Ipswich UAD child record record IPS 1325 - Structure (Possible Jetty) 0158

A timber structure (0158), driven into the top of the river silts (0049, 0068, 0076, 0079) in trench 0031, comprised two parallel and north-south post and plank walls, 1.1m apart, with a line of east-west posts, 1.5m to the south-west. The north ‘wall’ was made up of two planks (0062, 0063) sloping at 45 degrees, four vertical posts(0058. 0060, 0061, 0109) with a horizontal plank (0059). The south ‘wall’ had three vertical posts (0066, 0072, 0127) and one plank (0065). A layer of sand (0064) lay between the two ‘walls’. The line of rounded posts due west (0054, 0055, 0056, 0057) was surrounded by sand (0053).
There is no direct evidence of function. It could be a small jetty allowing access to the river channel across the mud but the planking would imply that it was more like a container and, in freshwater, this might suggest oyster farming or eel catching.
The dating of finds from around the posts suggests that the structure is no later than 16th century in date. Timbers were submitted to the DOE dendrochronology laboratory at Sheffield for tree-ring analysis but unfortunately no dating was possible. A copy of the report on this analysis is lodged in the digital archive (R016), (S1)