Monument record COG 025 - Land off Bures Road, Great Cornard.

2006:An archaeological evaluation was carried out on land off of Bures Road, Great Cornard in advance of the relocation of Sudbury Rugby club. The evaluation revealed a concentration of features including the corner of an enclosure ditch or part of a ring ditch, a linear ditch and a group of pits were found in close proximity to suggest a focus to the activity to the north of the sample area, with a low density of dispersed small pits beyond that. Flint and quartz sand-tempered pottery and struck flint suggested an Early Bronze Age date for the features and a presence on the site from the Palaeolithic period (S1).
In May 2007 full excavation followed which identified evidence of funerary activity in the Bronze Age period, with a possible earlier phase of occupation in the Mesolithic/Early Neolithic. Features identified consisted of a sparse scatter of pits (at least 7 were undated) lying adjacent to a small ring ditch with central pit. A small finds assemblage, predominantly consisting of struck flint, indicated that [the BA] activity on the site was not domestic in nature. Although no human burial was identified the ring ditch and central pit are clearly related to the wider landscape of Bronze Age funerary activity known in the vicinity, with several ring ditches, originally identified by aerial photography, lying immediately to the north-west. Recent excavations by SCCAS in 2009 of two of these large ring ditches, on the former rugby pitch, also identified another example of a small ring ditch. Following the prehistoric period there is no evidence of any activity on the site until the post-medieval period where three linear ditches probably represent former field boundaries. A recommendation has been made for the site results to be considered in any future archaeological publication of these latter excavations (S2).

2007: Metal detecting also found Mesolithic and Neolithic flintwork, including axeheads, (S3)