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Abstract
THIS REPORT PRESENTS the results of analyses carried out following the discovery and excavation of a medieval pottery kiln in Pontefract, a discovery which featured in the ‘Fieldwork Highlights’ section of Medieval Archaeology 53 (2009). The kiln is remarkable for having produced vessels previously only associated with the Stamford ware industry of the late 11th and 12th centuries and demonstrates the existence of at least one northern production site, the likely existence of which was first mooted in the 1950s. As both radiocarbon and archaeomagnetic dating methods indicate a last firing of the Pontefract kiln in the late pre-Conquest period, the discovery also poses questions about the chronology of Stamford ware production.
Acknowledgement is due to Rippon Homes Limited who funded the excavation work carried out by Archaeological Services WYAS in 2007–8. The post-excavation work on the pottery from the kiln was funded by English Heritage. The archaeomagnetic dating samples were taken and processed by David Greenwood of the Department of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford. Radiocarbon dating was co-ordinated by John Meadows of English Heritage, duplicate samples being dated by the SUERC Laboratory in East Kilbride under G T Cook, and the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit under C Bronk Ramsay. Grateful acknowledgement is extended to the community archaeology group led by Pam Judkins of Wakefield Museums who washed, marked and reconstructed the pottery assemblage. The figures are by Jon Prudhoe and Chris Philo, while the photographs are by Phil Weston and Paul Gwilliam (all of Archaeological Services WYAS). The authors would also like to record their gratitude to Jane Young, Paul Blinkhorn and the late Alan Vince, for their comments on the pottery, John Hudson for his observations on the kiln, Dr Beris Cox for his information on the clay sources for the Stamford pottery and Christopher Whittick for his thoughts on the nature of pre-Conquest Pontefract. The paper has been prepared and edited for publication by I Roberts.
Detailed technical archive reports on the pottery analysis, petrographic and ICP analyses, and the radiocarbon and scientific dating, can be accessed online through the Archaeological Data Service (DOI: 10·5284/1012479).
Notes
1 Freelance Archaeologist (Sheffield). [email protected]
2 Archaeological Services WYAS (Leeds). [email protected]; [email protected]
3 Freelance Archaeobotanist (Glasgow). [email protected]
4 Department of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford. [email protected]
5 Consultant Geoarchaeologist, 10 Foxhill Crescent, Leeds LS16 5PD, UK.
6 Freelance Potter (Mirfield). [email protected]
7 Freelance Archaeological Scientist (Harpenden). [email protected]
8 Department of Geology, University of Leicester. [email protected]
9 English Heritage. [email protected]
10 Freelance Ceramicist (Lincoln). [email protected]
11 AOC Archaeology 2004.
12 Weston and Roberts 2011.
13 Hinde 1868; Arnold 1885, both cited by Faull 1981, 190.
14 Faull and Stinson 1986, 9W.
15 Wilmott 1987; Wilmott et al 2009; Roberts 2002, 73–6, 85, 401–4.
16 See Farrer 1916, 178–9; Holmes 1899, 17.
17 Roberts and Whittick 2013.
18 See Wilmott 2009.
19 Roberts 2002, 101–2; Young 2002.
20 Le Patourel 1965, 107–9; Blinkhorn 2005.
21 Bailey 1971.
22 Holmes 1899, 17.
23 Dugdale 1846, 120, 128; Farrer 1916, 1492; Holmes 1899.
24 Smith 1961, 79.
25 Morris 1989, 160–1; Fellows-Jensen 1987.
26 Dugdale 1846, 121; Farrer 1916, 1486.
27 Beresford 1988, 160, fig 37.
28 Holmes 1878, 100–1; 1899, 86–8.
29 Public Record Office DL 28/1/13.
30 Public Record Office DL 29/507/8228.
31 Le Patourel 1968, 103.
32 Holmes 1899, 144.
33 Le Patourel 1968, 103–4.
34 Musty 1974.
35 Simpson 1982.
36 Ibid, 147.
37 Bryant 1977, 108, fig 38.
38 Moorhouse 1981, 100.
39 J Hudson pers comm.
40 Greenwood et al 2010.
41 Buck et al 1996.
42 Kilmurry 1980, 131–2; Leach 1987.
43 Cumberpatch 2002; Moorhouse and Slowikowski 1987; Vince and Young 2007.
44 Eg Manby 1964; Moorhouse and Slowikowski 1987; Cumberpatch 2002; 2007; Vince and Young 2007; Cumberpatch and Roberts 1998–99.
45 Cf Hillam type ware; Cumberpatch 2002.
46 Young et al 2005, 81–8.
47 Perring 1981, 18–21.
48 Wragg 1997.
49 Kilmurry 1980, fig 67.
50 Newell 1995.
51 J Hudson pers comm.
52 Cumberpatch 1997.
53 Kilmurry 1980, 142–3, figs 72–8.
54 Ibid, fig 73.
55 Ibid, 318.
56 Cumberpatch 2002, fig 94·1.
57 Hurst 1965, 120–2, fig 28.
58 Cumberpatch and Slowikowski 2005.
59 Young et al 2005, fig 88·605.
60 Kilmurry 1980, figs 3, 50–2.
61 Ibid, 301, 305, figs 68 and 69.
62 Ibid, fig 3·6.
63 Ibid, 140.
64 Ibid, 18.
65 Ibid, fig 46.
66 Ibid, fig 55, form 7.
67 Ibid, fig 65.
68 Ibid, fig 67.
69 Cf Thorner type wares; Cumberpatch and Roberts 1998–99.
70 Kilmurry 1980, figs 74–6.
71 Edwards et al 1940, 162.
72 Goossens and Smith 1973, 498.
73 Dr B Cox pers comm.
74 Alan Vince collection: V2757–V2762.
75 Kilmurry 1980, 140.
76 Ibid, 141.
77 Ibid, 137.
78 Simpson 1982, 146–50, fig 71.
79 Kilmurry 1980, 30, 53; Simpson 1982, 156.
80 Young et al 2005, 95–7.
81 Ibid, fig 87, 593.
82 Ibid, fig 87, 594, 596–8.
83 Ibid, fig 86, 579.
84 Ibid, fig 88.
85 Ibid, fig 88, 601–2.
86 Ibid, fig 88, 605.
87 Ibid, fig 88, 607–8.
88 Ibid, fig 88, 624.
89 Cumberpatch 2002; 2007; Vince and Young 2007.
90 Lightfoot et al 2008.
91 See Cumberpatch 2002.
92 Cumberpatch 1997.
93 Cf Vince 2003.
94 Hurst 1965.
95 Ibid, fig 28.
96 Ibid, 122.
97 Roberts 2002, 89–90; Cumberpatch 2002, 172.
98 Kilmurry 1980, 15, fig 3·2.
99 Slowikowski 2006; Wilmott 2009.
100 Cumberpatch 2001; 2004; 2005; Cumberpatch and Slowikowski 2005.
101 Roberts 1987; Roberts and Burgess 1999.
102 Cumberpatch and Slowikowski 2005.
103 Blinkhorn 2005.
104 Mahany 1982, 111.
105 Kilmurry 1980, 160–1, fig 32.
106 Dunning 1956, 231; Hurst 1957, 39; Swinnerton 1959, 81.
107 Eg Hurst 1965, 122; Gilks 1978, 79.
108 Mainman 1990, 462–3.
109 Ibid, 462–3.
110 Moorhouse 1981, 112.
111 Hurst 1957, 61.