A new publication, funded by Southampton Football Club, redraws the map of Hamwic - the Saxon settlement beneath part of Southampton. The investigations reveal a rather dirty, polluted and unhealthy place, pockmarked with rubbish and cess pits, where disease and infection were daily hazards.
Excavations between 1998-2000, the most extensive single investigation yet undertaken within the Saxon settlement, were funded by Southampton Football Club prior to the building of the new Friends Provident St Marys Stadium.
They show that the Saxon town extended further north than had previously been thought. Much of the pottery that was found had been imported, showing that foreign trade was clearly already important to Saxon Hamwic.
As well as an early Saxon cemetery, traces of a street and of wattle and daub buildings were found, including the possible site of a blacksmith’s workshop.
Intriguing finds include a small skein of gold thread, and Romano-British jewellery that was already 300 years old when it was buried.
Update December 2011
This book has now sold out. If it is reprinted, or made available as an ebook, we will update this page.