Great Pan Farm

During late June 2005 the project undertook an assessment of fields surrounding the Middle Palaeolithic site of great Pan Farm on the Isle of Wight. The site is one of national importance having produced a flint tool assemblage of Middle Palaeolithic character including Levallois flakes and Bout Coupe bifaces (Poole 1925; Shackley 1973 and 1981)asscoaietd with the ifrst terrace of the medina river system. An assessment of the site earlier this year by Dr Francis Wenban-Smith and Dr Martin Bates did not identify any deposits of Medina Terrace 1 within the study area. However they were able to map the presence of at least two additional higher terraces across the fields to the east of the site (Medina 3 & Medina 4). The deposits included gravels containing occasional worked pieces.

The Boxgrove Projects team, working in association with Archaeology South-East, widened the scope of the investigation and identified a further, higher terrace (Medina 4). Additionally they were able to locate deposits of Terrace 1 to the west of the site, including a distinctive organic bed which may be that noted by Poole. This bed contained large elements of plant macrofossils which may provide dating evidence. Apart from a very small number of undiagnostic flakes, no significant tool assemblages were recovered.
The study has shown that the Great Pan Site forms part of a much wider series of fluvial deposits preserving a depositional history of the Medina valley over a period in excess of 200,000 years. Deposits which produced the important Middle Palaeolithic assemblage have been shown to be present in the vicinity of the site and have the potential to yield important contextual information for the original finds. Further post-excavation analysis and follow-up field work by the Project tereforelooks set to greatly improve our understanding of this site.

Searcher he outcome justified the search