page_title: Sleaford
section_title: Early
hierarchical_section_title: Sleaford / History / Early
caption_attribution_description: English: An electrum stater ('South Ferriby type') of the Corieltauvi tribe of the British East Midlands, mainly in Leicestershire and Nottinghamshire. The coin is around 30 percent gold with the bulk of the rest being silver and the balance copper. This coin was found near Boston in Lincolnshire and was very probably minted at the Iron Age mint at Sleaford around the middle of the first century BC. It was exceptionally well struck and saw almost no circulation and thus preserves the type in almost perfect original condition These coins depict a stylized horse on one side and a pattern of pellets on the other. The design represents copies of copies of copies of coins originally produced by Philip II of Macedon in the fourth century BC. The pellets were derived ultimately from the Macedonian ruler's hair. Guy de la Bédoyère
context_page_description: Sleaford is a market town and civil parish in Lincolnshire, England. Since 1973, the parish boundaries have included Quarrington to the south-west, Holdingham to the north and Old Sleaford to the east – contiguous settlements and former civil parishes which, with New Sleaford, had formed an Urban District. The town is on the edge of the fertile Fenlands, about 11 miles north-east of Grantham, 16 mi west of Boston, and 17 mi south of Lincoln. With a population of 17,671 at the 2011 Census, the town is the largest settlement in the North Kesteven district. Bypassed by the A17 and the A15, it is connected to Lincoln, Newark, Peterborough and King's Lynn. Sleaford railway station is on the Nottingham to Skegness and Peterborough to Lincoln Lines.
  The first settlement formed in the Iron Age where a prehistoric track crossed the River Slea. It was a tribal centre and home to a mint for the Corieltauvi in the 1st centuries BC and AD. Evidence of Roman and Anglo-Saxon settlement has been uncovered.
context_section_description: Archaeological material from the Bronze Age and earlier has been recovered and excavations have shown that there was unsustained late-Neolithic and Bronze Age human activity in the vicinity. The earliest known permanent settlement dates from the Iron Age and began where a track running northwards from Bourne crossed the River Slea. Although only sparse pottery evidence has been found for the middle Iron Age period, 4,290 pellet mould fragments, likely used for minting and dated to 50 BC–AD 50, have been uncovered south east of the modern town centre, south of a crossing of the River Slea and near Mareham Lane in Old Sleaford. The largest of its kind in Europe, the deposit has led archaeologists to consider that the site in Old Sleaford was probably one of the largest Corieltauvian settlements during this period and may have been a tribal centre.
  During the Roman occupation of Britain (AD 43–409), the settlement was "extensive and of considerable importance." Its location along the fen-edge may have made it economically and administratively significant as a centre for managers and owners of fenland estates. There is evidence to suggest that a road connected Old Sleaford to Heckington (about 4 ¹⁄₂ mi or 7.2 km east), where Roman tile kilns have been uncovered and may imply the presence of a market at Sleaford. When the first roads were constructed by the Romans, Sleaford was bypassed due to it being "less conveniently located" and more "geared to native needs". A smaller road, Mareham Lane, which the Romans renewed, ran through Old Sleaford, and southwards along the fen edge, towards Bourne. Where it passed through Old Sleaford, excavations have revealed a large stone-built domestic residence, associated farm buildings, corn-driers, ovens and field systems, all from the Roman period, and a number of burials. Other Roman remains, including a burial, have been excavated in the town.
caption: An electrum stater of the Corieltauvi, probably struck at Sleaford in the mid-1st century BC. Diameter 17–19 mm.
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