Buried under Cirencester's Kingshill site is Roman farmhouse (From Wilts and Gloucestershire Standard)

Buried under Cirencester's Kingshill site is Roman farmhouse

12:07pm Thursday 6th August 2009

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ARCHAEOLOGISTS working on a building site in Cirencester have uncovered more evidence of the town's rich Roman heritage.

The foundations of a Roman farmhouse have been discovered just below the surface of the second Kingshill development next to North Home Road.

"I would not be at all surprised if we found something unexpected there too from an even earlier period."

County archaeologist Charles Parry

A team from Oxford Archaeologists are currently excavating the site, which will be developed into a new housing estate by Berkeley Homes.

The experts believe they will discover evidence of earlier occupation if they dig deeper, literally. They hope to find evidence of animal shelters, a burial site and cesspits to prove the area was a former encampment.

Last July archaeologists uncovered a huge Roman settlement at the first Kingshill housing development on the A417.

A Bronze Age burial mound dating back to 2,000BC complete with skeleton was found.

It was described as Cirencester's "most significant" historical find.

Ken Welsh, senior project manager at Oxford Archaeology, confirmed more evidence of Roman life in Cirencester had been uncovered this week.

"We have only just started on the site so we don’t quite know what we have got at the moment but we do think there is Roman archaeology down there," he said.

County archaeologist Charles Parry said initial investigation at the farmhouse site showed up building debris and wall foundations.

"We did have a bit of an inkling that there was going to be a Roman building on the site," he said.

"It is on the immediate periphery of Cirencester and we know from work carried out elsewhere that we have got these well-guarded Roman farmstead type buildings dotted around the town.

"Roman archeology is not the end of the story. During the evaluation they found pre-historic occupation. So we have got both late prehistoric and Roman finds.

"I would not be at all surprised if we found something unexpected there too from an even earlier period."

Oxford Archaeologists are hoping the painstaking research will help to piece together the history of who may have once lived and worked in the area.

The team will review all of the finds after a couple of months excavating at the site.

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