FILMING has taken place at one of Norfolk’s most important historical sites for a new series of the BBC Four programme Meet The Ancestors.

A television crew, including presenter Julian Richards, spent about three hours filming at Burgh Castle, which is home to one of the best preserved Roman monuments in the country.

The crew filmed an opening scene to an episode about early Anglo Saxons, which will be part of a four part series and is likely to be aired next spring.

The Roman fort at Burgh Castle is owned by Norfolk Archaelogical Trust and site warden John Russell said the crew filmed at the site last Thursday while visitors happily walked around the fort.

He said: “In the course of a year the site gets between about 30,000 and 50,000 visitors.

“It is a little secret that is becoming better known.”

Mr Russell added: “It is a Roman fort that would have originally had four walls, but one collapsed centuries ago. There are three remaining walls and for their age they are in remarkably good condition. It is quite a remarkable site.”

Georgina Leslie, the producer/director of the episode, said: “We were filming the opening scene to an episode about early Anglo Saxons. “

She continued: “It is home to one of the best preserved Roman Saxon shore forts and it is in a beautiful location right by the coast.”

The fort, which lies close to the River Waveney and overlooks Halvergate Marshes, was built in the late third or early fourth centuries as part of a string of forts around the south and east coasts stretching from Porchester in Hampshire to Brancaster in north Norfolk.

The fort now overlooks a large expanse of grazing marshes to the west which once formed a great inland estuary.

There is considerable evidence for Anglo-Saxon activity in and around the fort, including what may be the monastery of a seventh-century saint, St Fursey.