Nicky Grayson, Project Archaeologist

We’ve just finished work on a site in Cambridgeshire and excavating a ring ditch here was probably one of the highlights of my time on the job.

It is really satisfying to work on something concrete; a feature about which you can say “yes, someone was here and dug this and now I’m here at the other end repeating the process” simple pleasures eh? Even if there are no finds just the idea that I am standing in the same spot working on the same thing that someone else was a few thousand years ago is enough to make the daily grind exciting and meaningful…most of the time.

While digging I bandied around a few ideas for the feature’s interpretation.

Could it be a round house? It does have four stake-holes in the middle which could potentially form part of a circle for an internal structure, the others might simply have disappeared on the bottom of peoples shoes as we did have a particularly wet week. No hearth or other domestic features were found within the ring ditch  and the ditch was 1.2 meters across in places which is a little excessive for a drip gully – so are we dealing with the foundations of a wall? If so, why no postholes in the bottom of the ditch, and why weren’t any finds such as daub (used in the construction of wattle and daub walls) found in the fills?

It could be an enclosure ditch for animals? A fairly small enclosure ditch dug for purpose? It is 15m in diameter, the land in Cambridgeshire is flat, and I think it would be fair to assume that the site shouldn’t be truncated too badly from ploughing, meaning the ditch won’t be too different in size now as it was then. The stake-holes could be a small wind break or shelter for the inhabitants.

The fill of the ditch was very dark and organic which could be the product of rotted wooden remains and settlement waste accumulated following the disuse of the feature. However, the ditch was also recut at one point indicating at least two phases of activity. I did also find what looks like a buckle or clothing attachment, this was in the uppermost fill of the ditch and with the wet weather was revealed, as it happens with my shoe.

Another thing I both love and hate about archaeology in almost equal measure is that we will never have the full story. Ever. From the way we have excavated it to how I was feeling on the day (looking back I was feeling a little soggy) to our social projections of the present on the past. Although there’s so much we can now tell from scientific analysis we have to accept that something will always remain an enigma.