Tithe Barn Green, Monkerton, Exeter, Devon. Post-Excavation Assessment and Updated Project Design.

A programme of archaeological investigation was undertaken by Cotswold Archaeology between March and May, 2015, at the request of Linden Homes Ltd, on land at Tithe Barn Green, Monkerton, Exeter, Devon in response to an planning condition (no. 12/0802/01). The investigation comprised five individual excavation areas, which targeted archaeological features which had previously been identified by geophysical survey, and trial trenching. Geophysical survey identified a number of possible ring ditches in the south-west part of the site, together with enclosures, a trackway, and a single, possibly prehistoric, boundary ditch to the north of the Pinn Brook. Excavation revealed evidence of a multi-phase site, dating from the Middle Bronze Age to the medieval periods. Archaeological features extended across all five excavation areas, but were primarily encountered within Areas 2, 3, and 5. The substantial ditch, 101, investigated in Area 1, contained no dating evidence, with the exception of an abraded Neolithic sherd, which is likely to be a residual item. Area 3 contained a Middle Bronze Age barrow ring ditch, together with truncated ditch sections representing a probable Middle Iron Age roundhouse. Further evidence of Middle Iron Age settlement was recorded in Area 5, in the form of an oval-plan ditched enclosure and associated features. An early-mid Roman phase included two rectilinear enclosures in Area 5, together with a number of related ditches which are likely to have comprised elements of surrounding drovewaysand field system. Later Roman activity in Area 5 was evident in the fills of a small number of cut features, but was otherwise impossible to characterise. The final phase on this site was of mid to late medieval date, and comprised several ditches and pits in Area 2. The ditched features were interpreted as elements of a drove-way running alongside the Pinn Brook. With the exception of a group of Middle Bronze Age sherds from the ring ditch in Area 2, this site produced a limited range and quantity of artefactual evidence, and most excavated features, particularly within Area 5, had been considerably truncated. Many features, including those in Area 5, produced no dateable material. Chronologically, the finds groups correspond discretely to excavated areas, thus Middle Bronze Age from Area 3, Middle Iron Age from Areas 3 and 5, Medieval from Area 2, and Middle/Late Iron Age and Roman from Area 5. The Tithe Barn Green site should be considered within the context of the available results of a number of recently investigated comparator sites of late prehistoric and Roman date within the environs of Exeter.