Holes and ‘special deposits’ at Mildenhall Hub, Suffolk
- DATE WRITTEN:
- READING TIME: 1 minute
- AUTHORS: Chris Fern (Post Excavation Manager)
People in the Iron Age liked to dig holes. Archaeologists can find dozens, sometimes hundreds of small pits on settlement sites of the period (700 BC–AD 43), associated with roundhouses, and the ditched outlines of fields for crops and animals. Such excavations can often appear reminiscent of the movie Holes, in which miscreant youths dig pits in the hot sun as punishment — an irony not lost on archaeological diggers! In 2018, such a site was found by Cotswold Archaeology (Suffolk), whilst excavating ahead of the development of the Mildenhall Community Hub. On this occasion, over 120 pits were excavated, found clustered in groups and some with intriguing discoveries!
Unlike in Holes, the Iron Age pits were dug for a purpose, to form neat cylindrical pits (typically about 1.5m diameter) in which to store grain. New holes had to be dug quite often and — not wishing to waste a good hole— the old pits were frequently used to bury rubbish, such as broken pottery and butchered animal waste. The pottery at Mildenhall dates the settlement to the Middle Iron Age (400–100 BC).
Sometimes unusual things were placed in the pits. At Mildenhall these included two human burials, animal skulls, pieces of human bone, a whole horse and an oven! Such findings are not unusual on Iron Age settlements and archaeologists call them ‘special deposits’. Such acts must have had significant meaning, and it is even possible the human and animal burials could represent sacrifices — perhaps offerings to ensure a good harvest or made for some religious purpose. One group of pits at Mildenhall had a concentration of ‘special deposits’, including the horse burial and the small circular oven, which originally would have had a clay and wattle dome. Radiocarbon dating for these two discoveries indicates that they are contemporary events (2nd to 1st century BC), so they might relate to a single episode, perhaps of sacrifice and feasting, with the oven used to cook for the revellers.
