Miscellaneous

Meare Lake Villages
Ancient Village / Settlement / Misc. Earthwork

Pastscape description of Iron Age settlement:

wo occupation sites, classified by Hawkes as Iron Age SW 3rd B, near the village of Meare. They were first noticed by a farmer, Mr S Laver, in 1895 when pottery etc was found in digging post-holes and were followed up by Bulleid in 1896. The western site was excavated sporadically from 1910 to 1933, and the eastern site from 1933 onward.

There were some 50 to 60 hut sites in each of the villages, represented by mounds some 4 ft high, having successive floors of clay above a foundation of timber and brushwood, with central hearths. These huts were circular, but there was evidence of earlier rectangular huts.
The finds, mostly in Taunton Museum, include decorated and coarse pottery, vessels of wood, evidence of spinning and weaving, agriculture and metallurgy, and fibulae (La Tene 1 – 3) and other personal ornaments.

Roman coins from Constantius II to Valens and pottery including Samian were found at both sites.

Both sites are marked by low, irregular contiguous mounds and are under permanent pasture. Outline of the sites surveyed at 1:2500.

Excavation of a limited area of the eastern village in 1966 suggests a new scheme for the sites history. This envisages 4 Iron Age phases, from the 3rd century BC to the 1st century AD, and 2 Roman phases, the first sterile and flooded (the reason for IA abandonment?) and the second 4th century. After this the site suffered from repeated floodings.