JOHN MOOREHERITAGE SERVICES
EXCAVATION OF A LATE MEDIEVAL
WORKSHOP AND PITS
ADJACENT TO PROSSER’S YARD,
7 & 9 TEMPLE ST, BRILL
BUCKINGHAMSHIRE
NGR SP 65465 14030
On behalf of
Duncan Harding
AUGUST 2010
John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Archaeological Evaluation Report
REPORT FOR Duncan Harding Raybourne House Mill Street Islip Oxfordshire OX5 2SZ
PREPARED BY Gwilym Williams
ILLUSTRATION BY Eoin Fitzsimons & Gwilym Williams
FIELDWORK 10th – 16th September 2009
REPORT ISSUED 10th August 2010
ENQUIRES TO John Moore Heritage Services Hill View Woodperry Road Beckley Oxfordshire OX3 9UZ Tel/Fax 01865 358300 Email: [email protected]
Site Code BRTS 09 JMHS Project No: 2053 Archive Location The archive will be deposited with Buckinghamshire County Museum. John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Archaeological Evaluation Report
CONTENTS Page SUMMARY 1
INTRODUCTION 1 Site Description 1
HISTORICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL BACKGROUND 2 By Stephen Yeates with Gwilym Williams
The manor of Brill 2 The Forest of Bernwood 4 The pottery industry 5
THE EXCAVATION 9
Prehistoric 9 13th/14th century 9 Late 15th century 9 Mid 16th century 10 19th century 11 Undated 11
DISCUSSION 12
FINDS 16 Pottery by Paul Blinkhorn 16 The Ceramic Building Materials by Andrew Peachey 22
Appendix 1 Catalogue of sites in Figure 1 25
BIBLIOGRAPHY 26
FIGURES
Figure 1 Site location
Figure 2 Ordnance Survey First Series 1833
Figure 3 Plan of excavation area
Figure 4 Section drawings
Figure 5 Photograph of excavation area
Figure 6 Pit 63
Figure 7 Long section
John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Archaeological Evaluation Report
Figure 8 Saggar rim diameter, in EVE, per 20mm diameter class, context 35
Figure 9 Saggar rim diameter, in EVE, per 20mm diameter class, context 49
Figure 10 Saggar rim diameter, in EVE, per 20mm diameter class, all contexts
Figure 11 Pottery Illustrations
No. TS1: Context 49. Saggar base with base of a Cistercian ware cup adhering to the outside. Saggar: Buff-orange fabric with uniform dark grey surfaces, thick layer of green-and vitrified glaze adhering t the outside of the base pad. Cistercian ware cup: dark purplish-red fabric with black glaze on both surfaces.
No. TS2: Context 49. Saggar base. Dark grey fabric with a red core. The outside of the base- pad has a thick layer of vitrified glaze, and stacking scars from at least two vessels. The smaller scar has a bright green glaze attached, and appears likely to be from a ‘Tudor Green’ vessel.
No. TS3: Context 49. Full profile of heat-distorted saggar. Orange pink-fabric with grey surfaces, some vitrified glaze adhering to the rim where the vessel had been inverted during firing.
No. TS4: Context 49. Lower part of saggar. Brick-red fabric with dark grey surfaces. Ring of thick, partially vitrified green glaze on the outside of the base. Runs of very dark green glaze on the outer surface of the body.
No. TS5: Context 49. Lower part of saggar. Brick-red fabric with dark grey surfaces. Thick, partially vitrified green glaze on the outside of the base which sagged inwards and broken during firing, as the glaze has run over the fracture.. Runs of very dark green glaze on the outer surface of the body.
No. TS6. Context 49. Saggar rim with shallow cut-aways. Buff fabric with light grey surfaces. Small ‘sticking scar’ on the rim.
Figure 12 Pottery Illustrations
No. TS7: Context 35: Jar rim. Uniform pale buff-orange fabric with a few spots of pale green glaze on the rim.
No. TS8: Context 35: Full profile of large bowl or pancheon. Pale pink-buff fabric with grey surfaces. Some spalling on inner surface.
No. TS9: Context 49: Rim from large bowl or pancheon. Buff fabric with grey surfaces. Heavily vitrified glaze on the inner surface.
No. TS10: Context 35. Handle from ‘Tudor Green’ drinking jug. Reddish-pink fabric with glossy, copper-speckled glazed on the both surfaces.
No. TS11: Context 49. Handle and bodysherd from a ‘Tudor Green’ drinking jug. Pale buff- pink fabric with glossy yellow glaze on both surfaces.
