EAB1 - Excavation - ADEN ARBORETUM

Eleven trenches were excavated in an attempt to locate the site of the Monastery of Deer. Two radiocarbon dates were obtained from the evaluations: one of Mesolithic date (4931-4716 BC) from a firepit in Trench 3, and one of Iron Age date (45 BC-136 AD) from the matrix of a disturbed wall with a stake-hole located outside the churchyard wall. Other trenches revealed traces of probable Later Prehistoric cultivation and a substantial mortared wall of Post-Medieval date. These were sealed beneath deep waterborne and hill wash deposits, which lay across the area to the east of the church. Thick modern midden deposits over the waterlogged subsoil were found around Grains Well, in the south of the village. The results indicate that if Old Deer is the site of the original monastery, the low-lying ground to the east of the church was not used to accommodate dwellings, workshops, or other permanent components of the monastery's infrastructure, probably because of its propensity to flooding, while the area around the well appears to have been historically boggy.