Excavations in the Extramural Settlement of Roman Alchester, Oxfordshire, 1991

This is a study of major excavations that took place in 1991 in the northern extramural settlement of the small Roman town of Alchester, Oxfordshire, in advance of road construction on the A421. These excavations produced Neolithic/Bronze Age flintwork, residual Beaker material and evidence for a middle Iron Age settlement, as well as extensive activity throughout the Roman period and post-Roman burials. This evidence has been integrated with that from other recent work in the Bicester area and the wider region at large to produce a new framework for understanding the development of the Roman town in its regional context. In the 1st to early 2nd centuries the Roman settlement was characterized principally by ditches on alignments relating to the early Roman Akeman Street. Later a system of ditched plots developed on each side of a minor lane parallel to and north of the line of Akeman Street. The settlement continued to the end of the Roman period and probably beyond, and there may have been some continuity in agricultural practices into the post-Roman period. A small late Roman cemetery with a post-Roman phase complemented the domestic structures and other features. There were finds of a wide variety of types and materials, of which the most remarkable was a fragment of a monumental inscription. The pottery assemblage was also particularly large and significant. Smaller-scale work elsewhere on the road scheme uncovered a Bronze Age burial, a late Iron Age to early Roman settlement, and elements of the fields systems relating to the Roman town.