Despite many generations of archaeological fieldwork in Britain’s southwestern peninsula and Cornwall’s central role in later prehistoric exchange networks, the prehistory of the southeastern part of the county has not been exposed to the same amount of modern archaeological investigation. The Southeast Kernow Archaeological Survey (SEKAS) project aims to develop a better understanding of the prehistoric landscape of this region which links the metal-rich uplands to the English Channel. The study region for the SEKAS project comprises of the area between the Tamar and the Fowey rivers and south of the A38, and the period from the Neolithic through to the later Iron Age.

The project was launched in 2012 as a collaboration between Dr Catherine Frieman (ANU) and James Lewis, a professional archaeologist currently based in Scotland. Since then, geophysical and topographic surveys have been conducted at a number of later prehistoric sites in the study area. The results of several of these surveys were incorporated into Mr. Lewis’ 2016 MA thesis Iron Age and Romano-British Enclosures of southeast Cornwall (Dept of Archaeology, University of Glasgow). Commencing in 2017, this ongoing fieldwork will provide the case study for Dr. Frieman’s ARC DECRA project Conservatism as a dynamic response to the diffusion of innovations (DE170100464).