What they found

Timbers sticking out of the mud banks of St Osyth Creek had become increasingly exposed over recent years. Fitting in the excavation work between tides, in an environment protected by English Nature, Time Team and Essex County Council excavated these timbers and investigated how they related to the village and priory of St Osyth, which lie one kilometre to the east of the site.

Excavation in the bank revealed a line of vertical, round stakes parallel to the course of the creek. Running perpendicular to these, towards the shore, were the remains of two sets of wattle hurdling. Pottery from gravel within this hurdling dated the destruction of the feature to the second half of the 17th century. Gustav Milne, of the Institute of Archaeology, University College London, concluded that the damage to the structure indicated that the remaining timbers were part of an unusual truncated feature. This had once extended further south into the creek and been destroyed in a particularly violent natural event. Carbon 14 analysis of timber and wattling gave a calibrated date of 1550 AD ±100 years.

A variety of 12th-13th century pottery was collected during fieldwalking in the field north of the creek and geophysics surveys there indicated a lot of activity. However, rubbish pits, structures and a brick kiln excavated in the field were all dated to the 15th-17th century. It appeared that the earlier pottery finds, including imported wares and one mid-Saxon German wine jar sherd, were residual, relating to earlier periods of occupation for which no evidence of structures was found.

Residents of the village helped to dig test pits on their properties in an attempt to understand how their village had developed. Despite the 12th-century foundation of the priory and the presence of a 13th-century house, pottery dating from before the 15th century was very scarce. Dendrochronology on timbers from a public building on the market place gave a date of 1494-1500.

A few pieces of mid 14th-century pottery were excavated in the churchyard. These were identified by finds specialist Paul Blinkhorn as a sherd of late London ware; one of early German stoneware; and another of Dutch medieval pottery. The general picture was one of wealthy merchants up by the priory and industry down by the creek.

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