A sequence of intercutting linear and curvilinear features was partially exposed at the north side of the excavation area. The stratigraphically earliest of these was a fragment of roughly NW-SE aligned, sinuous or possibly curvilinear ditch, which was exposed to a length of approximately 5m before being truncated (possibly recut) by the curvilinear ditch. At 1.30m wide and 0.55m deep, cutting ditch was significantly larger than the earlier ditch and was the most substantial feature in the complex; it had two fills, and its narrow, steep-sided base below an otherwise V-shaped profile suggested that it had been maintained over a period of time. This feature seems likely to be a continuation of the ditch recorded to the north. A small, heterogeneous pottery assemblage from the lower fill was tentatively ascribed to the 2nd century AD, and the upper fill also produced a single, very abraded sherd of mid- to late Roman pottery as well as a struck flint of earlier Neolithic type that may have been an unfinished tool. This mixed mid- to dark brown and black silty sand deposit contained frequent charcoal inclusions which could be seen to be following tip lines in the fill, and an environmental sample was taken. The sample proved to contain such a high level of charred cereal remains that it had to be sub-sampled: remains of emmer wheat, spelt wheat and hulled barley were retrieved, with a lower level of oats and free-threshing wheat: a combination frequently encountered on Iron Age sites in the north of Britain. A wide variety of charred seeds of ruderal and segetal native plants, with plants associated with grassland, marginal land and scrub, were also identified.

A ditch fragment running roughly westwards from the northern site edge, terminated just before the north-eastern edge of the curvilinear ditch, suggesting a possible association between the two features; two flint flakes, one datable to the earlier Neolithic period and one identifiable only as prehistoric, were retrieved from its single fill. The ditch fragment was cut along its northern edge by a gully, which may have been a recut, but continued past the western terminal of the ditch fragment, cutting across the curvilinear ditch and extending beyond the western site edge. This feature was probably the undated ditch recorded in an evaluation trench, although its profile was closer to that of another feature exposed in that evaluation trench: it was shallow, generally displaying steep sides and a broad, flat base in several excavated sections. It produced no finds, and no spatial relationships could be identified within this excavation area, although it was roughly parallel to the much larger ditch in excavation area to the north and to the east-west aligned elements of the putative Roman enclosure system. Another short length of undated linear feature, on the west side of this feature complex, extended some 4m to a south-western terminal: it resembled the other gully in both profile and fill, seemed likely to intersect the curvilinear ditch and gully directly outside the excavated area, but displayed no relationships within it. In association with the larger ditch and feature group in the excavation area to the north, it seems likely that this cluster of intercutting features represents an area of more intense activity during the Roman period, when the layout of the managed landscape was being changed more frequently.

The latest archaeological feature identified was a ditch which ran roughly east-north-east to west-south-west across the full width of the site, cutting the ring-ditch anda linear ditch: it increased in width from less than 0.80m at the eastern site edge to more than 1.0m at the western, and was nowhere more than 0.32m deep. This feature was probably the undated ditch recorded in the evaluation. The only finds retrieved during the excavation were two earlier Neolithic struck flints – a knife and a flake – from the fill of a section at its intersection with the ring-ditch, and these seem likely to be redeposited in this context: the projected line of this ditch connects it to the most substantial of the ‘perpendicular’ ditches of the mid-Roman enclosure complex in the excavation area to the east.

R. D. Savage, L. Brocklehurst & S. Palmer-Brown, 2021, Phases 3 and 3B, Fairham Pastures, West of Nottingham Road, Clifton, Rushcliffe, Nottinghamshire: Scheme of Archaeological Mitigation (Evaluation and Targeted Excavation) Combined Report (Unpublished document). SNT6051.