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Alfan Lane
7 open denehole entered through the
roots of a tree
Bankside
11, Small depression in corner of rear garden. Almost
certainly a denehole.
Joydens Wood
This
320 acre hill top wood was once part of the Mount Mascal Estate and in 1956 it was acquired by the Forestry
Commission and in 1987 the wood
and the plantation were purchased by the Woodland Trust who also gained
commoners rights in exchange for land taken for the A2 trunk road. The name
comes from William Jordayne, a 16th
Dartford resident, - and the wood has also been called ‘Jordans’. over 240 species of plants, 50 different
trees, many
fungi, 270 species of moth, 58 species of birds in or over the wood, many butterflies and insects,
plus a small number of animals and reptiles
have been noted. Forestry Commission which cleared
much
of the area and planted Corsican Pine, Larch, Maple and Western Hemlock for commercial purposes . Later, horse rides were established to separate riders and walkers..
bomb
craters from the Second World War
Deneholes. in the
1880s Spurrell made a map of Joydens Wood and plotted the locations of the
shafts. He descended many of them and made drawings of some, writing
"Deneholes and Caves with artificial entrances" published in the
Archaeological Journal. there are Roman remains in the woods and some of the
pieces of pottery found their way down the shafts and Spurrell also claimed
that fragments of human bone had been found. His map
however showed that the shafts were nearly always associated with ancient the
earthworks often next to them. They are associated with mediaeval field systems
which pre date the square earthwork. Of the 120 deneholes noted by
Spurrell only 5 remained by 1966 and later there were only 2. Some of them
including the square enclosure in the north east portion are
now under a housing estate and were excavated in 1958.. The date of construction of the deneholes is
therefore before 1280 and a date of around 1250 is suggested.
square earthwork located a few
hundred meters to the west. Excavations here found the footings of buildings
dated 1280 to 1320, and are thought to be part of the lost mediaeval manor of
Ocholt. Ocholt was held, with Baldwyns, by Lesnes Abbey in the
middle ages.
Earth banks excavated by H.A. Hogg. It was
wartime and he seems to have laboured alone, shifting many tons of earth and
drawing beautiful sections. He found that the bases of the banks were chalk and flint,
while pottery gave evidence of the enclosures being built around 1250 to 1300.
As noted above there is a discernable correlation between these earth banks and
the deneholes. So that some of the excavations may be contemporary with the
earth bank construction.
Anglo-Roman settlement
Memorial posts in Summerhouse Drive area
Keeper's cottage
Tump with Woodland Trust plaques
Faesten Dic a defensive earthwork,
Anglo Saxon, dated at about 450 AD. this ancient defensive ditch that crosses north to south and it is
thought ditches like this marked the frontier of the last Roman power base in
London and there was also local tribal warefare at the time it was constructed.
The name means ‘The Strong Rampart’ and
it goes across a sandy gravel slope of the Cray valley. It is 1.67 km long and
is a series of connected zig zag ditches.
There is a layer of gravel on the east side of the dyke which may be a
military walk way.
Hollow Way – reference to an old
road through the wood running north-south.
Roundhouses – sites of two iron age roundhouses have been
identified plus four post granaries.
supposed
site of the City of Caswallon occupying
this and Rowhill Woods. They were a tribe of Celts called the Cassii.
Summerhouse Drive
Entrance to the wood – Horticultural hut there
Kissing gate and electricity transformer
Denehole said to have been utilised by a
'self build' housing group as a storm drain. The shaft was 460 yards east of the Summer House.
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