Lockleys
The Roman villa 0.8 km to the E of the Belgic and Roman settlement at Welwyn on the Roman road from Verulamium to Braughing. It was discovered in 1930 and excavated in 1937. Two Belgic periods (only the earlier was related to any structural remains) and three Roman ones were distinguished.
In the first Roman period (dated to A.D. 60-70) a rectangular house (21.6 x 7.5 m) was erected and divided into five rooms; the footings were of mortared flint and there were stone bases for a timber verandah not quite parallel with the W front. In the second period (dated to ca. 160) this was enlarged by the replacement of the verandah with a corridor and the addition of rooms at the N and S ends, to produce a typical winged-corridor house at least 30 m long; the wing room at the N end was of two stories. After minor modifications this house was destroyed by fire early in the 4th c. and after a break, in the fourth period (ca. 340), new buildings were erected over the S end. Though no subsidiary buildings were located, a ditch evidently enclosed a considerable area around the house.
Along with Park Street Lockleys has been taken as a type site for the smaller class of villa common in SE Britain, but recent reexamination of the pottery has cast doubt both on the continuity of Belgic and Roman occupation and on the dating of the two earlier Roman phases, both of which, it is argued, should be placed much later.
BIBLIOGRAPHYJ. B. Ward Perkins, AntJ 18 (1938) 339-76; reassessment: G. Webster in A.L.F. Rivet, ed., The Roman Villa in Britain (1969) 243-46.
A.L.F. RIVET