Binham, Norfolk
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Binham is a small, rural village more than 50km from the county town of Norwich, located about 17km north-east of Fakenham and around 6km inland from the present north Norfolk coastline. Also likely to have been of significance in the medieval period is the proximity of Binham to Walsingham, a major destination for pilgrims in the middle Ages, just 5km from Binham. Binham lies at c. 25m OD on sand and recent geological deposits. The priory, whose impressive remains dominate the village today, was founded c. 1104 AD, and a market charter was also granted in the reign of Henry I, along with a four-day day annual fair. After the priory was suppressed in 1539 the nave was retained in use by the parishioners as a parish church, an arrangement which continues today. There is some speculation whether there was ever another church in the village which would have functioned as the parish church while the monastery was still in operation. Unlike at Ramsey, the present settlement at Binham does not seem to have developed immediately outside the priory gate, but at some distance from it. Binham village today lies either side of the remains of the Priory precinct, in two distinctly different parts. To the south and east the village is currently arranged as a nucleated cluster around a triangular arrangement of streets. The space within the triangle defined by these streets is devoid of buildings on the north and east sides, and appears to be the remains of a formerly larger green, if so, this is likely to be where the market was held. Manor Farm, a holding of uncertain date, lies to the south of this triangular area, and modern development to the west of Manor Farm. To the north of the green, the road bifurcates with one part leading north to the lowest-lying part of the present village along the south side of a small stream. To the west of the priory lies Westgate, a linear area of settlement arranged either side of the Warham Road, which has a distinctly interrupted row character towards its western end. Metal detecting has produced a large number of finds, indicating Roman activity and an early/middle Anglo-Saxon cemetery in the vicinity, probably located to the south-west of the priory remains.
Local Information Websites
2009
Fifteen test pits were excavated in Binham in 2009, six in the Westgate area and the rest in the northern part of the eastern village. Three of these (BIN/09/08, BIN/09/11 and BIN/09/14) produced Roman pottery, two of which were in undisturbed Roman contexts and the third residual in later Anglo-Saxon/medieval levels. These three pits are all clustered together around 150m south of the priory church, and constitute good evidence for Roman settlement in the immediate vicinity. BIN/09/02 produced handmade pottery of early/middle Anglo-Saxon date, a single sherd residual in later Anglo-Saxon levels, indicative of some level of activity in the Westgate area at this time. BIN/09/15 revealed the more substantial discovery of a beam slot containing two large sherds of Ipswich ware, clear evidence of a timber-framed building dating to c. 720–850 AD. The proximity of this to the later priory gatehouse may be a coincidence, but does prompt intriguing questions as whether the middle Saxon structure may be a previously unknown pre-tenth century high status building or possibly even an antecedent to the Norman priory, eleventh-century memories of which may have determined the siting of the later priory. Notably, this middle Anglo-Saxon building also lies close to the putative early-middle Anglo-Saxon cemetery inferred from the metal-detected finds.
In the late Anglo-Saxon period, pottery was found in pits both east (BIN/09/04, BIN/09/08 and BIN/09/11) and west (BIN/09/02 and BIN/09/03) of the later Priory, but, interestingly, not in the area closest to its entrance, which seems to have been unoccupied open space at this time. Again, it is interesting to note that settlement in the late Anglo-Saxon period seems to respect the area around the entrance to the Norman Abbey, although no documentary evidence exists to indicate that it was in existence before the early twelfth century. Pottery of twelfth to fourteenth century date was found widely the 2009 test pits, mostly in some quantity, indicating considerable growth in the extent and possible the intensity of settlement in the post-Conquest centuries. It seems reasonable to infer that the presence of the Priory acted as a stimulus to growth in the settlement. Whether the settlement at this date took the form of a nucleated village or a more attenuated interrupted row, or a combination of the former around the green with the latter along Westgate, is impossible to say based on the number of test pits excavated in 2009, but such a hyphothesis is not contradicted by the evidence to date. A marked downturn is evident in the later medieval period: hardly any pottery dating to the later fourteenth to mid sixteenth centuries was found, with only three pits producing any material of this date. The village east of the priory produced pottery of this date from just a single pit (BIN/09/08) and this yielded just two sherds totalling 3g in weight - hardly indicative of significant activity in the area which otherwise produced no post-fourteenth century medieval material at all - on present data, it would appear that Binham was almost completely deserted at this time.
June 2009
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Pottery Report |
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Test Pit Location Map |
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October 2009
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Pottery Report |
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Test Pit Location Map |
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Photographs: To view photographs from your field academy, type the following address into the address bar at the top of your browser window: http://www.arch.cam.ac.uk/aca/******/ (Replace '******' with the unique six-character code you were given for your site during the field academy. Important Note: Make sure you write your code in capital letters. And don't forget the forward slash at the end of the address!). |
2010
Fourteen test pits were excavated in Binham in 2010, bringing the total to twenty-nine, sited to infill gaps in the coverage of 2009. As in 2009, pits in the area south of the Priory church produced Roman pottery, as did BIN/10/9, a little to the north. None of these test pits produced any early Anglo-Saxon pottery, suggesting occupation was not continuous after the end of the Roman period. BIN/10/7 and BIN/10/13 between them produced three sherds of Ipswich Ware, both close to the site of the middle Anglo-Saxon beam slot found in 2009. Both of these pits also produced single sherd of Roman pottery, and the area in general is close to area where the pits producing most Roman material are clustered. However, without early Anglo-Saxon material, this does not seem to constitute evidence for continuity of occupation on the site.
The late Anglo-Saxon period seems to see another break, with the area of the middle Saxon activity noticeably devoid of this while sites to its north and south have produced pottery of this date. Binham seems to see considerable growth in the high medieval period, focussed on the roads leading past the Priory. There is notably less pottery produced from the core of the present village to the south of the Priory. The impression of a marked contraction in the later medieval period which was noted in 2009 was supported by the excavations of 2010, when little material of this date was found.
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Pottery Report |
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Test Pit Location Map |
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Photographs: To view photographs from your field academy, type the following address into the address bar at the top of your browser window: http://www.arch.cam.ac.uk/aca/******/ (Replace '******' with the unique six-character code you were given for your site during the field academy. Important Note: Make sure you write your code in capital letters. And don't forget the forward slash at the end of the address!). |
2011 - Communtiy Dig
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Pottery Report |
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Test Pit Location Map |
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Pottery Distribution Map |