Site Event/Activity record ESF21899 - Excavation, Phase 5 Liberty Village, RAF Lakenheath

Archaeological excavation carried out prior to the redevelopment of the Liberty Village housing estate at RAF Lakenheath identified occupation and funerary activity from the prehistoric to Anglo-Saxon periods. The earliest main phase of activity consisted of an Early Bronze Age ring ditch, set c.60m east of a similar known example (ERL 148). The ring ditch was 4.5m wide and 1.25m deep, enclosing an area c.30m in diameter, and showed two distinctive periods of infilling. Roman material consisting of two deliberately placed pig skulls and feet together with a coin scatter, was recovered from the upper fills of the ring ditch on the eastern side. A single grave, slightly off-centre to the south-east within the ring ditch contained a mature male inhumation of presumed Bronze Age date. With Roman deposits in the upper ring ditch fills the two Bronze Age barrows are presumed to have survived as visible monuments throughout the Roman period and into the Anglo-Saxon period. The final phase of activity on the site consisted of seven inhumation burials, two of which have been radiocarbon dated to the 7th-8th century middle Anglo-Saxon period. Four of these were positioned in a row, apparently inserted into the eastern side of the surviving Bronze Age barrow. The remaining three burials, consisting of two adults and a child, were on a similar alignment to the previous four, but cut into the northern part of the backfilled ditch and so post-date the final infilling of the ring ditch.