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Iron Age
Iron Age Agriculture
Farming expanded in the Iron Age (800 BC onwards), as storage pits and raised granaries (represented by squares or rectangles of posts) were found all along the route. Many of the pits had offerings placed in them before they became disused. These ranged from whole pots or quernstones for grinding grain to layers of clay loomweights, red deer antlers and skulls, layers of charred cereal grain, briquetage (salt containers) and human bones. The finds tell us much about the economy and relationships of the local people, and also about their rituals and beliefs. Iron objects, one possibly the lynch pin from a chariot, were found alongside whole pots in pits dated to the middle Iron Age. In the late Iron Age tin-bronze coins and chalk loomweights add to the variety of offerings, a tradition of belief lasting for nearly 800 years.
A cluster of enclosures, forming a settlement 500 metres long, developed west of Tollgate Junction during the Iron Age and lasted for about 400 years. Two cremation burials uncovered in this settlement were of people of high status. One contained four pottery vessels and four copper brooches, two of which were joined by a chain. The other cremation contained two pottery vessels, a bucket made from Yew bound in bronze strips with decorated metal plates, and a high tin-bronze cylinder, probably from a drinking horn.
Another important find was a cobbled trackway up to eight metres wide crossing the site, a rare instance of road construction before the Roman period.
Boundaries and Fields
To the west of this settlement, a very large boundary ditch was revealed along the edge of the plateau, seen as a crop mark prior to construction. This may have been dug to lay a stronger claim to territory. Burials were placed in the ditch during the Iron Age, a practice that continued into the Roman period, when a small cemetery grew alongside the ditch. Most of these people were buried between AD 50 and AD 250.
