The Roman 'small town' of Ariconium in southern Herefordshire has long been known as an important iron production centre but has remained very poorly understood. The town is suggested to have developed from a late Iron Age Dobunnic tribal centre, which owed its evident status and wide range of contacts to control of the production and distribution of Forest of Dean iron. Rapid expansion during the second half of the 1st century AD indicates that the local population was able to articulate rapidly with the economic opportunities the Roman conquest brought. The town developed as a typical small roadside settlement and a major iron production centre but a heavy reliance on ironworking appears to have made it especially vulnerable to the economic decline of the latter part of the 4th century. Some role as an administrative and political centre can be suggested during the late 4th century and may be implicated in the survival of the name Ariconium in the early medieval kingdom of Erynyg or Archenfield, however, firm archaeological evidence for any continuing occupation remains elusive.

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• Contributors
• Summary
• Zusammenfassung
• Résumé
• Report structure and archive
• Acknowledgements
• Section 1. Background
  • Introduction
  • The project
  • Site history
• Section 2: Archaeological Investigations: Summary and Analysis
  • The buried remains
  • Fieldwalking and other sources
• Section 3: Erosion and Deposition History
  • Soil erosion – Tony Lloyd
  • Erosion across the settlement area: case studies
• Section 4: The Finds and Environmental Evidence
  • The Iron Age and Roman pottery – Steven Willis
  • The brooches – Donald Mackreth
  • The coins – Cathy King
  • Other small finds – Hilary Cool
  • Worked stone – Ruth Shaffrey and Fiona Roe
  • Building materials – Robin Jackson
  • Ironworking residues – David Starley and Tim Young
  • Charcoal from Bridgewater’s 1963 excavation – Rowena Gale
  • Environmental evidence – Elizabeth Pearson
• Section 5: Archaeological Synthesis
  • The character of the settlement
  • Settlement chronology
  • Trade and exchange
  • The ironworking industry
• Section 6: Management, Erosion and Landuse
  • Management, erosion and landuse
• Section 7: Concluding Remarks
  • Summary of archaeological and historical evidence
  • Erosion and management
  • Areas for future research
  • Abbreviations
• Bibliography
• Appendices
  • 1. Sources
  • 2. Fieldwork/SMR index
  • 3. Aerial photographic assessment
  • 4. Detailed results from ADAS erosion survey
  • 5. Concordance of pottery fabric codes used in the report with WAS fabric series codes
  • 6. List of the illustrated pottery from the analytical groups
  • 7. Samian catalogue
  • 8. Coin catalogue
• Index