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Roman wood wells found at Iron Age settlement site
An excavation at the site of future highway improvements in Cambridgeshire has unearthed two Roman wooden wells so well-preserved they reveal an engineering failure and its correction. The first well collapsed; the second was built with reinforced walls to keep it from suffering the same fate.
A team of archaeologists from the Museum of London Archaeology (MoLA) found the wells during an excavation of a known Iron Age settlement that was founded around 350 B.C., long pre-dating the Roman conquest. After the Roman occupation began in 43 A.D., the sleepy farmstead shifted to industrial activity. The team found a large gated enclosure containing archaeological evidence of metalworking and carpentry.
The new activities required water, so the Romano-Britons set to digging a new well. They had to dig a lot — almost 28 feet down — to reach water for the first well. They built a square timber well but it collapsed before it was ever in use. The wooden ladder was left inside and the well abandoned. The second time around, they only dug down 21 feet, and they used flat wooden boards to line the well. It also had stones at the base to filter the water drawn from the thick clay soil. It too eventually was abandoned. It contains offcuts, wood chips and sawn branches, evidence that the former well was being used as a dump by carpenters. The quantities of discarded waste wood attests to the presence of a substantial industry here.
The contents of the well will now be carefully studied by specialists. Some of the larger pieces of wood even have decoration, including horizontal lines and crosses, which could offer a clue as to what was being produced here.
While work is ongoing to uncover exactly what the Roman carpenters were making, MOLA archaeologists have found evidence which suggests the workshop was part of a wider trade network. At the very south of the site, the team has identified a likely Roman road. This would have connected the site with major Roman routes, so they could have supplied large settlements such as Godmanchester, and nearby villa rustica (Roman countryside estates).
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