Romano-British Settlement and Cemeteries at Mucking: Excavations by Margaret and Tom Jones, 1965–1978

Excavations at Mucking, Essex, between 1965 and 1978, revealed extensive evidence for a multiphase rural Romano-British settlement, perhaps an estate center, and five associated cemetery areas (170 burials) with different burial areas reserved for different groups within the settlement. The settlement demonstrated clear continuity from the preceding Iron Age occupation with unbroken sequences of artifacts and enclosures through the first century AD, followed by rapid and extensive remodeling, which included the laying out a Central Enclosure and an organized water supply with wells, accompanied by the start of large-scale pottery production. After the mid-second century AD the Central Enclosure was largely abandoned and settlement shifted its focus more to the Southern Enclosure system with a gradual decline though the 3rd and 4th centuries although continued burial, pottery and artifactual deposition indicate that a form of settlement continued, possibly with some low-level pottery production. Some of the latest Roman pottery was strongly associated with the earliest Anglo-Saxon style pottery suggesting the existence of a terminal Roman settlement phase that essentially involved an ‘Anglo-Saxon’ community. Given recent revisions of the chronology for the early Anglo-Saxon period, this casts an intriguing light on the transition, with radical implications for understandings of this period. Each of the cemetery areas was in use for a considerable length of time. Taken as a whole, Mucking was very much a componented place/complex; it was its respective parts that fostered its many cemeteries, whose diverse rites reflect the variability and roles of the settlement’s evidently varied inhabitants.

Table of Contents

Contents

Chapter One: Roman Mucking – Many Things
Background and Prehistoric Sequence
Situation, Excavation Context and Methods
Base-line Sources
Site Phasing and Analysis
Volume Structure

Chapter Two: The Settlement Sequence
Conquest Period Components - A Sketch
Phase 1 - Later First/Early Second Century AD
The Central Enclosure
The Western Enclosures
The Southern Enclosures
Phase 2 - Early Second to Mid Third Century AD
The Central Enclosure
The Southern Enclosures
Pits

Phase 3 - Mid Third to Fourth Centuries AD
Discussion - Settlement Sequence, Pits and Building Parallels
Pits
Structures
Site Sequence

Chapter Three: Settlement Finds
Metalwork
Roman Coinage Richard Reece
Base Silver Finger-ring Martin Henig
Roman Brooches Colin Haselgrove
Other Copper Alloy Artefacts Grahame Appleby
Lead Artefacts Quita Mould
Iron Artefacts Quita Mould
Other Finds
Quern Stones David Buckley and Hilary Major
Jet Artefacts Chris Going and Sam Lucy
Glass Jennifer Price, D. Charlesworth and Donald Harden
Pottery
Samian Wares Joanna Bird and Brenda Dickinson
Mortaria Kay Hartley
Amphorae David Williams
Romano-British Pottery Rosemary Jefferies and Sam Lucy
Grafitti Chris Going
Pottery Petrology David Williams
Other Ceramic Finds
Clay Figurines Catherine Johns and F. Jenkins
Ceramic Building Material M.U. Jones with a note on Animal Foot Prints on Roman Tiles (Leslie Cram)
Fired Clay and Daub Paul Barford and Grahame Appleby
Textile Impressions Elizabeth Crowfoot
Economic Data
Animal Bone Krish Seetah and Geraldine Done
Mollusca from Pit 373Nx407E J. Cooper
Carbonised Grain from Corn-drier 3 Marijke van der Veen
Discussion - Distributions and Depositions
Distributions
Depositional Case-studies

Chapter Four: The Cemeteries
Cemetery I
Cemetery II
Cemetery III
Cemetery IV
Cemetery V
Smaller Cemetery Groups
Discussion - Rites and Practices
Nailed Footwear - Overview (Quita Mould)
Pottery Use and Deposition (Rosemary Jefferies)
Personal Ornaments
Contexts of Burial

Chapter Five: Integrating Parts - Settlement and Cemeteries
Transitions (I) - Iron Age/Roman
The Pottery Industry
Distinguishing Functional Difference
Pottery Analysis
Well 4 (Redux)
Metalwork and Other Category Distributions
Sets for the Living (and Dead)
Economic Basis
Ritual