Land North of Bradney Farm, Knight's End Road, March, Cambridgeshire

Between the 8th and 15th of September 2015 Oxford Archaeology East (OA East) conducted an archaeological evaluation on land north of Bradney Farm, Knight's End Road, March, Cambridgeshire (TL 3727 9455). The evaluation, comprising 28 evaluation trenches, was carried out prior to the proposed construction of the Benwick Solar Scheme. Evidence was found for a large roddon (a silted up river channel) - the pre-Roman course of the River Nene - running along the eastern half of the site, across which were cut three shallow linear ditches. No artefacts were recovered from these ditches, although it is possible that they were of Roman date. Two large parallel ditches were identified in the northern half of the site that correspond with post-drainage modern field boundaries shown on the first edition Ordnance Survey map (1889) of the area. Associated with these were two sets of cultivation furrows on different alignments that extended across most of the field. A more recent ditch was also present that bisected one of the earlier field boundaries and is shown on the 1971 Ordnance Survey map. Four modern machine dug pits were also found in the eastern part of the field, adjacent to the most recent boundary ditch.