| Description | An excavation was carried out by WYAS between the 3rd and 30th October 2000 in advance of the redevelopment of a site at Jubilee Place, Pontefract. The development site (centred on the above grid reference) consisted of a 0.23 hectare rectangular plot of land bounded to the south by Northgate, to the north by Back Northgate and by buildings to the west and east.
A trench was excavated using a 360 degree tracked excavator fitted with a toothless ditching bucket, under direct archaeological supervision. Topsoil and subsoil deposits were removed in controlled, level spits until the first archaeological horizons were identified. The resulting surface was then cleaned by hand to identify the extent of all archaeological features.
The total excavated area measured 487 square metres. The archaeological evidence indicated that the earliest activity on site may have dated back to the 10th/11th centuries, although information relating to this is extremely sparse, only 2 sherds of pottery dating from this period were found.
Evidence for the 13th century was similarly limited with 8 sherds of pottery recovered from a layer covering almost the entire northern part of the development area.
In the later 14th century a kiln (c.SE 4576 2226) was constructed at the northern end of the site, marking the beginning of a phase of industrial activity which seemed to have continued for much of the 15th century.
Archaeomagnetic dating of the kiln produced two possible dates; AD 1230 1270 and AD 1380 1415. Stratigraphically, the later date would seem more probable as it cut into the layer containing 13th century material. The kiln contained no lime burning debris, pottery, or food processing waste but as deposits of lime/lime mortar were present in 7 circular clay lined pits on site, lime burning was thought to be the most probably function. These pits ranged in diameter from 0.9m and 1.6m and were 0.46m deep.
The site became used as a tawyers' and horn workers' yard in the 15th century. The majority of the tawing pits were constructed along a very clear northwest to southeast alignment and this may have been aligned with structures or plot boundaries. However, no evidence of structures was identified. Significant quantities of medieval pottery and animal bone was recovered from the pits. The bone assemblage from the medieval pits consisted of 753 fragments. The fragments were not typical of domestic debris as meat rich bones were scarce; horncores and metapodials were much more common. |