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Excavations at Hembury (Devon), 1980–83: A Summary Report

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  29 November 2011

Malcolm Todd
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Summary

Excavations at Hembury (Devon) in 1980–83 have revealed a new Neolithic earthwork to the north of the causewayed enclosure excavated by Miss D. M. Liddell in 1930–35. The eastern defences of the Iron Age hillfort have been examined for the first time and a sequence of box rampart followed by dump rampart demonstrated. The latter phase of construction is datable to the second or first century b.c. On the Roman conquest of the region the northern end of the hillfort was occupied by Roman troops who constructed a series of regular planned timber buildings, including a structure identified as a fabrica. This occupation probably ended in the 60s a.d. and thereafter the hillfort remained in disuse.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Antiquaries Journal , Volume 64 , Issue 2 , September 1984 , pp. 251 - 268
Copyright
Copyright © The Society of Antiquaries of London 1984

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References

Notes

1 D., and Lysons, S., Magna Britannia, vi, Devonshire (1822), pp. cccxiv–xxiiGoogle Scholar; Lysons comments, ‘If Hembury be not regarded as Moridunum, I am inclined to allow it to have been a British camp occupied by the Romans’.

2 Lysons, op. cit., p. cccxix. Hutchinson, P. O., Trans. Devonshire Assn. xiv (1882), pp. 516–24Google Scholar.

3 Rivet, A. L. F. and Smith, C., The Place-Names of Roman Britain (London, 1980), pp. 421–2Google Scholar.

4 The Earthworks of England (1908), p. 84.

5 Proc. Devon Arch. Explor. Soc. i, 1 (1930), pp. 1–24Google Scholar; i, 3 (1931), pp. 90–119; i, 4 (1932), pp. 162–90; ii, 3 (1935), pp. 135–75.

6 e.g. Piggott, S., Neolithic Cultures of the British Isles (Cambridge, 1954)Google Scholar; Smith, I. F., ‘Causewayed enclosures’, in Economy and Settlement in Neolithic and Early Bronze Age Britain and Europe, ed. Simpson, D. D. A. (Leicester, 1971), pp. 89–112Google Scholar.

7 Proc. Devon Arch. Explor. Soc. i, 3 (1931), p. 105Google Scholar.

8 Proc. Devon Arch. Explor. Soc. ii, 3 (1935), pp. 152–4Google Scholar.

9 Notably at the north-east angle of the hillfort, where a substantial ditch running close to the edge of the scarp was located, along with a palisade outside it: ibid., pp. 148–50.

10 This programme of work has been made possible by grants from the Society of Antiquaries, the British Academy, the University of Exeter, Devon County Council and a number of private individuals. Thanks to all these donors are gratefully recorded here.

11 This is most fully revealed in Proc. Devon Arch. Explor. Soc. ii, 3 (1935), pl. xxiGoogle Scholar.

12 Dixon, P. W., Excavations at Crickley Hill (Edinburgh, 1983)Google Scholar; Mercer, R. J., ‘Excavations at Carn Brea, Illogan, Cornwall’, Cornish Arch. xx (1981), pp. 1–204Google Scholar; id., Hambledon Hill, a Neolithic Landscape (Edinburgh, 1980).

13 Gallia Prihistoire, xxiii (1980), pp. 45–66Google Scholar. It must be noted that these sites are not closely dated and could be later than Hembury.

14 These have been seen by some later writers as evidence for early palisaded enclosures; e.g. Cunliffe, B., Iron Age Communities in Britain (London, 1974), pp. 227–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar. It remains a possibility that Liddell's outer palisade surrounded such an enclosure.

15 Hod Hill: Richmond, I. A., Hod Hill, ii (London, 1968)Google Scholar, fig. 65. Blewburton Hill: Harding, D. W., The Iron Age in the Upper Thames Basin (Oxford, 1972), pp. 45–50Google Scholar and pl. 18. Wandlebury, : Proc. Cambridge Antiq. Soc. I (1956), pp. 1–28Google Scholar. South Cadbury: Bull. Board Celt. Stud, xxviii (1980), pp. 666–70Google Scholar.

16 Bulleid, A. H. and Gray, H. St. George, The Meare Lake Village, x, i-ii (1948–53); iii (1967)Google Scholar, compiled by M. A. Cotton. It is too readily assumed that the decorated wares of Devon and Cornwall are of the same date as those of Somerset. This has never been demonstrated and the whole question requires much more investigation.

17 Bull. Board Celt. Stud, xxviii (1980), pp. 696–8Google Scholar.

18 Proc. Devon Arch. Explor. Soc. ii, 3 (1935), fig. 14 opp. p. 152Google Scholar.

19 Schönberger, H., Kastell Oberstimm (Berlin, 1978), pp. 39–57Google Scholar.

20 Proc. Devon Arch. Explor. Soc. i, 4 (1932), pl. 11Google Scholar.

21 Richmond, op. cit. (note 15), fig. 42A.

22 I am grateful to Mrs. Joanna Bird for her comments on this material.

23 A bronze coin of Nero picked up close to the site need have no connection with the military occupation: Trans. Devonshire Assn. xcv (1963), pp. 83–4Google Scholar.

24 For Julius Caesar's use of Gaulish strongholds as quarters for his troops, de Bello Gallico, vii.90 (Bibracte, employed as hiberna) and viii.5 (Cenabum, where the men were partly housed in native dwellings). Early Roman occupation in a number of Gaulish oppida may well turn out to have been military, e.g. at Pommiers near Soissons, the Titelberg in Luxembourg, where military structures have now been identified, Velzeke and Tongres in Belgium, and perhaps the Valkhof at Nijmegen. The Limberg, above Sasbach, in south-west Germany is another very clear instance: Planck, D., Archäologische Ausgrabungen in Baden-Württemberg, 1981 (1982), p. 96.Google Scholar

25 Arch.j. cxv (1958), pp. 80–3Google Scholar.

26 Antiq. J. xlix (1969), p. 35Google Scholar.

27 Antiquity, liii (1979), pp. 51–5Google Scholar- I am indebted to the excavators for further information about their findings.

28 Wheeler, R. E. M., Maiden Castle, Dorset, Soc. Antiq. London Res. Rep. xii (1943), pp. 242–6.Google Scholar

29 Unpublished. Miss P. M. Carlyon has kindly supplied me with details of this remarkable site.

30 A small quantity of Roman military equipment might be noted from Bilbury Rings (Wilts.) in the British Museum. Early military use of large oppida is also to be suspected: e.g. Camulodunum, Hawkes, C. F. C. and Hull, M. R., Camulodunum, Soc. Antiq. London Res. Rep. xiv (1947), p. 117Google Scholar, fig. 32—a timberfronted enclosure and gate which has much in common with military works in Augustan and Tiberian Germany; Stanwick, Wheeler, R. E. M., The Stanwick Fortifications, Soc. Antiq. London Res. Rep. xvn (1954), pp. 31–8Google Scholar; here the Roman imported pottery could well result from a brief military occupation, as B. R. Hartley has suggested: Antiq. J. lvii (1977), pp. 93–4Google Scholar.

31 Britannia Romana (London, 1732), p. 491Google Scholar.

32 Britannia, viii (1977), pp. 107–48Google Scholar, esp. 147–8

33 Op. cit. (note 3), pp. 421–2.

34 Britannia, i (1970), p. 77Google Scholar.