Somerford Keynes

Somerford Keynes (grid reference SU019952, pronounced "summerford canes") is a small village and civil parish in Gloucestershire, England, close to the River Thames and Thames Path about five miles (8 km) from its source and in the Cotswold Water Park. It lies on the boundary with Wiltshire midway between Cirencester, Swindon and Malmesbury. The parish population at the 2011 census was 479.

The first beavers to be born in Britain for 400 years were born at Lower Mill in the summer of 2008. Somerford Keynes is the name of a character in the Rutshire Chronicles books by Jilly Cooper.

A series of salvage excavations at Spratsgate Lane from 1986 to 1988, before the creation of the Cotswold Water Park, revealed part of an Iron Age and Roman settlement at Somerford Keynes. The earliest features discovered comprised a series of curvilinear enclosures dating from the early 1st to the early 2nd century AD, which may have been part of a farmstead. A religious focus is also hinted at by an unusually large number of coins and brooches, which may have been votive deposits. Stone sculptural fragments were found of an eagle and a shield. These may have belonged to a representation of the Roman Capitoline triad (The gods Jupiter, Juno and Minerva), and therefore point to an official religious presence.

...
Wikipedia