Archaeological Investigations in Chapel Court, St John's College, Cambridge 1991

Abstract

The excavation of a trial trench in the southwestern corner of Chapel Court, St John’s College, Cambridge, revealed traces of late Romano-British occupation. Thereafter left undeveloped until medieval times, no evidence was found of Middle or Late Saxon utilization. In the 13th/14th century, a large embanked ditch, possibly a minor barge channel, was dug running down to the river. Re-cut-this ditch-line remained open as an earthwork until the 15th/16th century. At this time, as attested by the building up of alluvium, the site lay within the floodplain of the river Cam. The open profile of this riverside ditch apparently determined the line of St John’s Lane. Initially an insubstantial thoroughfare/hollow way flanked by backyard gardens, in the later 16th/17th century its relationship to the north-lying property was formalized with the erection of a boundary wall whose construction was contemporary with the laying of a robustly cobbled laneway surface. This wall was later incorporated into a back-property shed, possibly related to iron-working. A sequence of post-medieval laneway surfaces was recorded. Later horizons were apparently truncated in the later 19th century when the area was turfed over and transformed into College-related ‘green space’. This lawn was raised to its present day level earlier this century.