Mersham (West of), ARC MSW 97

Abstract

• As part of a programme of archaeological investigation along the route of the Channel tunnel Rail Link, Union Railways (URL) commissioned the Museum of London Archaeology Service (MoLAS) to undertake an evaluation of five trenches at Little Hook Farm, in the parish of Mersham, Kent TR 0465 3965, URL grid 84636E/19672N. The work took place between the 5th - 7th November 1997. The aim of the evaluation was to examine a number of geophysical anomalies. Archaeological features consisted of elements of a series of linear field ditches, probably of post-medieval date, and a ditch of late Iron Age date (100 BC to AD 60-70) in 1974TT. The Iron Age ditch contained several large unabraded pot sherds which suggests that there was an unlocated contemporary settlement nearby. Geologically the site lies on the boundary between the Cretaceous Lower Greensand/Speenton Clay and the Weald Clay. In all trenches there was an accumulation of brickearth type sediments of late Pleistocene and Holocene date from which the top soil was derived.