The wall discovered last week in the trench by the War Memorial has proved to be substantial. There is very little dating evidence coming out of the trench, but we are reasonably confident that this is a late medieval structure and it would explain the dumps of clay roof tile that we have found across this area.
Slightly to the west of the wall are other features that are much more likely to be earlier in date and associated with the ones we have found further down the trench with middle Saxon pottery, contemporary with the Anglo-Saxon monastery.
We are extending the trench gradually to see what we can expose in this transect across what was clearly an intensively used area, although from the lack of finds, the people living and working here were not very untidy. This means they did not leave a lot of rubbish around for us to find, which is a shame.
We have finished work in the area of the church now. There was a final clean-down today, but we are not anticipating further work here now.
As the dig begins to draw to a close, we are starting to get more media interest. There was an article in The Times, and the Mail Online carried a piece too.
Don’t believe everything you read in the newspapers. Gabor definitely did NOT say that the church was like a classical temple. And it was complete news to us that King Edwin invaded Kent and carried Ethelburga off to be his wife. What fevered imaginations some journalists have! They should have read our blog more carefully. Just follow the link to learn what really happened.