Description

Summary: 1 iron nail from the Middle Saxon iron smelting site at Ramsbury, near Marlborough, Wiltshire, excavated by Jeremy Haslam in 1974, supported by the Department of the Environment through the Wiltshire Archaeological Committee.

Research results

A Middle Saxon iron smelting and smithing site at Ramsbury, Wiltshire, dating to the late 8th century and early 9th century AD. The industrial structures consist of bowl furnaces and associated features of at least three phases, and include a timber structure. The site is important because of its relatively good state of preservation, and because the furnaces show a sequence of technological inovation over a short period. Associated finds include quantities of animal bone, as well as some pottery, bronze and iron artefacts and fragments of imported lava querns. This and other evidence hints at patronage by an important royal estate.