Norton lies to the south of the river Derwent, with the market town of Malton to the north, and together they form the site of an important Roman centre, originating as a fort located on Orchard Fields, Malton. Both towns have witnessed many archaeological interventions since the 1920s and the book begins with a useful and comprehensive summary of these by Wilson. The excavation itself took place prior to the redevelopment of the former Brooklyn House Youth Centre as a primary school, along with a new approach road and associated works. Chapter 2 by both editors provides a phase-by-phase account of the excavation. Although no features were found, Mesolithic to Bronze Age lithics were recovered, demonstrating some prehistoric activity. Geophysical survey revealed a field system and trackway, which was dated by the excavation to the later Iron Age/early Roman period, which after a relatively short time was succeeded by a Roman road and possible roadside ditch sometime in the mid-third century a.d., along with burials including the near complete skeleton of an infant. The most unusual feature, however, was a bustum-type cremation consisting of a pit over which there had been a pyre, with the human remains contained in a large calcite gritted jar. In Phase three, as the Roman settlement expanded, the burials were overlain by a series of stone structures. An intriguing discovery was a pit containing the skulls of two geese and nearby pit which also contained goose bones, possibly buried in some form of ritual. After the abandonment of the buildings by the late fourth/early fifth century, the area was used for the dumping of a large amount of rubbish.
What follows are the specialist reports. The longest concerns the Roman pottery, which consisted of 21,000 sherds, by Rowlandson and Fiske, with additional material by Hartley, Mills, Bird and Williams. This is attractively presented with colour photographs of some of the most important types, particularly the Crambeck painted parchment ware and locally made greywares, decorated with faces, wheels and blacksmith's tools.
The identification of the cremated body as a soldier was based on a brilliant piece of observation and deduction from the belt fittings and other items from the pyre material by Cool and Greep, which forms a key part of the finds report presented in Chapters 7a and 7b. This conclusion was also supported by Keefe and Holst's analysis in their report on the human remains in Chapter 13, as they noted similarities with other Roman military cremations in northern England.
Contributions by McCormish on the building materials, also embellished with useful colour photographs, chipped stone lithics by Carter, querns by Cruse, whetstones by Tibbles, vertebrate remains by Foster, shell by Carrott, post-Roman pottery by Cumberpatch and coins by Brickstock exemplify the wealth of information gained from this excavation. The book ends with an insightful review of the evidence by Wilson, which includes an intriguing glimpse into Norton and Malton in the early fifth century.
All in all, this book sets a high standard for the production of archaeological reports, and the publishers are to be congratulated on the very attractive presentation of this volume, which I fully recommend.
