10 Stephen Road Headington Oxford

Between November 2011 and May 2013 Oxford Archaeology carried out an archaeological evaluation and watching brief at 10 Stephen Road, Headington, Oxford. The works were carried out in advance of and during a redevelopment for
housing, comprising four town houses and a block of four apartments, with associated parking plots and gardens.
Prior to the development works, two evaluation trenches were excavated. These were located in areas identified as 'anomalies', possibly pertaining to burials, in a
Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR) survey of the site. However, no archaeological features were revealed. The anomalies observed in the GPR survey corresponded with areas of modern disturbance.
Following the evaluation, an archaeological watching brief was carried out on all groundworks that had potential to impact upon archaeological deposits. The groundworks included general ground reduction and excavation of footings and service trenches. A number of modern features, including a bottle/metal waste dump, two redundant water pipe trenches and a manhole, three soakaways and two
modern rubbish pits, were revealed. Another pit, possibly archaeological, was revealed within a pad-stone footing, although no finds were recovered from which to estimate a date. The most archaeologically significant feature revealed was a north-east – southwest aligned burial. However, the skeleton was in very poor condition, with only the legs surviving. A single fragment of Bronze Age pottery was recovered from the grave fill, although this was probably residual. It likely that the burial dates to the Saxon period, given its proximity to the site of a furnished Saxon burial that was revealed during groundworks at No.2 Stephen Road in 2003.