Test Pits
A Test pit is a 1 metre square hole dug in volunteer gardens throughout the Parish. We endevour to excavate each Test Pit, record its details and back fill it in 1 day.
Our first dig was in the back garden of the Chequers where some trees had been cleared creating a “diggable” patch. We found a lot of tile and brick, some sheep bone? and plenty of Georgian and Victorian pot. Of particular interest were 2 pieces of medieval pot, 1 of which may be from Brill and date to the 13th cent.[1250AD]. The records for the Chequers only go back as far as 1577 so we may have established people were living on the site for much longer.
We have also dug the front garden of the Chandos Arms and found tile and brick along with pot from the medieval to the present day, where the best example is a white 20th cent chamber pot. However we also found a flint core [see photo] which may date to the Neolithic [5000BC]. If you look carefully you can see where 3 flakes of penknife sized flint have been struck off the core. Someone was sitting in the Chandos front garden flint napping 7000 years ago..