St Edmund Hall, Norham Gardens, Oxford Archaeological Evaluation Report

Oxford Archaeology was commissioned by Turnberry on behalf of St Edmund
Hall Design and Build Ltd to undertake a trial trench evaluation at the site of a
proposed development at St Edmund Hall, Norham Gardens, Oxford. The work
comprised the excavation of five trenches targeted within the footprint of the
proposed development. The fieldwork was undertaken over the course of five
days, between 23 and 27 May 2022.
The earliest activity on the site was represented by three pieces of struck flint
recovered from Trench 3. Although these were found as residual artefacts,
they have been broadly identified as Neolithic to Bronze Age in date.
Several ditches apparently forming part of a rectilinear enclosure system were
revealed in Trenches 1 and 3. Only a small quantity of early to mid‐Roman
pottery was recovered from one of these ditches but based on their
appearance and alignment it is thought likely that they were broadly
contemporary and Roman in date. The NE‐SW and NW‐SE alignments of these
ditches fit well with the cropmark features recorded in University Parks to the
south and they are likely to be related. Two larger features of uncertain extent
were also revealed in the north‐east of the site in Trench 4, but no dating
evidence was recovered.
Varying levels of overburden across the site demonstrate that various
landscaping and terracing work associated with the construction of the hall
have had a reasonable impact on the topography and deposits. However, the
archaeological remains appear unaffected by this landscaping. Although they
are likely to have been truncated by medieval and post‐medieval agricultural
activity in the area.