Record Details

NHER Number:5712
Type of record:Monument
Name:Mesolithic worked flints and potentially prehistoric earthwork features

Summary

A number of potentially Mesolithic flint implements were recovered from the ground surface in this area during the early 20th century. No further finds were recovered when this site was visited in 1976. In 2001 a rapid earthwork survey noted a burnt flint patch atop a natural knoll with several associated small depressions. These features are probably trenches but they could relate to flint extraction pits.

Images - none

Location

Grid Reference:TL 8805 8944
Map Sheet:TL88NE
Parish:WRETHAM, BRECKLAND, NORFOLK

Full description

1922. Stray Find.
Found by H. Dixon Hewitt on east side of Fowl Mere, partly in Croxton parish (within his Site XLV):
A 'few' Mesolithic flints. Some donated to the Norwich Castle Museum (NWHCM : 1922.39). Information from (S1).
Although Dixon Hewitt's Site XLV covered the whole of what was formerly West Wretham parish, notes that he supplied to the NCM record that "…nearly all of the implements came from the heaths near the Drove Road, including a marked subsite near Fowlmere, which is just in Croxton parish". It is recorded that the latter was a "pseudo-Cave site, like [Site] XXII, [Site] XX* etc". See copy of notes in file.

It is likely that these are the finds that W. G. Clarke was referring to when he described there being evidence for prehistoric settlement "…on a small plateua on the east shore of Fowlmere…" (S2). These finds are also noted in (S3).

The NCM's Dixon Hewitt Collection was includes 40 worked flints from his Site XLV, the majority of which are marked as being from the vicinity of Fowl Mere. A Mesolithic microlith is amongt the Fowl Mere finds, the remained of which include 1 retouched blade, 5 scrapers, 1 borer/burin, 1 notched flake, 1 retouched flake (?borer), 2 blade cores, 1 abandoned core, 7 flakes and 15 blades/blade fragments. These flints were identified by P. Watkins (HES), during a rapid examination of the NCM's Mesolithic collections in October 2014. This collection is noted in (S4), which also records that material from Dixon Hewitt's Site XLV is in the NCM's W. G. Clarke Collection (NWHCM : 1926.32), the Ipswich Museum (ex J. Reid Moir) and the Sedgwick Museum of Geology (Cambridge). It is noted that the assemblage as a whole includes a number of scrapers, piercers and "truncated pieces", although it is not specified which museum holds which objects. The "truncated pieces" are presumably Mesolithic truncated blades.

The Thetford Museum holds a flint scraper that was found by W. G. Clarke at Fowl Mere, most likely at this site (THEHM : 1978.591).
Amended by P. Watkins (HES), 24 April 2013 and 27 October 2014.

1976. Field Observation.
Site examined but no new material found. Area pasture and lightly wooded.
A. J. Lawson (NAU) 21 January 1976.

February 2001. Woodland Earthwork Rapid Identification Survey.
Management Unit J, Site 87:
In vicinity of earlier finds a burnt flint patch was noted. It is located on a probable natural knoll, roughly circular and about 25m in diameter, height difficult to establish with natural slopes. Possible barrow, but very tentative. Naturally undulating area with several small depressions nearby, probably trenches, but could in part be extraction pits, possibly for flint.
See report (S5) for further details.
B. Cushion (NLA) February 2002. Amended by P. Watkins (HES), 12 May 2015.

Monument Types

  • BURNT MOUND? (Unknown date)
  • FLINT MINE? (Unknown date)
  • MOUND (Unknown date)
  • FINDSPOT (Prehistoric - 1000000 BC to 42 AD)
  • FINDSPOT (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC)
  • BARROW? (Bronze Age - 2350 BC to 701 BC)

Associated Finds

  • BURNT FLINT (Unknown date)
  • SCRAPER (TOOL)? (Lower Palaeolithic to Late Iron Age - 500000 BC to 42 AD)
  • BLADE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • BLADE CORE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • BORER? (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • CORE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • FLAKE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • HOLLOW SCRAPER (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • LITHIC IMPLEMENT (Mesolithic - 10000 BC? to 4001 BC?)
  • LITHIC IMPLEMENT (Mesolithic - 10000 BC? to 4001 BC?)
  • LITHIC IMPLEMENT (Mesolithic - 10000 BC? to 4001 BC?)
  • MICROLITH (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC)
  • NOTCHED FLAKE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • RETOUCHED BLADE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • RETOUCHED FLAKE (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)
  • SCRAPER (TOOL) (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC?)

Protected Status - none

Sources and further reading

---Record Card: Ordnance Survey Staff. 1933-1979?. Ordnance Survey Record Cards. TL 88 NE 7.
---Record Card: NAU Staff. 1974-1988. Norfolk Archaeological Index Primary Record Card.
<S1>Record Card: Clarke, R. R. and NCM Staff. 1933-1973. Norwich Castle Museum Record Card - Mesolithic.
<S2>Article in Serial: Clark, W. G. 1923. An Early Neolithic Site at Hockham, Norfolk. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia. Vol IV Pt I (for 1922-23) pp 92-95. p 92.
<S3>Article in Serial: Clarke, W. G. and Hewitt, H. D. 1914. An Early Norfolk Trackway: the 'drove' road. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia. Vol I Pt IV (for 1913-14) pp 427-434. p 432.
<S4>Archive: R. Jacobi. -. Jacobi Archive. 10175.
<S5>Unpublished Contractor Report: Cushion, B. 2002. STANTA ILMP Woodland Earthwork Rapid Identification Survey. Brian Cushion Archaeological & Cartographical Surveyor.

Related records - none

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