John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
EXCAVATION OF A LATE MEDIEVAL WORKSHOP AND PITS ADJACENT TO PROSSER’S YARD, 7 & 9 TEMPLE ST, BRILL, BUCKINGHAMSHIRE
GWILYM WILLIAMS WITH CONTRIBUTIONS BY PAUL BLINKHORN, DAVID GILBERT, ANDREW PEACHEY AND STEPHEN YEATES
SUMMARY An excavation followed the evaluation of land to the rear of 7 & 9 Temple Street, part of Prosser’s Yard. A workshop shed and pits containing kiln waste – including saggars – dating from the late 15th century, as well as pits containing kiln clearance from the 16th century were investigated. The work has enabled a re-dating of previous interventions at Brill. The development of the pottery industry at Brill, from a royal manor in the early part of the medieval period to an enfeoffed manor from the 14th century, is discussed. Consideration is given to royal manorial trade as well as the mechanism for the emergence of early modern industrialisation in rural Buckinghamshire.
INTRODUCTION
Planning permission was granted by Aylesbury Vale District Council for the conversion of an existing 18th century building at 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill and for the erection of a new dwelling to the rear of the property. Due to the potential of archaeological remains to be present on the site, Buckinghamshire County Archaeological Service (BCAS) advised that a programme of archaeological works should be carried out, and prepared a brief in accordance with PPG 16 outlining how this work should be carried out. These works took the form of an archaeological evaluation, which established the presence and condition of archaeological deposits present within the site, followed by further work, which comprised an archaeological excavation.
Site description (Fig. 1) The village of Brill is located on an outcrop of Kimmeridge Clay, overlain by Portlandian limestone deposits and Whitchurch Sand (BGS 1994 Sheet 227). The site lay on the Whitchurch Sand.
The village takes its name from a conflation of the British breg and Old English hyll, both of which mean ‘hill’ (Ekwall 1960). Brill is located within the former royal forest of Bernwood, which existed by the 10th century AD when it was described as a large territory at Bree, rendering forest dues (Broad and Hoyle 1997, 1). The earliest form of the name is Byrnewudu of c. 950 (Mawer and Stenton 1925, 132-3), the etymology of which is also associated with bryn, reflecting the generally hilly topograohy of the Ashendon Hills.
The site comprised a rectangular parcel of land c. 104 sq metres in size to the rear of properties 7 & 9 Temple Street, Brill (NGR SP 65465 14030) (Fig. 1), of a relatively flat open area of grass bordered by various trees and bushes at an approximate height of 188.8m above Ordnance Datum.
The site is located within, or immediately adjacent to, Prosser’s Yard (Cocroft 1985) (Fig. 1 15). The original extent of the 18th century kiln-yard is not presently known. It is proposed that the excavations carried out by JMHS at 7 & 9 Temple St (Fig. 1 11) form part of the original kiln-yard, and may well indicate a start date in the latter part of the 15th century for production at Prosser’s Yard, which extended into the 18th century (Cocroft 1985).
1 Track
TRAM HILL
145
1
21 16 2 4 5 14 22 3 24 9 7 23 10 13 12 6 20 11 18 ? 25 140 17 19 28 THE FIRS 26
LB 27 SPA CLOSE
29 Sites referred to in text 30 15 Sites Buckingham 8 Aylesbury 32 13th - 15th C. 31 Brill 15th - 16th C. 16th - 18th C.
High Wycombe 135
650 655 660 0 m 500 m © Crown Copyright 2009. All rights reserved. Licence number 100020449 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
HISTORICAL AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL BACKGROUND (Figs. 1, 2) By Stephen Yeates with Gwilym Williams
The manor of Brill Brill is located in the former hundred of Ashendon, and the manor was held by the king in 1086, and before him by Edward the Confessor (Morris 1978, 1.6). The Domesday entry has been taken to imply that Edward visited Brill to enjoy the hunting in Bernwood Forest (Barlow 1962, 64).
Brill answered for 20 hides in 1086 (Morris 1978, 1.6), with land for 25 ploughs (of which 3 were in lordship). Of the ploughs some 17 were held by 19 villans and 13 bordars; there were 2 slaves. There was a mill (probably water) valued at 10s, meadow for 20 ploughs, and woodland for 200 pigs. The manor paid a total of £38 in white silver, and the Forest £12. The whole manor before 1066 paid £18. Woodland was also located at Oakley (Morris 1978, 19.3), a holding of Robert d’Oilly in the hundred of Ixhill (Williams & Martin 1992, 410), an estate of 5 hides and 3 virgates. The woodland at Oakley was also for 200 pigs, were it not for the king’s park, in which the woodland lies.
