Some of Oriel College’s original structures from before it was redeveloped at around 1620–40 have been discovered meaning the medieval layout of the college can now be more accurately mapped.
This archaeological dig was possible because the renovation of an area in the south east of the college created a once-in-a-century opportunity for excavations to go ahead.
The college’s kitchens are being rebuilt, and the bar is refurbished.
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Oriel’s Provost, Lord Mendoza CBE, said: “As I am also chairman of Historic England I am doubly delighted that renovation and restoration at Oriel have enabled this wonderful and important archaeological work to take place.
“There is a serendipity in finding the medieval structures just before we celebrate 700 years since the college’s royal foundation in 1326.”
Ben Ford, senior project manager at Oxford Archaeology, said: “This is an archaeologically rich area of Oxford, having once been located in the late-Saxon town’s south-eastern corner, before the city expanded to the east.
“These recent findings at Oriel build on our understanding of how it has developed.
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“The discovery of a roasting hearth and oven base tells us where Oriel’s medieval kitchens were located.
“We have also found the remains of a substantial medieval stone wall, which was probably the former boundary between what was once St Martin’s Hall and land owned by Oriel to the north.
“These findings shed new light on the medieval layout of the area and extent of the original Oriel College buildings and add detail to the otherwise patchy evidence from the earliest known historical maps, views and the surviving historical documents.”
Oriel College has been a hub of archaeological discoveries in recent years.
Experts discovered the original eastern defensive line of the late Saxon town of Oxford at Oriel College in October.
The discovery confirmed a hypothesis that had gone unresolved since the Victorian period, when excavations outside the Bodleian Library revealed a section of wall thought to be the original town’s north-eastern corner.
The whereabouts of the defences gives credibility to theories that the early fortified Oxford was significantly smaller than the later medieval town and had a square perimeter — built by the Anglo-Saxons according to the model of walled Roman towns such as Winchester.
Oxford City Council’s archaeologist David Radford described this as a “significant breakthrough” required for understanding Oxford’s “emergence and evolution on the boundary between the kingdoms of Wessex and Mercia”.
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