Our Projects

Most of our fieldwork has taken place at Teffont, excavating a Roman shrine and adjacent support sites from 2010-2024. In 2022 we excavated an Iron Age and Roman settlement in Coombe Bissett, building on work undertaken by Alyson Tanner in 2021. We returned to a second Roman site in Coombe Bissett in spring 2024, and finished our 2024 season by excavating a Roman villa in the Chalke Valley.

2024

Garsons Villa, Chalke Valley, 2024

Our last project in 2024 was the excavation of a Roman villa in the Chalke Valley funded by Chase and Chalke. The site first came to light because metal detectorists reported all of their finds from the field to the Portable Antiquities Scheme at Salisbury Museum. Geophysics commissioned by the Teffont project and Portable Antiquities Scheme several years previously revealed stone-built structures, and our excavation discovered that these buildings were the main villa, a bath house and a large barn. The villa and bath house were luxurious, with painted plaster on the walls and a mosaic on the villa floor.

2024

2024

Teffont 2024

Our 2024 season, the last by the project in Teffont, focused on investigating the central structure of the ridge-top sacred complex. Working at scale and pace, with a team of professionals and highly experienced volunteers, we revealed the full extent of the large central structure of the complex, and excavated the most important room within the building. Post-excavation analysis of the finds and environmental remains continues, with the aim being for submission of our overall publication on Teffont to our publishers in 2026.

2024

Coombe Bissett 2024

In 2024 Teffont Archaeology was funded by Chase and Chalke Landscape Partnership Scheme (itself National Lottery Heritage Fund funded), to provide community excavation at Coombe Bissett, about a kilometre from our 2022 excavations. This work followed up on a geophysical survey conducted by Wessex Archaeology for Chase and Chalke which revealed a series of prehistoric and Roman features. Our excavations demonstrated that the site included a probably Bronze Age barrow and a late Iron Age to Roman agricultural enclosure, providing training in excavation, post-excavation, metal-detecting and other skills to a large number of volunteers.

2024

2023

Teffont 2023

In 2023 a large team of Cardiff University students, National Lottery Heritage Fund-funded positive action placements, community volunteers and Wiltshire Field Group members returned to excavate the northern half of the original site we first investigated in 2008-9. We completed excavation of the monumental pool building, which transpired to be very significant in terms of scale, richness of waterlogged environmental deposits, and architectural elaboration, incorporating running water within its building as well as the pool itself beneath a vaulted roof. An unusually large grain dryer, three further masonry structures, a small number of burials and the previously investigated trackway together demonstrated intensive use of the site from the late Iron Age to around the end of the 3rd century AD. Over 130 participants took part in excavation and post-excavation for over 1100 person days, with outstanding feedback in terms of their enjoyment, wellbeing and skills development.

2022

Coombe Bissett 2022

In 2022 Alyson and David co-directed a large excavation of the site Alyson’s team had evaluated the previous autumn, funded by National Lottery Heritage Fund, the Cookson Trust and generous private donors. Volunteers, Cardiff University students and positive action placements worked on this open area excavation, which revealed widespread Iron Age grain storage pits and Iron Age and Roman postholes and post-built structures, as well as ovens and grain dryers / malting ovens. The site continued to be occupied for similar agricultural processing tasks through the Roman period, until in the late 4th century AD it was enclosed by a very large ditch, palisade and large gate structure at the new enclosure’s eastern entrance. This phase of activity may be an attempt by the late Roman military to control the site’s arable produce.However, the enclosure was short-lived and it appears the local community recommenced grain processing after the ditches had been filled in and gate removed.

2022

2021

Coombe Bissett 2021

In 2021 Alyson Tanner led an independent research excavation at Coombe Bissett as part of her MSc research. Test pitting in collaboration with the Wiltshire Field Group, with support from Phil Andrews of Wessex Archaeology and volunteers, dated and characterised features visible from the geophysical surveys Alyson had previously organised.

2021

Teffont 2021

Continuing the theme of returning to follow-up previous work, in 2021 the team explored geophysical features and new structures in the field to the north-east of the ridge-top complex. We revealed one major masonry building, a large masonry terrace, a trackway and a range of other features relating mainly to what we believe to be a late Roman ancillary complex supporting visitors to the ridge-top enclosure.

2021

2020

Teffont 2020

When restrictions allowed during the covid pandemic, key members of the team undertook test pitting in the ridge-top sacred enclosure. This discovered another major Roman structure, which we would explore further in 2021 and 2024.

2019

Kingston Deverill 2019

Further geophysical survey in 2018 and 2019 in the Deverill valley had revealed a wide range of features in various locations in the parish of Kingston Deverill. One of these, close to Kingston Deverill ford, was investigated on a small scale through excavation. Both Roman and Medieval features were revealed, probably relating to the management of animals or riverside craftworking.

2019

2019

Teffont 2019

In 2019 the Teffont team conducted small-scale excavation within the ridge-top enclosure to attempt to answer a series of questions raised by discoveries in 2014 and 2017, and characterise the scheduled area of the site under Scheduled Monument Consent. Our work revealed parts of several structures and a well-built oven. Most importantly, our re-excavation and expansion of antiquarian trenches on the scheduled part of the site revealed a complex sequence of prehistoric, Roman and post-Roman activity at and around a mound adjacent to the entrance of the Roman sacred enclosure. This conclusively demonstrated the elaboration of a pre-Roman burial mound in the Roman period, including by the addition of a structure built into its side, and the further elaboration of the mound with the demolished remnants of the structure in the post-Roman period.

