Quick Links: Introduction | Area A | Area B | Area C
Area A has been the main focus of the project so far, with the most in depth work being carried out there. In this area the walls of the amphitheatre have been uncovered, and are clearly visible. From these discoveries it has be concluded that the site has played host to two different amphitheatres during the Roman occupation of Chester. For more information on what happened last year you can still read the archived information on what happened in 2004.
At it's deepest points, excavations in this area have reached a thick grey layer of soil that is thought to be directly overlapping the original, pre-Roman ground surface.
Pollen samples taken from two exposed sections of this layer have produced good results and an initial assessment has identified alder, hazel, grass and cereal pollen suggesting that the surrounding area had been managed as part of an arable farming regime (possibly an Iron Age farmstead.)
Details of the construction of the first amphitheatre to stand on the site are becoming clearer. The first structure to appear on the pre-Roman soil (see above) appears to have been the 'concentric wall'. This is made in a typical Roman military style: with a rubble core, faced with sandstone. and bonded with red clay. It is built into a relatively shallow foundation trench to avoid solid bedrock below. A specialist masonry archaeologists has suggested the wall shows signs of being erected in hurry.
Once the 'concentric wall' was built it seems a large amount of clay was dumped behind it. It is thought this was possibly from the first stage of the production of the arena floor. In this clay the foundation for the timber terracing was cut, which was first discovered during the excavations of the 1960's.
Along a six metre stretch of the wall a sandstone footing has been detected that is thought to be the base of a staircase that would have led to the back of the amphitheatre seating.
On the floor, just outside of the concentric there is evidence of a cobbled surface laid over the original ground. These cobbles were covered in surfaces, deposits and post holes that strongly hint a the existence of several booths and stalls that would have been associated with the activities in the amphitheatre. Some of the deposits include objects like chicken bones, spare ribs, souvenir pottery, and coins. Which adds further weight to the theory.
So these stalls would have been the Roman day equivalent of todays programme sellers, burger vans and merchandise dealers at a football match.
![Imag showing the work caarried out in Area A]](images/areaa_b_2507.jpg)
The outer most wall was a massive construction consisting of a sand-stone foundation 2.7m wide that was excavated to sandstone bedrock. This foundation was clearly cut through the deposits thought to represent the booths and stalls of the first amphitheatre – thus demonstrating that this wall was a later addition.
The external face of the outer wall was furnished with buttresses at regular intervals: one buttress either side of each vomitorium (entrance to seating) spaced at three paces; a single buttress between each vomitorium and entranceway spaced at six paces. These buttresses were suitably massive as to suggest that they had performed a structural function as opposed to being part of a façade.
The vomitorium walls were also added at this time though the construction trench for these walls was no deeper than the foundations of the concentric wall and they were not as massive as the foundations of the outer wall. Even so the massive size of the vomitorium foundations would suggest that they were intended to take a heavy load bearing as one might expect from stone vaulting designed to carry the upper rows of seating in the enlarged amphitheatre.
It was clear that the construction of the vomitorium walls would have necessitated the removal of the timber framework seating of the first amphitheatre, suggesting that an entirely new arrangement for the seating would ld have been installed.
Beyond the external face of the outer wall there was a series of between five and six metalled road surfaces – the earliest one of which appeared to be contemporary with the construction of the second amphitheatre. These road surfaces have still to be excavated but it is hoped that they may yield vital dating evidence for the construction and use of the second amphitheatre.
Two episodes of wall robbing were detected. The earlier seems to have concentrated on the concentric wall and the vomitorium suggesting that there was a desire to keep the outer wall standing to a significant height – perhaps for defensive purposes? The second robbing episode was aimed at the outer wall, but interestingly the stone robbing was undertaken from outside, which led to the inner face of the wall surviving to a much higher level – possibly to maintain an existing property boundary?
The dating of the stone robbing is still tentative, but some late Saxon Chester ware pottery (10th /11th century) may be present in the backfill of the stone robbing trenches. Certainly the amphitheatre walls had been robbed be- fore the appearance of medieval cess pits on the site during the 12th and 13th centuries.
From the 12th century onwards area A appears to have been to the rear of properties fronting on to Little St. John Street and was largely used for the construction of cess pits. The distribution of medieval pits may enable us to distinguish individual properties though the property boundaries themselves did not survive. These pits produced a good assemblage of medieval artefacts including some exceptional finds such as the bone hair comb and the complete pottery jug. They also produced a wealth of environmental samples which have produced plant seeds, fish bone and even parasite remains.
Despite the fact that some substantial buildings were still standing in the area up until the 1950’s very little evidence was present. Two flights of stone steps were identified along the north-western edge of the excavation, which led to cellars now buried beneath the modern road. The main feature of these buildings present on the excavation was a network of salt-glazed sewer pipes which probably served outside toilets at the back of the properties. A brick built garage with a concrete floor and car inspection pit was also identified.
The northern limit of Professor Newstead’s excavation trench from 1930 was re-excavated and this suggested that the stone foundations of the amphitheatre recorded by Newstead had been removed as part of his excavation process. Conversely the 1960’s excavation undertaken by F H Thompson had left far more intact archaeology in the ground than we had predicted – leaving us with an opportunity to excavate some of the timber grillage this year!