Great Weldon
A Romano-British villa, N and E of the present village. The first structure was a small farmhouse consisting of four rooms with a verandah along either side. Though unpretentious, its furnishings included imported glassware and Samian pottery, indicating occupation ca. A.D. 150-200. This house was burnt down and replaced by a longer house with more rooms, and a single verandah with simple bath suite at the S end.
During the 4th c. the house was embellished with mosaic pavements, a kitchen was added, also a projecting wing at the N end of the verandah, and the bath suite was greatly enlarged. In front lay an extensive walled courtyard or garden, flanked on the N by a barn, twice burnt down and containing quantities of carbonized grain, and on the S by another building. Two 4th c. burials were found N of the barn. Coins attest occupation at least to the late 4th c., probably into the 5th. The finds will be deposited in the Central Museum, Northampton.
BIBLIOGRAPHYPlan, showing the mosaics, engraved by Messrs. Lens and Cole, 1739; VCH Northamptonshire I (1902) 192; D. J. Smith, “The Roman villa at Great Weldon, Northamptonshire,” Trans. Ancient Monuments Society NS 1 (1953) 74-76; “Roman Britain,” JRS 44 (1954) 93, 95; 45 (1955) 135; 46 (1956) 131, 133; A.L.F. Rivet, ed., The Roman Villa in Britain (1969) 72 n. 5, 79-80, 107-8, 122, 132-33, 271.
D. J. SMITH