Chilgrove refers to two adjacent Romano-British villas (Chilgrove 1 and Chilgrove 2) situated in a dry chalk valley of the South Downs north of Chichester (Noviomagus Reginorum). Both began as modest timber or simple masonry farmsteads in the late 1st or 2nd century and developed into winged corridor villas with bath suites, reaching their fullest form in the 3rd–4th centuries before declining around AD 350–400.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
The Chilgrove villas form part of the dense cluster of villa estates in the hinterland of Chichester, reflecting the prosperous agrarian economy of the civitas Reginorum and the integration of the South Downs into a market-oriented landscape supplying the regional capital. They are particularly valuable as a paired estate, illustrating how neighbouring villa establishments could coexist within a single small valley.
Both sites were excavated by Alec Down in the 1960s and 1970s (published in the Chichester Excavations series), revealing stone foundations, hypocausts, painted wall plaster, tessellated and mosaic pavements, and associated agricultural outbuildings; Chilgrove 1 produced a notable geometric mosaic and evidence of late Roman occupation. Coin and pottery assemblages indicate continuous use into the later 4th century, with some evidence for sub-Roman activity on the site.
Chilgrove refers to two adjacent Romano-British villas (Chilgrove 1 and Chilgrove 2) situated in a dry chalk valley of the South Downs north of Chichester (Noviomagus Reginorum). It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a villa site from the Roman period in Britain.
Chilgrove is classified as a Roman villa — a civilian site in the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer. Roman Britain's archaeology encompasses thousands of sites ranging from legionary fortresses and marching camps to villas, temples and towns.
Several Roman sites lie within a short distance, including Roman villa on Warren Down (1.5 km), Batten Hanger (1.7 km), Iron Age farmstead and Roman villa, 360m SSW of Brickkiln Farm (2 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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