Broad Street Place, City of London (BDC03)

Clients: Corporation of London

Author: Robin Nielsen

Site supervisor: Chiz Harward

After evaluation in 2003, two phases of excavation were carried out at 6 Broad Street Place in 2004 on behalf of the client, the Corporation of London. The first consisted of trenches for thrust blocks and a tower base necessary for the installation of a facade retention system. The excavation for the tower base was combined with that for a tower crane. The second phase was for new pile caps, ground beams and drainage. The areas between these were preserved in situ. Programming and cooperation with the contract managers, Costain, was the key to the success of the project on a very constricted site.

The site is situated in the upper valley of the Walbrook, a tributary of the Thames, and a brickearth-filled palaeochannel, running across the eastern half of the site, was its earliest manifestation. During the later prehistoric period, shallow braiding channels formed. Several sherds of redeposited prehistoric pottery, flint tools and flakes were found.

The channels were infilled in the 1st century AD and replaced by man-made ditches. Roman Londoners may first have been buried here in the later 1st century AD. At this time, disarticulated and semi-articulated human remains ‘ponded’ in a wet area at the east of the site. In the past, human remains in the River Walbrook have been colourfully associated with the victims of the Boudican revolt or ‘Celtic’ head-hunting activity.

An east–west road was laid across the site, probably about AD 120. A wide channel constructed along the northern edge of the site would have drained a wide area, and contained flood deposits, interspersed with sandy beach or foreshore deposits. Human remains were found interspersed with these. A number of horse bones were also recovered, a species that has been associated with cemeteries elsewhere. A series of 2nd-century burials were dug to the south of the channel, through former flood deposits, and several bodies showed signs of being eroded into the channel; in one case, then being reburied by similar material whilst still relatively intact.

The central area of the site had been horizontally truncated in antiquity, possibly removing further burials. However, here a group of three coffined burials did survive, aligned with a gully or drain. The complete corpse of a ram had latterly been disposed of in the gully.

In the late 2nd or early 3rd century AD, rubbish was dumped over the increasingly waterlogged road. The drainage channels finally silted up and a marsh formed across the area, to remain until at least the 16th century. Medieval remains were limited to intrusive artefacts in the marsh deposits. These included a bone ice-skate and a possible sledge runner made from a horse mandible.

The site significantly contributes to our knowledge and understanding of Roman burial practice in the area, and the management and use of the Upper Walbrook valley in the Roman period.

This site report is extracted from MoLAS 2004: annual review