Local councillors’ report

1 Response

  1. Jeremy says:

    We’ve heard of the Royal and Ancient at St Andrews. Now we can report that Bath has its own Roman and Ancient… on the High Common.

    During a watching brief in 2004 on irrigation works for the High Common golf course a quantity of Roman pottery and building material was encountered in two trenches. These were examined archaeologically and further demolition material was found including a column drum with a linear recess for a shutter and a socket for a locking device. The Bath and Camerton Archaeological Society was asked by the Bath Archaeological Trust to undertake a geophysical survey across the area where evidence of the Roman building had been discovered. The geophysical survey suggests that the building contained three rooms, two lager rooms flanking a smaller central one with a corridor or veranda to the front, downhill side. A short distance downhill from this building was traces of a similar sized building, it is unclear if it predates or is contemporary, and possibly a second to the north and a third, or a trackway, to the north-west. The building probably represents a farmstead with a small enclosure to the east and ancillary buildings dating to the 1st and second centuries. No wall plaster was found, but only a small area was excavated. A number of circular features, to the south and south-east, and to the north were also detected. It is possible that these represent Iron Age or early Roman timber-framed roundhouses 6 to 8m in diameter. A holloway on the 12 hole course, when projected to the north, lines up with this building. It also, when projected to the south, lines up on another Roman/Iron Age site on the Lower Common and the Fosse Way crossing point further on. ref Bath Archeological Trust.