The King's Parade Water Mains Watching Brief, Cambridge, Part II: Medieval Buildings and Deposits between Great St. Mary's Church and Bene't Street

Abstract

A trench dug to replace the water mains in King's Parade, Cambridge, provided an opportunity to record the archaeological deposits that were revealed. This report concerns a 170 metre stretch from opposite the entrance to Great St. Mary's Church to the junction of King's Parade and Bene't Street. A deep and complex urban sequence was revealed. Natural gravels and a buried soil lay under two lanes of probable pre-Conquest date. Large scale 12th/13th century dumps preceded 13th to 15th century timber buildings, yards, lanes, pits and ditches. These were cut by later clunch and brick wall footings and cellars which were demolished in the 18th/19th centuries. The sequence shows that the Medieval street layout was established in the 13th century and that the area was intensively occupied from then until the 18th century.