South Cotswolds NMP
The South Cotswolds project of the National Mapping Programme (NMP) has been designed to extend up to previous aerial survey projects, including the North Gloucestershire Cotswolds and the Upper Thames Valley. The South Cotswolds project area extends from Wooton-under-Edge in the southeast to just south of Stow-on-the-Wold in the north of the Cotswold Hills. The project has been funded by the Historic Environment Enabling Programme (Project No. 4755) and is being carried out by Gloucestershire County Council Archaeology Service staff based within the Aerial Survey and Investigation team in Swindon. The aim is to provide a complete transcription and interpretation of archaeological features from all periods which are visible on aerial photographs.
Mapping has begun in and around the Cirencester area and has already revealed an interesting wealth of archaeological monuments and features which date from the prehistoric periods to the Second World War. Numerous ring ditches are visible as cropmarks, and are interpreted as the levelled remains of probable Bronze Age round barrows. Although no settlements have been identified dating to this period the presence of the numerous funerary sites and field systems which may be contemporary is indicative of a Bronze Age population. The area continued to be settled during the Iron Age, suggested by the numerous examples of ‘banjo’ enclosures, rectilinear enclosures, hill forts and unenclosed settlements.
The South Cotswolds is also well known for its Roman sites, and many have been identified by the aerial survey. There are a large number of villa sites and other settlements mostly visible as cropmarks, such as that at Barnsley Park which is associated with an extensive system of field boundaries. It is hoped that the results of the aerial survey will examine examples of both continuity and change in this period, and address some of the questions of ‘Romanisation’, such as the reuse of earlier sites.
The most common form of archaeological evidence across the study area is the remnants of the medieval and post medieval agrarian landscape. There is extensive medieval and/post medieval ridge and furrow which is visible as earthworks on the historical aerial photography, much of which has subsequently been plough levelled. The south Cotswolds region was extensively cultivated in the past, as it still is today. Aerial survey can reveal some of the innovations and changing farming practices which were adopted in the agricultural revolution of the 17th and 18th centuries. Along many of the valley bottoms, such as the River Churn, Daglingworth Brook and Ampney Brook are extensive and well preserved water meadows dating to the post medieval period. The water meadows comprise a series of parallel and interlinked water channels and drainage ditches intended to facilitate the controlled water logging and drainage of the valley bottom. They would improve the grass and start the growing season earlier, giving significant advantages for sheep husbandry.
The South Cotswolds contains a number of Second World War military camps, airfields and hospitals, many of which were located within large scale parks and gardens which were requisitioned during the war. In Cirencester Park, immediately to the west of the town, was a pair of American army hospitals visible on the historical aerial photography. The hospitals were set up in advance of Operation Overlord, and staffed by the US Army Medical Corps. Each hospital had a central core of wards, mess halls, operating theatre and other specialist buildings, while the peripheries consisted of staff quarters. The remnants of medieval ridge and furrow as well as early 18th century landscape park features are also visible within the landscape parks.
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