Site Event/Activity record ESF26661 - Evaluation - Land Adjacent To 96 Stowmarket Road, Needham Market

2019: In May 2019, an archaeological evaluation comprising seven trenches was undertaken by Cotswold Archaeology, on land adjacent to 96 Stowmarket Road, Needham Market, Suffolk, in advance of a housing development. An area of 0.7ha. Was evaluated, equating to 195m of linear trenching with a width of 1.80m, divided among six 30m trenches and a single 10m trench. The stratigraphic sequence was changeable across site. Topsoil ranged in depth from 0.30m in Trenches 4, 5, 6 and 7 to 0.47m in Trench 1. Colluvium was encountered towards the bottom of the rise in Trenches 2 and 3. Alluvial deposits were encountered in Trenches 1, 2, 3, 6, 7, positioned on either the floodplain or the tributary to the River Gipping. At the base of the sequence was natural drift geology consisting of compact, mixed mid orange grey and yellow clay with chalk patches and stones and a pale-yellow orange silty sand with gravel stones. (S1)