plan more like a discontinuous ditch. Their purpose is unknown but it has been suggested that they were part of a 'half-henge', a ceremonial feature of early prehistory in Britain.

Even more enigmatic are the pair of isolated intense anomalies right of centre which were identified in the data as hearths. These were excavated and found to be in shallow scoops in a buried soil below the modern agricultural horizon. Both were radiocarbon dated, using large pieces of charcoal, to the Anglo-Saxon period and their apparently isolated presence within a prehistoric landscape is not understood.

The broadly parallel linear anomalies crossing the bottom of the plot are ditches flanking the former road from the nearby village as it crossed an area of upland to the left. Their irregular appearance is due to their reuse as sand quarries.

Client

Marches Archaeology