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Birmingham and Warwickshire Archaeological Society |
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The area was heavily cut by rubbish pits, many of which dated from the late 15th century and a smaller number from the 16th to early 18th centuries. A considerable assemblage of medieval pottery was recovered along with a selection of leather shoes and other fragments (a not uncommon type of find on larger excavations in Coventry). The excavated area of the central burgage plot exposed a series of rooms which contained numerous medieval floor surfaces often formed of thin layers of ash. The uppermost of these contained hundreds of copper alloy pins showing that these had been made on site in the late medieval or early post medieval period. Some evidence of metal working was found in the form of crucible fragments with the remains of copper slag adhering to them and evidence for bone working consisting of discarded offcuts and two instrument tuning pegs were also recovered. It is hoped that results from this site can be compared to another large site on Much Park Street about 100m to the north-west which was excavated by Birmingham Archaeology in 2008. |
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Fig. 7: Parkside site looking north |
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Fig. 6: Approximate location of the site (arrowed) on Samuel Bradford’s map of 1748-9 |
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ARCHAEOLOGY IN WARWICKSHIRE
In the first half of the year Warwickshire Museum carried out a reasonably large area excavation at Parkside, Coventry (Figs 6-10). This took place alongside Short Street, actually a name for this part of the medieval Much Park Street created after the area was severely altered by the highly destructive ring road. The actual medieval and later street frontage now lies under a particularly wide pavement alongside short street. However, excavations revealed parts of the rear areas of three medieval burgage plots with the remains of stone foundations from ranges of buildings running at right angles to the former street. |