Monument record 0109000000 - SCHOOL, ADJ WING CHURCHYARD

SEVERAL SKELETONS FOUND, NO DOUBT SAXON, WHEN DIGGING FOUNDATIONS FOR SCHOOL. AS SITE ADJOINS CHURCH YARD, SKELETONS BELIEVED TO BE STRAYS FROM CONSECRATED GROUND & WERE RE-INTERRED ACCORDINGLY (B1).
3 SKELETONS, PROBABLY SAXON; NO ACCURATE ACCOUNT OF (B2).
CENTRE OF FIND PLACE B3).
Archaeological evaluation carried out on the site of the demolished school by Northants Archaeology in December 1997 prior to redevelopment confirmed the 19th century reports of the discovery of burials, suggesting the churchyard was once more extensive. Six trial trenches totalling 99m in length were opened. Trench 1 revealed human burials disturbed by the later foundations of the brick built school. Trench 2 revealed more graves and a shallow pit and small gully. Trench 3 encountered a large area of disturbance and further burials. Trench 4 revealed three shallow pits or scoops containing 13th century pottery. Trench 5 contained a ditch and pit containg charcoal flecks and 13th century pottery. Trench 6 contained only tree root disturbance. The pottery finds included Maxey-types, Greyware, Denham Red, Brill, St Neots and Olney Hyde Shelly wares. Personal finds included a perforated boars tusk and a strap end (B10).
Subsequent excavation carried out by Northants Archaeology in May and June 1999, was limited to the footprint of the proposed new dwellings (30m x 20m). Residual pottery finds of early or middle Saxon pottery suggests early settlement in the vicinity. The earliest features on the site included part of the cemetery of All Saints Church (possibly an extension to the original cemetery) and boundary ditches. A total of 77 individual internments were excavated, laid out in north-south rows with the graves aligned east-west. Radiocarbon dating of 5 skeletons indicate that burials may have begun as early as 700 AD and were certainly underway between 750-900 AD. Use of the cemetery appears to have been continuous, with the last burials taking place between 1050-1200 AD and possibly as late as 1250 AD. A number of late graves were on a slightly different alignments and cut through earlier burials, suggesting that the earlier graves were no longer visible. The boundary of the churchyard to the south and east appears to be defined by two phases of ditch, the earliest a narrow ditch with possible internal bank probably marking out an extension to the original churchyard. This was replaced by a much larger boundary ditch which was backfilled in the 12th century. A building with tile hearth or oven and other occupation features including pits, postholes and a well encroached into the south east corner of the cemetery in the 13th century. The cemetery was finally abandoned in the 13th century and the site given over to secular use but the excavation area had gone out of use completely by the early 14th century . A new phase of occupation began again in the 16th century with features comprising pits and postholes, possibly associated with a building shown on the 1798 enclosure map. The site was in use as pasture in the early 19th century until construction of the school buildings in 1850. See report for detail (B11,B14-15).
NGR to centre of excavated burials.