Research & Fieldwork Reports - by date of work

The original medieval settlement and manor of Albury, in Albury Park, is well-known for its displacement by the local lord(s) of the manor in the late 18th and early 19th century and re-location a kilometre away, to the present-day village, formerly the manor of Weston. Little is known of its earlier history, including its precise extent and any evidence of medieval activity beyond its Domesday ‘Old Saxon’ church (TQ 0631 4785) and mill along the banks of the Tillingbourne.

Between 1995 and 1997 Surrey Archaeological Society carried out excavations under the direction of Steve Dyer to investigate archaeological evidence revealed when a tree blew over at Cocks Farm, Abinger. The presence of a  villa had been known since the 1870s when Roman walls were found during the expansion of a kitchen garden . When well-preserved remains of an east-west range of a Roman building were discovered, the fieldwork was targeted to provide information for the future management of the site and to indicate a suitable area for scheduling as an ancient monument.

In March 2022, a small team of volunteers from Surrey Archaeological Society carried out a geophysical magnetometry survey and fieldwalking exercise on Neale’s Field, Chipstead as part of a small community project. This work was undertaken in order to investigate an unusual concentration of early metal-detecting finds, most notably a number of rare 15th century coins, which led to speculation of the site being the possible location of a medieval fair which was recorded at Chipstead from the 13th century, and to define, date and characterise the site.

A community test-pitting program took place in 2019 at Rowhurst near Leatherhead in Surrey. The site has a Grade II* listed building on the site dating back to 1346 and surface finds on the site included Bronze Age and Roman pottery and an Iron Age gold stater. The public were given experience in both test-pitting and finds processing.

This note covers the results of archaeological monitoring of a pipeline trench  excavated between the Hawthorne Pavilion in Farnham Park and the northern end of Upper South Park View in Farnham (centred SU 840 474). A few finds of possible Civil War date were recorded.

In November 2019 the final season at this muddy site took place. The intention was only to complete excavating a few features which had been left unfinished in 2018 when the team had to leave the site due to the deeply unpleasant conditions caused by the ‘Beast from the East’. Fortunately November 2019 was rather kinder and in spite of some rainy days there were enough dry ones for the work to take place within few days. In November 2019 the final season at this muddy site took place.

A survey of 51 churches and their medieval graffiti was undertaken by Abigail Coskun as part of her Durham University undergraduate dissertation, entitled 'Life and Death, Demons and Devotion: the Medieval Graffiti of Surrey’s Parish Churches'.

A new report on the prehistoric pottery from rescue excavations carried out between 1961 and 1968, at Weston Wood, Surrey, ahead of sand extraction, has just been published online.

In March 2018, a trench was opened to investigate a pit and ditch formation found in 2017 to the east of the known site. However, due to the weather and soil conditions it was not possible to undertake much work safely for either the archaeology or the volunteers (who were remarkably determined in spite of the challenging conditions). We now hope to return to deal with unfinished business in the autumn.