A Romano-British Villa at Itter Crescent, Peterborough: PXA and UPD

Between August 2011 and February 2012 Oxford Archaeology East conducted an archaeological excavation at Itter Crescent, Peterborough (TF 182 018), commissioned by CgMs Consulting on behalf of Bellway Homes (East Midlands) in advance of a residential development. The total machine stripped area covered 0.5 hectares.

Prior to the excavation, Peterborough City Historic Environment Record (HER) contained no records relating to archaeological sites or finds from the development area itself.

The excavation revealed multi-period archaeological remains dating from the Neolithic through to the post-Medieval period. The earliest finds were neolithic struck flint including a retouched blade. The earliest cut features evidenced a substantial Iron Age settlement, with three roundhouses, a hayrick and extensive settlement debris in an enclosure surrounded by a bank and ditch. Occupation of the enclosure continued into the Romano-British period with the construction of an extremely high status set of timber framed buildings which were later replaced by a two-storey stone courtyard villa and bath house complex. The exceptional level of preservation within the villa revealed mosaic floors, painted plaster walls, deeply stratified sequences of clay floors, a domed keyhole-shaped oven and hypocaust foundations of the tepidarium and caldarium in the bath house. Beyond the villa, evidence of the life of the inhabitants survived in the courtyard in the form of ovens, a well, drains and water tanks and occupation debris. Behind the villa a tile kiln used to fire the roof and floor tiles of the building was dug into the backfilled enclosure ditch. Sixteen neonate burials were contemporary with the inhabitation of the villa.

There was no major land use following the abandonment of the Villa in the later Roman period. Over time stone from the walls and foundations was systematically robbed and used elsewhere. The site was returned to for burial, with eleven adults and one juvenile buried within or close to the remains of the villa itself. In the Saxon period an adult female was buried with high status grave goods including gold gilt shoulder brooches and a necklace of baltic amber and glass beads.