The new information places the construction of the dyke within the shadowy period that began with the formal withdrawal of the Roman administration (AD 410) and ended with the absorption of the area into Mercia. The report concludes: 'The dyke should therefore be regarded as being contemporary with that other great fifth-century linear earthwork, the Wiltshire Wansdyke, rather than Offa's Dyke, and should be considered as an achievement of the post-Roman kingdom of the northern Cornovii, rather than the work of seventh- or eighth-century Mercia.'