Category Archives: VM_365 Project

VM_365 Day 170 Reconstructed Iron Age comb decorated jar

Archaeology, Iron Age, Margate, Prehistoric pottery, Thanet archaeology, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project
Late Iron Age 'Belgic' comb decorated jar.
Late Iron Age ‘Belgic’ comb decorated jar.

The image for VM_365 Day 170 is of the reconstructed profile of a Late Iron Age jar with a beaded rim and combed surface decoration. This pot was found broken into many pieces in the lower fill deposits at the base of a storage pit, during an excavation on the site of Margate Football club in 2003.

The vessel is made from a grog tempered  fabric, meaning that crushed pot has been used as a filler to stiffen the clay in the body of the vessel. Pots of this type were common in the later Iron Age period 50BC to 25AD.

Vessels with these characteristics are often classed as ‘Belgic’, after Julius Caeser’s assertion that the Iron Age tribes of southern Britain, including Kent, were related to the tribes of Belgae, who lived around the northern coast of Gaul between the west bank of the Rhine to the Channel

The comb decoration has only been applied to the upper section of pot. The area below the rim was decorated with a circuit of horizontal combed lines, then the shoulders and sides of the pot were covered using a series of arching strokes from just below the horizontal line toward the middle and lower part of the vessel.

The comb decoration was common in the Late Iron Age period and there are several variations represented in the application of the decoration among the vessels found in Thanet.

VM_365 Day 169 Where earth and sky meet. Iron Age potters surface decoration techniques

Iron Age, Margate, Prehistoric pottery, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 169-1The image for VM_365 Day 169 shows a series of pottery sherds from Iron Age kitchen/storage-ware vessels from Margate, which have deliberately applied clay coarsening on the surface. The general currency of coarsewares of this type was the Early to Mid Iron Age period, between c.600 and 350 BC.

Some of the bodysherds show how the appearance of different methods of surface treatment; wet clay slurried; ‘pebble-dashed’ tacky; lumpy, sometimes produce almost bizarre surface effects on the vessels.

Some of the sherds show how the rustication tended mostly to be applied below the shoulder, although as one of the examples shows it is not always the case.

It has been suggested, with some reference to the contrast of application of coloured finishes to contemporary Halstatt/La Tene art styles, that the very evident tonal variation of the vessel finishes, the smooth and the coarse elements of the pattern, had some meaning for the maker. With the rusticated coarsewares of this type it has been suggested that the difference in visual tone represents a smooth sky or heaven above the rough lumpy surface of the earth below.

Maybe it is simply a practical innovation, without such embedded symbolism, simply making an easy-grip surface for greasy fingers on large heavy pots.

VM_365 Day 168 Retouched Flint Arrowhead

Archaeology, Beaker, Bronze Age, Cliffsend, Neolithic, Places, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 168

Today’s VM_365 Day 168 image shows a late Neolithic/Early Bronze Age arrowhead from Cliffsend.
This barbed and tanged arrowhead had broken along one of the barbs and instead of being discarded, the edge was retouched so it could be reused.

Other examples of flint objects that have been reworked into a useable object following damaged were posted for Day 165 and Day 50.

VM_365 Day 166 Palaeolithic Hand Axe from Westwood, Broadstairs

Archaeology, Broadstairs, Palaeolithic, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 166

Today’s VM 365 image for day 166 shows the two faces of a small flint Palaeolithic hand axe which was found at Westwood, Broadstairs in 2000.

The axe is of Acheulian pointed heavy butted type and measures less that 10cm in length. It is unpatinated and is sharp on its edges and struck facets indicating that it had not moved far from the place where it was lost or discarded approximately 400,000 years ago.

VM_365 Day 165 Reworked Polished Flint Axe

Archaeology, Beaker, Broadstairs, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 165

The image for Day 165 of the VM_365 project shows a reworked polished flint axe that was found in the primary ditch fill of a Beaker period barrow at North Foreland, Broadstairs in 2004.

This was originally a small polished axe that was reworked to make it usable after it broke at the butt end. The butt end was tapered to aid re-hafting and the cutting edge was re-sharpened.

 

VM 365 Day 164 Earliest Iron Age red oxide painted pottery from Minnis Bay, Birchington

Archaeology, Birchington, Iron Age, Prehistoric pottery, Thanet archaeology, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 164

Today’s image is of a sherd of Earliest Iron Age pottery with a bright red finish applied to its outer surface.  Around 900 BC, in the earliest phase of the Iron Age, a new technique was adopted by potters where  vessels were decorated by applying  iron-oxide powder as a slip to the outer surfaces.

