Early Iron Age Settlement on Jack's Hill, Great Wymondley, Herts

Extract

In January, 1930, my brother started work on a garage on the west side of the Great North Road between Baldock and Stevenage, in the parish of Great Wymondley, and 180 yards south of the milestone indicating 34 miles to London. A hole in the chalk containing black soil and pottery was found in sinking a petrol tank.

It was a bowl-shaped pit (see Plate XXXV., Pit 1), showing in section on the chalk wall just dug, its greatest width being 8 ft., and the depth 5 ft. from the surface. Above the solid chalk was 2 ft. of soil, shading evenly from yellow at the base to dark yellow at the surface, and showing no variation or disturbance over the pit, as if the whole top-soil had been laid down after the pit had been filled in. I was fortunate in having Mr. T. C. Lethbridge, F.S.A., to help me clear this and the other pits, and on the first day we had the help and advice of Dr. Cyril Fox. F.S.A., and Mr. Louis Clarke, F.S.A.

By digging down from the surface we found that the pit was irregular in shape and extended 6 ½ ft. back from the chalk face. The filling was of dark soil varying in colour.

There were three layers which, from the quantity of wood ash in them, might have been hearths. In the filling were numerous brook pebbles cracked and blackened by fire (potboilers probably), and many potsherds.