This is the report of 14 seasons of a training dig run by Keele University from 1983 to 1996, following the accidental discovery of a Roman building. After a short introduction, pp. 4–61 contain a synthetic account of the excavation and results by phase. Six building phases are identified based on stratigraphic analysis (Phase 7 is medieval robbing, related to building activity in the village). Each section begins with a reconstruction drawing and ends with a plan of that phase, sandwiching a text which is fully illustrated with plans, well-chosen photographs and sections. There is no full discussion, although a short ‘endpiece’ rounds off this account, raising one or two of the questions that such a discussion might treat.

The excavation revealed a middling-sized Roman building, which the excavators deliberately avoid calling a villa, laid out around three sides of a courtyard. One wing contained a bath-house from the beginning; the central range had little accommodation, over half being taken up with a tower and a yard and the other wing was of only one room with a cellar. The building remained in use, with alterations, well into the fourth century. Only one end of one wing remained in occupation into the fifth century, and at some time in the immediately post-Roman period the site of this range was occupied by earthfast timber buildings following its alignment. Not all of the building could be excavated, but the full extent, not far beyond the northern excavation edge, was nonetheless established through geophysical survey (GPR).

The excavation revealed some unusual features. The deep cellar is convincingly claimed to have had some sort of cultic function and seems to have been closed off by a ‘termination deposit’ of pottery and bone when abandoned in Phase 5 (late fourth century). Much (very well-reported and illustrated) painted plaster was found in the cellar backfill, from the cellar and from the room above. More was found in the collapsed material in the bath-house. Fragments of mosaic are also well discussed. There is an exhaustive set of full specialist reports and a technical report of the GPR survey. These, the bibliography and index take up the rest of the volume.

Given the synthetic excavation text, one is surprised to see the specialist reports laid out in such detail. As the context or even phase of the material is rarely given, the value of such full publication is much reduced. There is a very extensive illustrated pottery catalogue, but it is not clear if this is exhaustive, nor where any of the material (bar three or four specific pots) comes from. Coins are carefully identified and illustrated, but for the reader are effectively unstratified. The same is true for the animal bone report. The results of various scientific investigations are equally left floating. In some reports it is clear that the data could be further interrogated by going to the site archive, and this is no doubt true of all. In that case, however, one must question the point of publishing so much detail. This is frustrating because the site is potentially of great interest and has some intriguing finds, which are well-presented and discussed as objects.

One therefore has to take the dating and phasing of the site on trust, including that of the first phase, dated by the excavators to c. a.d. 60. There is material from that earliest period with a strong military connection, but its relevance cannot be tested by the reader. The authors provide an unusual reconstruction of this phase with a possible water tower and a cellar, hinting further at military involvement or purpose. This excavation is an important contribution to the question of early masonry ‘villas’ in the West Country and of the function of cellars. If it was not to be published fully, then perhaps a discussion of its significance with salient evidence would have been more useful. What we have is a sort of preliminary draft in need of an editor (especially as the authors use natatarium throughout). Nonetheless, the volume is worth having for the finds and other specialist reports, and for making this unusual site known to the rest of us.