Like the finger tip decoration  that was applied to bronze age on vessels that was shown on VM_365 Day 155, this technique is a skeuomorph, using the inspiration of one decorative form as a reference to create another decorative style.   The  process evolved with the deliberate intention of  emulating the bright colour of freshly made and polished bronze vessels.

The technique was only applied on thin-walled fineware bowls, which were most ike the bronze models. The sherd shown in the image is from a bowl found at Minnis Bay, Birchington which can be  dated broadly to around 900 to 600BC .

VM_365 Day 163 Moulded shoulder vessels characteristic of Early to Middle Iron Age period

Archaeology, Iron Age, Margate, Prehistoric pottery, Thanet archaeology, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project
Early to Mid Iron Age fineware bowl with moulded shoulder, with sherds from similar vessels

Early to Mid Iron Age fineware bowl with moulded shoulder, with sherds from similar vessels

Today’s image for VM_365 Day 163 shows some examples of a characteristic of pottery from the Early to Mid Iron Age period, dating around c.600-500 BC. This earliest phase of Early to Mid Iron Age pottery is epitomised by fineware bowls that have complex, moulded shoulders. The vessel form was based on examples that were coming in to Britain from North East France and other areas of the continent.

A fairly complete example of a vessel with this characteristic shape from Fort Hill Margate is shown at the top of the image. The four sherds below are from a series of other vessels  showing variations of forms with the characteristic moulded shoulder that is typical of this period.

Vessels with this distinctive shape would not be easy to make, requiring careful and firm moulding at the shoulder junction. The pots frequently break at this point because the pieces of clay that make up the vessel’s body, formed of coils or slabs,  are sometimes poorly joined together.

The bowl and sherds shown in the VM_365 image show how small, but very characteristic pottery sherds and fragments can be used to identify the potting traditions form a specific period that are represented among the many sherds that may be present among the finds recovered from an excavated feature, or in the assemblage of pottery from a site.

The VM is grateful to Nigel Macpherson Grant for the images and information for today’s post.

VM_365 Day 162 Early Bronze Age barbed and tanged arrowhead from Drapers Mills, Margate

Archaeology, Bronze Age, In the Store, Margate, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 160

The image for Day 162 of VM_365 is of another fine example of Early Bronze Age flint work from Thanet. This barbed and tanged arrowhead was found at Draper’s Mill, Margate in 1980, as a residual object recovered during the excavation of a Roman building.

This tiny object embodies all the skills of the Early Bronze Age flint knappers who could create such a well proportioned and symmetrical tool through the careful flaking of tiny chips from such a small piece of stone.

Other similar barbed and tanged arrowheads have featured in earlier VM_365 posts, arrow heads found with a burial close to QEQM Hospital featured in VM_365 Day 24 and an arrow head found in excavations at Lord of the Manor, Ramsgate was shown as VM_365 Day 141 .

 

VM_365 Day 161 Beaker from Manston, Ramsgate

Archaeology, Beaker, Bronze Age, In the Store, Ramsgate, Uncategorised, VM_365 Project

VM 161bToday’s VM_365 image shows a Beaker vessel, which has been heavily restored, that accompanied the same burial as the  plano-convex flint knife and ‘V’ perforated jet button shown on Day  159 and Day 160.

The Beaker was found on its side on the base of the grave which was cut into the chalk geology. One large sherd from the neck and rim were found lying about 10 cm away from the main body, suggesting that the burial had been disturbed at some point in its history, possibly when a later Anglo Saxon burial may have been cut into the earlier burial.

A radiocarbon date from bone from the skeleton buried in  the grave dates the burial to 1680±50 BC.

The beaker is approximatley 10cm high with a base diameter of 6cm is made of light brown fabric. Grey patches of firing clouds on the body are indicative of an open firing. The core of the fabric  is grey, indicating that the short firing at a low temperature had not succeeded in burning out the natural organic inclusions in the clay.

The decoration on the vessel was made with a toothed comb, which has been carelessly used. On the upper part of the vessel the impressions of the comb’s teeth are so blurred that they seem to be incised. The decorative scheme consists of rows of chevrons, encircling combed lines and filled triangles. There is a basal zone of paired finger nail impressions

The vessel is unusual in that although the fabric is fine, the vessel is well fired and finished but the vessel is  asymmetrical and the decoration has been carelessly applied. The lop sided shape of the vessel is possibly a result of the clay being too wet, causing it to sag.