Stonea is a

hamlet ''The Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark'', often shortened to ''Hamlet'' (), is a tragedy written by William Shakespeare sometime between 1599 and 1601. It is Shakespeare's longest play, with 29,551 words. Set in Denmark, the play depic ...

Cambridgeshire Cambridgeshire (abbreviated Cambs.) is a Counties of England, county in the East of England, bordering Lincolnshire to the north, Norfolk to the north-east, Suffolk to the east, Essex and Hertfordshire to the south, and Bedfordshire and North ...

, England, south east of

March March is the third month of the year in both the Julian and Gregorian calendars. It is the second of seven months to have a length of 31 days. In the Northern Hemisphere, the meteorological beginning of spring occurs on the first day of Ma ...

and part of the parish of

Wimblington Wimblington is a village in the Isle of Ely, Cambridgeshire, England, with a population of 1700 as of the 2001 census, including Stonea and increasing to 2,211 at the 2011 Census. History The place-name 'Wimblington' is first attested in a do ...

.Wimblington
at Genuki.org.uk, accessed 20 September 2013 Stonea today consists of a scattered collection of farmsteads and houses, the majority sited along Sixteen Foot Bank, a man-made river which forms part of the Middle Level Navigations. The largest settlement is on the bank near the Golden Lion pub. A former

Primitive Methodist The Primitive Methodist Church is a Methodist Christian denomination with the holiness movement. It began in England in the early 19th century, with the influence of American evangelist Lorenzo Dow (1777–1834). In the United States, the Primit ...

chapel is now a private residence. This part of Stonea is dissected by a staffed railway crossing on the Ely to Peterborough Line; Stonea railway station closed in 1966. The underpass neighbouring the bridge (which provides a diversion avoiding the level crossing) is said to be the "most bashed rail bridge in Britain", with 33 truck and van strikes in one 12 month period.

History

There has been human habitation in the area since at least 500 BC;

Stonea Camp Stonea Camp is an Iron Age multivallate hill fort located at Stonea near March in the Cambridgeshire Fens. Situated on a gravel bank just above sea-level, it is the lowest hill fort in Britain. Around 500 BC, when fortification is thought to ...

archaeological site is the lowest

Iron Age The Iron Age is the final epoch of the three-age division of the prehistory and protohistory of humanity. It was preceded by the Stone Age ( Paleolithic, Mesolithic, Neolithic) and the Bronze Age ( Chalcolithic). The concept has been mostl ...

hill fort A hillfort is a type of earthwork used as a fortified refuge or defended settlement, located to exploit a rise in elevation for defensive advantage. They are typically European and of the Bronze Age or Iron Age. Some were used in the post- ...

in Britain. The site is thought to be the site of a battle in 47 AD mentioned by

Tacitus Publius Cornelius Tacitus, known simply as Tacitus ( , ; – ), was a Roman historian and politician. Tacitus is widely regarded as one of the greatest Roman historians by modern scholars. The surviving portions of his two major works—the ...

, between the

Iceni The Iceni ( , ) or Eceni were a Brittonic tribe of eastern Britain during the Iron Age and early Roman era. Their territory included present-day Norfolk and parts of Suffolk and Cambridgeshire, and bordered the area of the Corieltauvi to the ...

tribe and a Roman auxiliary force under governor Ostorius Scapula. A medieval farmhouse at Stitches Farm was demolished in 1973. The camp itself was ploughed over in the 1960s, but the filled-in ditches were restored to the bank formation by the

British Museum The British Museum is a public museum dedicated to human history, art and culture located in the Bloomsbury area of London. Its permanent collection of eight million works is among the largest and most comprehensive in existence. It docu ...

and

Cambridgeshire County Council Cambridgeshire County Council is the county council of Cambridgeshire, England. The council consists of 61 councillors, representing 59 electoral divisions. The council is based at New Shire Hall at Alconbury Weald, near Huntingdon. It is a me ...

in the 1980s. To prevent further damage by agriculture, the area is now designated as a

Scheduled Monument In the United Kingdom, a scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or historic building, given protection against unauthorised change. The various pieces of legislation that legally protect heritage assets from damage and ...

and pocket park. The remains of a multi-storey Roman tower have been excavated to the north of the Stonea Camp fortifications.Stonea Camp
, Cambridgeshire County Council, accessed 20 September 2013 The substantial foundations of the rectangular building suggest some height; at least three storeys are proposed. The building featured a

hypocaust A hypocaust ( la, hypocaustum) is a system of central heating in a building that produces and circulates hot air below the floor of a room, and may also warm the walls with a series of pipes through which the hot air passes. This air can warm th ...

and had walls decorated with painted plaster. Architectural fragments include tiles and window glass. However, the tower was demolished ca 200 AD. The Roman settlement at Stonea may have been the establishment of a

procurator Procurator (with procuracy or procuratorate referring to the office itself) may refer to: * Procurator, one engaged in procuration, the action of taking care of, hence management, stewardship, agency * ''Procurator'' (Ancient Rome), the title of ...

, based in the tower or it may have been planned as a town with a market and bureaucratic role.

Film and Television

Stonea has featured in TV dramas. In the 1980s an episode of '' Tales of the Unexpected'', "The Flypaper", was filmed at Stonea. In the 1990s, a

Fay Weldon Fay Weldon CBE, FRSL (born Franklin Birkinshaw; 22 September 1931 – 4 January 2023) was an English author, essayist and playwright. Over the course of her 55-year writing career, she published 31 novels, including ''Puffball'' (1980), ''The ...

adaptation of ''Growing Rich'', starring Martin Kemp and John Le Stride was filmed in Stonea and Chatteris.

References

{{Coord, 52.4751, 0.1010, region:GB-CAM_type:city, display=title Hamlets in Cambridgeshire Fenland District