As more and more of us start to work from home, we are actually following in the footsteps of our ancestors who did lots of work in and around their houses. Most people did not travel to work in a particular spot, they would do all kinds of activity in their settlement.
For many of the people living here, farming was their main occupation. The sheer number of settlements in this area shows just how good the farmland was and how many people could survive on it. This did not change much with the arrival of the Roman empire (in AD 43), however the availability of goods to trade massively increased.
We’ve found what could be pottery kilns at multiple settlements, showing us that people were making and firing their own pots, plates and bowls. One extremely well-preserved Roman kiln had several ‘wasters’ alongside it – bits of burnt and discarded pottery that didn’t survive the firing! Clearly, they weren’t all master potters.
Not only did these small settlements include amateur potters, but they also included beer brewers! At one site, we found evidence of beer brewing in the shape of tiny germinating grains which hint at the malting process. There’s no easy way for us to know whether the people here were drinking their own beer or trading malt – it’s a question we’d love to try and answer.
While a lot of things could be produced in each small settlement, with the arrival of the Romans people living here could suddenly make use of the huge trade network across the empire. We can see the impact this has in the arrival of new pottery like Samian Ware – a glossy red pottery that was definitely designed for fine dining, not everyday use!
At one settlement we even found large fragments of an amphora, which is a pottery storage vessel that was often used to hold liquids. The specific type of amphora we found was produced in southern Spain and may have transported olive oil all the way north to this small settlement in Bedfordshire!
