Street House Anglo-Saxon cemetery

The Street House Anglo-Saxon cemetery lies on Upton Hill north-east of Loftus in Redcar and Cleveland. It is a burial ground from the late 7th century surrounded by much older monuments. An Early Neolithic long cairn and a Bronze Age round barrow stand nearby. Aerial photographs once revealed an Iron Age rectangular enclosure on the same spot. Excavations between 2005 and 2007 uncovered more than a hundred graves and traces of several buildings. Among the finds was a bed burial of a high-status woman covered by an earth mound. Archaeologists believe the people buried here came from the south where bed burials were common. The cemetery shows signs of both Christian and pagan traditions, suggesting a time of change in the 7th century. The graves form a unique square layout around a central mound and the woman’s burial. A second large mound nearby may have been a memorial to an important person. The precise arrangement of the graves indicates careful planning long before they were dug. Visitors to the site see a nearly square area of about 36 by 34 metres marked by neat lines of graves. Each grave lies east–west, spaced evenly in double rows on the north and south sides. A main entrance gap in the southern side and a smaller one in the east divide the enclosure. Near the centre stands the woman’s burial beneath a low mound. A larger mound with a ring ditch lies a short distance away, its purpose still debated. The older monuments around the cemetery add to the sense of deep time at this quiet hilltop place.