THE MOST exquisite wines from France and quality tableware befitting the homes of Italy's richest and most influential families.

On the dockside eager customers waited impatiently for their luxury goodies to be unloaded from the flotilla of cargo ships, and hear the latest gossip from overseas.

Out in the crowded waters it was cargo ship rush hour with vessels laden with Poole's finest pottery, iron and metal objects - all for export.

Another hectic day at a busy international port.

But this was Poole Harbour 300 years before even the Romans had set foot in the South of England.

Archaeologists from Bournemouth University and the Poole Bay Archaeological Research Group have uncovered evidence to prove that the harbour is Britain's oldest working cross-channel port.

Hidden beneath a metre of water and another metre of mud they have found two massive stone and rubble Iron Age jetties, still with their wooden support posts intact.

"Excavating this was not like digging a hole in the countryside like television's Time Team," said Professor Tim Darvill, head of the university's archaeology group.

"Because of the tide you only have two hours to find and record stuff. It's like working in an ever changing pool of mud."

For the past few decades experts had been aware of what they wrongly thought was an ancient causeway reaching between Cleavel Point and Green Island.

Once a year, for only a few hours, the tide drops so low that it reveals part of what was thought to be the causeway - now identified as the Cleavel Point jetty.

But it was only when the student archaeologists from Bournemouth and volunteers from the Poole Harbour Heritage Project, as well as amateur divers, investigated the "causeway" that they made their exciting discovery.

So far only the northeast-pointing jetty situated near Cleavel Point has been investigated.

It's more than 150 metres in length.

"On top it's wide enough for a car to do a three-point turn," said Prof Darvill. "The harbour looked very different in pre-historic times. The sea level was up to three metres lower and we believe that Green and Furzey Island were one land mass, possibly including what we know as Brownsea Island.

"When the water rose and eventually flooded this area it preserved everything. It's an archaeologist's dream."

Remains of a substantial Iron Age settlement have been found on Cleavel Point and there are plans to investigate this area more closely in the near future.

"What we'd like to find hidden under the mud is a complete boat that's been scuppered, or even parts of one such as the anchor or mast," said Prof Darvill.