This site in south Dorset, lying in the hinterland of Dorchester (Durnovaria) and within a few kilometres of the Isle of Purbeck, represents a multi-period rural settlement with Romano-British occupation succeeded much later by a Tudor and 17th-century farmstead. The Roman phase likely spans the 1st to 4th centuries AD, fitting the regional pattern of small native farmsteads continuing through the conquest and developing modestly under Roman rule.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
Such sites form the basic agrarian fabric of Roman Dorset — small Durotrigan farms that supplied Durnovaria and the regional economy with grain, sheep, and possibly stone or shale products given proximity to the Purbeck industries. Individually unremarkable, collectively they illustrate the dense rural settlement that characterised the chalkland and heath margins of the Frome and Piddle valleys.
No detailed excavation record is associated with this specific location in published sources known to me; the site is most likely identified through field survey, surface scatters of Romano-British pottery (including local Black Burnished Ware), and possibly earthwork or cropmark evidence of enclosures alongside the later post-medieval farmstead remains. Without targeted investigation, the scale and full chronology of the Roman component remain undefined.
This site in south Dorset, lying in the hinterland of Dorchester (Durnovaria) and within a few kilometres of the Isle of Purbeck, represents a multi-period rural settlement with Romano-British occupation succeeded much later by a Tudor and 17th-century farmstead. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a settlement site from the Roman period in Britain.
Tudor and 17th century farmstead and Romano-British settlement is classified as a Roman settlement — 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 Romano-British settlement site (6.4 km), Preston Roman villa (7.4 km), Roman road over Thorncombe Wood and Black Heath (7.5 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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Research the area around Tudor and 17th century farmstead and Romano-British settlement