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Trial-excavations in the so-called ‘Danish Camp’ at Warham, near Wells, Norfolk

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 January 2012

H. St. George Gray
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Extract

Earthworks are not numerous in Norfolk, owing no doubt to the fact that the county is a somewhat flat one, and Hadrian Allcroft in Earthwork of England is almost silent upon the subject of camps in this district. Probably one of the best known is the Roman camp at Brancaster (Branodunum) on the north coast between Hunstanton and Wells, which encloses an area of 8¼ acres. The square is clearly visible, although becoming yearly more reduced by the action of the plough.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Antiquaries Journal , Volume 13 , Issue 4 , October 1933 , pp. 399 - 413
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1933

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References

page 399 note 1 V.C.H. Norfolk, i, 303; Arch. Jour, lxxxix, 346.

page 399 note 2 In this year (1913) Clarke, W. G. published a paper on ‘Norfolk Barrows’ in The Antiquary, xlix, 416–23.Google Scholar Under Warham (p. 423) he wrote, ‘there is a barrow surrounded by a ditch on Warborough Hill’.

page 399 note 3 At the time of the survey in 1929, the farm was tenanted by Mr. R. W. Green, who was quite willing that further excavations should be carried out at the Camp. Mr. A. E. W. Tower was then the agent of the estate.

page 399 note 4 The Director-General of Ordnance Surveys informed me that the magnetic declination of the compass at Warham on 1st August 1914 was 15° 6′ west of true north.

page 399 note 5 Dr. Tapp (who financed the excavation) and the writer watched nearly all the operations.

page 400 note 1 Miss M. A. Blyth records a tradition that the Saxons from their camp at Crabb's Castle in Wighton dislodged the Danes from Warham Camp by poisoning the water of the river (Norfolk Archaeology, xxiii, 263).

page 400 note 2 See 1-in. Ordnance Sheet (large sheet series), 1912, no. 57. These are not the only so-called ‘Danish Camps’ in Norfolk. South Creake Camp, it is understood, was levelled at the beginning of the nineteenth century. There is a geological note on the Holkham camp in ‘The Geology of the Country around Fakenham, Wells, and Holt’, by Woodward, H. B. (Memoir Geol. Survey, 1884, p. 43).Google Scholar

page 401 note 1 The farm may, perhaps, have belonged once to a man named ‘Swain’, but Mr. Moore stated that it was always spelt like the name of the Danish king.

page 402 note 1 This specimen is similar to two examples figured in Lee's, J. E.Isca Silurum (1862), pl. xlv, figs. 2, 3, and p. 112, and found in the upper layers of earth during the excavation of the Castle villa.Google Scholar

page 402 note 2 Norfolk Archaeology, xxiii, 263.

page 402 note 3 Under ‘Upper Chalk, Warham’ in ‘The Geology of the Country around Fakenham, Wells, and Holt’ (Memoir of the Geological Survey, 1884, p. 9) one reads: ‘Rubbly and bedded chalk with scattered flints was shown in pits SW. of Field Barn, west of Garden Grove, and on Warham Green. The “Danish Camp “is formed of chalk rubble.’

page 403 note 1 The small dots in the Plan represent the position of the fixed points for surveying purposes. The dots enclosed in small circles indicate the position in which wooden pegs were driven well into the ground when I left in May 1929.

page 404 note 1 This is included in the 1,454 ft. above.

page 404 note 2 The river Stiffkey in this part is about 19 ft. wide.

page 404 note 3 The air-photograph, pl. lxxii, seems to show indications of former slight water-courses in ‘Sweyn's Meadow’ on the west side of the Camp and river.

page 407 note 1 A similar, but rather smaller, brooch was found in excavations on a Roman site at Camerton, Somerset, in 1933.

page 407 note 2 No. 23 in the Section represents a calcined flint flake, depth 7 ft.

page 410 note 1 At Cadbury Camp in South Somerset, in 1913, a calcined flint celt (polished) was found in association with red Samian pottery and a Late-Celtic occupation proved. From Sigwell Camp, close to Cadbury, flint arrow-heads and objects of the Prehistoric Iron Age have been obtained. Polished stone implements have also been found at Ham Hill in association with Late-Celtic and Roman remains. A chipped and polished flint celt was found in trenching in the interior of Handley Hill entrenchment, North Dorset, close to the surface; and so one might go on.