Timber Circle II, Holme-Next-The-Sea, Norfolk: Dendrochronological Analysis of Oak Timbers
Author(s): Ian Tyers
A tree-ring sampling and dating programme was commissioned on oak timbers from a Bronze Age timber circle on the Norfolk foreshore at Holme-next-the-Sea. This circle, Holme II, is located about 0.1km east from the Holme I circle ‘Seahenge’ which was dated to 2049 BC when excavated in 1998–9 (Groves 2002). The Holme II circle comprises an outer palisade of large, vertical-split, oak posts set side-by-side; a possibly incomplete inner-arc of oak posts set at intervals, and a central setting of two horizontal timbers surrounded by an oval of stakes with interwoven branches. The central-setting timbers were displaced by tidal erosion in 2004, and one was lost to the sea. In June 2013 tree-ring sampling was undertaken on timbers exposed in two test pits. One timber with intact bark-edge was recovered from each test pit, the results of which identified that the oak timbers from the outer circle and the central setting are precisely contemporaneous with those of the Holme I circle, both being felled in 2049 BC.
- Report Number:
- 26/2014
- Series:
- Research Report
- Pages:
- 17
- Keywords:
- Bronze Age Dendrochronology Excavation
