Metal detecting in Basingstoke and Deane.

The land around Basingstoke and Deane

Basingstoke and Deane sits on the northern Hampshire chalk, capped in places by clay-with-flints. Away from the town itself the district is large arable blocks broken by shallow dry valleys, with the Test and the Candover brook cutting south-west. It is open, workable ground: long runs of stubble in late summer and clean ploughed chalk through the winter.

What's underfoot

This has been busy country for a very long time. The Roman road from Silchester (Calleva Atrebatum) runs through the north of the district, and the parishes around Overton and the Candovers carry Iron Age and Romano-British settlement evidence alongside deserted medieval sites. Later material is well represented too — post-medieval trade tokens, buckles and coinage turn up on almost every permission.

How we search here

Chalk with a flint cap means clean signals but plenty of iron near old farmsteads. We spread out widely, work in lines across the plough and refill every hole before moving on. Digs run midweek by written agreement with the landowner. We meet in the morning, spread out across the permission and search until mid-afternoon, refilling every hole as we go.

Permissions here have included ground in and around Cliddesden, Dummer, Ellisfield, Laverstoke, Deane and Bradley.

We have 126 recorded digs in the Basingstoke and Deane district, spread across 17 parishes, part of 487+ digs across Hampshire. Every member works to the NCMD Code of Conduct, and finds of note are reported to the Portable Antiquities Scheme through our local Finds Liaison Officer.