Monument record SKT 011 - Cedars Field Moated Site, Stowmarket, medieval (Med)

Moat, square, in SW corner of larger square `outer' moat.
June - October 1980: Excavation of inner moated area. Two clay-floored building areas within the moated area, one with a hearth. Pottery C13. Details in (S1)(S4)(S5 S6, S7).
See also Preh.

1997: Excavations showed the during the medieval periods, a small moated site was constructed in Cedars Field, the platform of which incorporated the spoil form the surrounding ditches, covered by a layer of boulder clay, I to the foundations of the presumed structures within the inner platform. At least four man-made features were found cutting into the boulder clay platform, but did not appear to from any kind of substantial habitable structure on there own. The site had a very short period of occupation with Pottery from the site indicates a date of the thirteenth century (S7).

The area of a known medieval moated site (partly excavated in 1981) was examined in advance of a commercial development. Eight phases of human activity were identified, ranging from prehistory through to the post-medieval period. The earliest phases consisted of dispersed pits and other features, some of which contained Neolithic pottery and worked flint. There was some evidence for a Roman presence in the form of abraded pottery. The main phases of occupation, however, belong to the early to high medieval periods, when a moated complex was constructed. No structures were identified, but several phases of infilling and clearance of the surrounding ditches were charted. Artefactual evidence indicates abandonment at some point after the 14th century, perhaps with final infilling of the exposed and weathered ditches in the 18th or 19th centuries. A brick structure of uncertain function was then built at the edge of the moat, and the area remained in agricultural use before dumping of constructional waste occurred in the 1960s.
Documentary evidence has revealed that in 1581 the moated site lay on a free tenement of the manor of Combs called Broughtons. In a survey of 1537, copying an earlier one of 1437, the same property is named as Pulhams tenement, belonging to the Stonham family, and included ‘a site formerly built’, which is probably a reference to the abandoned moated site. In 1327 Roger de Stonham was taxed 2s in Combs and may well have been living on the site. The lands of the Stonham family in Combs appear to have been inherited by the branch of the family that owned Stonham’s Manor in Rattlesden, and from them the lands passed, in the mid 15th century, to the Broughton family of Denston Hall, hence the name Broughtons. The documentary study has provided a detailed insight into the post-medieval and early modern land use of the area. Included in the Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology and History annual round up of individual finds and discoveries for 1999 (S8)