More information : (SY 66729492) ROMAN BUILDING (R) (site of) (NAT) (1)
(29) ROMAN VILLA in Walls Field (66729492). A tessellated pavement was found in 1891 on Chalk at the foot of an E-facing slope, about 260ft above OD and some 100 yds W of the R Cerne. An area of mosaic `of very interesting design' covering 12ft by 4ft was cleared in 1891 by E Cunnington and F.A.H Vinon. The design, a square of small white tesserae surrounded by a border of blue and red, had apparently formed a square of 15ft. Excavations in 1960 by H.S.L. Dewar revealed a furnace flue, three flint steps and two fragments of walling. Two reused voussoirs of Ham Hill stone, slate and tile roofing materials, hypocaust tiles, tesserae, painted wall plaster, one piece with a 'convolvulus', and window glass, indicate a major structure. Samian, green-glazed and New Forest ware, and coins of Victorinus, Tetricus II and Gratian suggest occupation in the C2nd to C4th AD. Near the building lay an inhumation burial with a bronze brooch pin. Iron Age sherds were also found. Some 19th-century finds are in D.C.M. (Dorset County Chronicle, 2nd April, 1891, p5; Dorset Procs. XIII (1891), xxii; XVII (1896), xxv; XXI (1900), p84; LXXXII (1960), pp86-7; S. and Dorset Notes and Oueries XXVII (1961), pp7-10). (2)
DO 6 Listed as the site of a Roman villa. (3)
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