Archaeology of the Axe Valley

Mr Bill Horner, the Deputy County Archaeologist, gave a most interesting talk on 22 February 2011 to a very well attended meeting of the Society. Taking us from pre-history to the present day, he gave an outline of the various settlers that have lived, worked and fought battles along and in the neighbourhood of the River Axe and the Estuary.

Early Palaeolithic stone axe-heads have been found along the banks of the river and chert hand axes from a little further upriver. Neolithic arrow-heads have been found at Beer and, coming into the early Bronze Age, pottery and flint axe-heads have been found at Farway.
Iron Age Hill Forts abound along the coast, and a lot of evidence of these and other settlements can be gleaned from studying aerial photographs. Darker colouration patterns in the crops indicate the presence of ditches and, where walls are present, there may be lighter patterns where the soil is shallower and the crop more exposed to drought.

The Romans then made their mark, and on Beer Head, a 2006 excavation unearthed five different stages of bank construction. Coins showing the head of the Emperor Vespasian have been found, as have slingshots from Hawksdown Hill. The Romans brought with them very sophisticated villas with bath-houses, as at Honeyditches in Seaton. Axmouth Harbour was very important in Roman times, being the main supply route for goods and merchandise being brought over from Cherbourg in France to their armies further North.

Recent funding has enabled cores to be taken of the mud and other sediments in the Axe Estuary in an attempt to ascertain why and when it silted up. The Domesday Book shows that there were eleven salt houses along the Estuary at that time and surveys show evidence of the channels and salt-pans.

Mr Horner then showed slides of the work being carried out on the Axe Boat, which lies in the mud in the harbour. Carbon dating of the timbers shows the wood to be between 400 and 600 years old. It was certainly a very large boat, judging by the exposed keel, so a Tudor age is a real possibility.

More recently, during the Second World War, a Stop Line running from Seaton to Weston-super-Mare was built to check the advance of enemy troops after the feared German invasion. Pill-boxes of various kinds still remain, as do smaller lines of concrete tank stops. A Cycle Way is now being constructed which will link our coast at Seaton to the North Somerset coast near Weston-super-Mare. It will follow the Stop Line and be called the Stop Line Way, neatly connecting us to our past history as we cycle or walk along paths trodden by our forebears centuries ago.