2018

Brixton Deverill 2018

Working with the Deverills Archaeology Group, newly formed with our encouragement and support, and funded by the National Lottery Heritage Fund, the Teffont team used geophysical survey and excavation to investigate a structure and associated enclosure in the immediate environs of the Deverill villa. Community volunteers learnt the essentials of excavation and post-excavation, and revealed significant supporting infrastructure for the villa.

2018

2017

Teffont 2017

A very small team undertook key-hole excavation in 2017 to refine our understanding of the trackway between Teffont’s ridge-top complex and the site to its south-west, and aspects of each site.

2015

Deverill villa 2015

In 2015 David was asked by the county archaeology team to investigate a newly discovered mosaic in the Deverill valley. The Teffont team undertook geophysical survey, then a rapid small-scale evaluation excavation to characterise the villa. The discovery of this large double courtyard villa made headlines worldwide, and transformed our understanding of the Roman period in the Deverill valley and the wider region. This project was run in partnership with Historic England, who funded the post-excavation analysis and archiving, whilst private donations from the landowners and local companies funded the excavation by the Teffont team. We are hugely grateful for their support in undertaking the project, which is approaching publication.

2015

2015

South Wiltshire Temple 2015

In 2015 PASt Landscapes work continued at the temple and expanded to evaluate an adjacent Roman settlement. Our team revealed the central area of the temple, a large iron-working furnace and a series of domestic enclosures, structures and deposits. The temple excavations have now been published: https://doi.org/10.1017/S0003581520000487

2015

Teffont 2015

At Teffont in 2015 we focused our resources on returning to the first site we’d investigated, below the ridge to the south-west. We conducted new geophysical surveys, revealing additional archaeological features and new questions. We excavated key areas of the site on a small scale to date and characterise selected features. This included returning to the monumental pool and sectioning its northern end, and dating the underlying late Iron Age banjo enclosure that was the precursor to early Roman activity on the site.

2015

2014

South Wiltshire Temple 2014

In 2014 the Teffont project supported the PASt Landscapes project (co-directed by David with Richard Henry, then Portable Antiquities Scheme Finds Liaison Officer for Wiltshire, and in collaboration with Dr Philippa Walton) in their first season of excavation at the South Wiltshire temple. The SWT excavations were directed by Steve Roskams (University of York) and revealed a nationally significant mid-late Roman temple with spectacular finds of ritually deposited objects.

2014

Teffont 2014

In 2014 the Teffont team launched a multi-method woodland survey over Easter to map and characterise archaeological deposits across the entire wood within which we’d excavated on a small scale in 2012 and 2013. We undertook analytical earthwork survey, geophysical survey, augering, shovel-pitting and test-pitting to build up a deposit model, with extraordinary results mapping the wood’s Roman archaeology. In the summer we returned to follow up our results with further excavation, discovering a stone gate to the complex, a partially colonnaded approach from the south-west, and structures within the enclosure. This was the year where we began to understand the overall scale, layout and importance of the ridge-top complex, which appears to have been the centre of Teffont’s Roman ritual landscape

2014

2013

Teffont 2013

In 2013 we returned to two areas of excavation from 2012, one in a ridge-top wood where we revealed more of a Roman sacred enclosure and a structure within it, and one in an adjacent field, where we investigated a large masonry building and associated deposits, including a possible cenotaph.

2012

Teffont 2012

In 2012 we expanded our work to include several fields surrounding the site we’d begun to investigate, conducting geophysical survey and a series of small scale excavations in the area on the border between Teffont Evias and Teffont Magna, and close to the Teffont stream. These revealed widespread Roman archaeology, some very well preserved. We also ran a very successful community garden test-pitting activity over a long weekend, and worked on understanding a book of records lent by the family of Ron Lever, who had previously investigated Roman Teffont.

2012

2011

Teffont 2011

August 2011 saw the team return to the site, expanding our excavations to reveal further walls, external activity areas, and the overall footprint of what we were to later understand to be Teffont’s monumental pool building, although this was only partially excavated due to time constraints.

2010

Teffont 2010

Our first field school season with University of York students excavated the south end of a major structure, and a large associated cobbled trackway, at the site we’d investigated in 2008 and 2009. This was the first demonstration of the potentially nationally significant scale of the Roman period investment in Teffont’s landscape.

2010

2009

Teffont 2009

In summer 2009 we returned to the site we’d discovered the previous winter. We undertook geophysical survey and small scale excavation to characterise the site, demonstrating the presence of in-situ Roman structures and deposits.

2008

Teffont 2008

Fieldwalking in winter 2008 was our very first work at Teffont. We set out grids and fieldwalked a site highlighted to us by Prof W Keatinge, collecting a significant quantity of Roman pottery indicating the presence of an archaeological site.

2008

Cookies

This website only uses essential cookies which are necessary for it to work.