Archaeological Intervention at Land at Belton Business Park. A161 between Belton and Epworth, Belton, DN9 1NY

The watching brief involved the archaeological monitoring of the mechanical stripping of topsoil for the construction of two new car parks. Work was initially undertaken on the smaller of the two car parks, located to the north of the former brickworks building complex. During the stripping it became clear that beneath the topsoil was a layer comprising mixed topsoil, subsoil and redeposited natural clay, which sealed the undisturbed natural. This meant that the proposed depth of stripping would not expose or disturb any potential archaeological features or deposits. Following consultation with the North Lincolnshire Council Historic Environment Officer it was agreed that the remainder of the stripping for this car park could be undertaken without archaeological monitoring. It was also agreed that if the same sequence of deposits and depth of impact were recorded for the second car park then this would also be curtailed. Sample monitoring of the second car park was undertaken, which exposed the same mixed deposit at the basal limit of excavation. Therefore the watching brief was stopped. Figure 4 shows the full extent of the areas monitored. Standard On-Site Archaeology techniques were followed throughout the watching brief. These involved the completion of a written description for each deposit encountered. A photographic record of the deposits and features was also maintained. As no archaeological features or finds were encountered drawings were limited to annotations to existing architect's plans. Trench 1. This consisted of an area to the north of the workshop buildings. It consisted of an irregularly shaped piece of land measuring approximately 110m by 52m. The earliest deposit exposed during the reduction was (102) a mixed reddish brown silty clay with brown and pink mottling. This material was a mixture of subsoil and natural, presumably a product or large-scale landscape management during the use of the site as a brick works. The material was not fully removed as it provided a suitable base for the imported stone car park foundation (Plates 1 and 2). A small test pit was hand excavated into this deposit to test its depth. This showed that the undisturbed firm natural clay (103) lay 0.25m below the base of excavation (see Plate 3). Above (102) was (101) a thin layer of mid reddish orange brown silty clay, a subsoil of variable depth. The upper deposit was up to 0.27m (100) a dark greyish red brown silty loam topsoil. No archaeological features or deposits were recorded. Trench 2. This consisted of an area to the east of the workshop buildings. It consisted of an irregularly shaped piece of land measuring approximately 200m by 145m. The earliest deposit exposed during the reduction was (202) a mixed reddish brown silty clay with brown and pink mottling (see Plates 4 and 5). This material was a mixture of subsoil and natural, presumably a product or large-scale landscape management during the use of the site as a brick works. The material was not fully removed as it provided a suitable base for the imported stone to sit on Above (202) was (201) a thin layer of mid reddish orange brown silty clay, a subsoil of variable depth. The upper deposit was between 0.05m and 0.30m of (200) a dark greyish red brown silty loam topsoil that contained occasional brick and 20th century rubble and scrap. It was readily apparent that in Trench 2, as in Trench 1, the site strip would not be taken deep enough to expose the natural horizon. No archaeological features or deposits were recorded. No archaeological finds were recovered from either trench. As it was established that neither trench would be deep enough to expose the natural layers on site the watching brief was curtailed following sample monitoring.