These extracts detail the extensive woodland and parkland associated with Brill within Bernwood Forest. The associated manor of Boarstall is not recorded in Domesday, but those of Nashway and Addingrove, which lay in the parishes of Oakley and Brill, are. Nashway means ‘to the ash-fence or pale’ (Mawer and Stenton 1925, 119-120). Addingrove was a manor of Walter Gifford assessed at 3½ hides (Morris 1978, 14.6). The royal associations are evident again as previously Wulfward held the land from Queen Edith.
Nashway is located to the south west of Brill on the road to Oakley, the manor house is probably that some 400m from the centre of the village. The manor of Lesa (associated with later Esses at Nashway (Mawer and Stenton 1925, 119-120) was held by Roger of Ivry, and of him Picot, accounting for 2 hides (Morris 1978, 41.1; Williams & Martin 1992, 417). The manor had 2 villans, 2 bordars with 2 ploughs, and 2 slaves. Before 1066 Azor held this manor from Queen Edith. The manor had woodland for 200 pigs. There were in Brill, Nashway and Oakley extensive areas of woodland that could accommodate 400 swine.
Accounts in the Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon have been taken to suggest that the Norman kings had a hunting lodge at Brill from the reign of William I, and that he and Henry I both visited (Stevenson 1858, ii.2, 90, 94; Allen Brown, Colvin et al. 1963a, 48; 1963b, 902). The three texts signed by the kings are dated and placed at Bruhellum or Bruhellam.
The manor remained in royal hands until the 14th century (VCH 1927, 15), and between 1337 and 1634 it was held as one knight’s fee. Grants of various parts of the manor had been made from the reign of Henry II in the 12th century; for example Willelmi de Rochela was gifted the vill of Brill 1168-1178 (Round 1905, 156). These grants continued into the reign of Richard I in 1190 (Stenton 1925, 139). The position that de Rochela held in the royal household is not known, but it is apparent from other later grants that clerks of the king can readily be noted. The manor was granted during the reign of John in 1202 (Stenton 1937, 21-23) and again in 1204 (Anon. 1833, 341-2, Stenton 1940, 8-9, 14) to Walterus Buistard servant of the King’s chapel (VCH 1927, 15). At the start of the 13th century the manor of Brill was rented to a tenant called Roberto de Drewes (Maxwell Lyte 1901a, 117)
Various accounts indicate that the hunting lodge complex (Fig. 1 28; although, see below) underwent periods of major renovation or construction between 1179 and 1247 in and around the earlier lodge (Allen Brown, Colvin et al. 1963a, 84; 1963b, 902-903). In 1179-80 Richard le Bret was paid £35 to make the king’s chamber there (Round 1905, 123). He is identified as one of the king’s clerks. A master fossator (ditch digger) and other workmen accounted for the construction of a bank and ditch around the King’s new chamber (Round 1910, 123), which indicates that the hunting lodge at Brill stood on or near that of the Norman kings (Allen Brown, Colvin et al. 1963b, 902-3).
In 1193-4 the sheriff ordered iron at a cost of £25 from Gloucestershire to repair the King’s House at Brill (Stenton 1928, 203, 232). The lodge was repaired during the reign of King John (Allen Brown, Colvin et al. 902-3), besides which major expenditure further monies were spent on a chapel dedicated to Saint Edmund in 1209-11 attached to the King’s Lodge (Stenton 1953, 84). The location of this chapel is not known, although the present church at Brill has been suggested as a possible location; it
2 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report should be noted that the current parish church at Brill has a 13th century chancel arch (Pevsner and Williamson 1994, 190-1). Historically the parish church for Brill was that now at Oakley.
The construction of the king’s hunting lodge indicates the movement of materials between the royal manor of Brill and the Forest of Dean. The location of the manufacturing and supply site in the Forest of Dean is not mentioned, but it is probably from the site of the king’s armoury at Saint Briavels. If indeed this is the case it raises the possibility that not only is the royal manor of Brill trading with mineral-rich areas of the West Country, but that this trade was possibly being carried out between various holdings of the king.
The source of the lead used for glaze at Brill has not been located; the nearest sources are in the West Country. The Forest of Dean has no lead mining, but lead could have been mined at Kingswood, Mendip, or even Bristol. The lead ores in Kingswood are found at Westbury-on-Trym, Almondsbury, Cromhall, Yate and Sodbury (Kellaway and Welch 1993, 66-67, Welch, Crookall et al. 1948, 93). These deposits may well have supplied the lead for the glaze of the far larger medieval pottery industry of Ham Green.
The king’s principal manor in this area was at Barton Regis, while Old Sodbury and the borough of Chipping Sodbury lie between the Cotswold Ridge and the route between Bath and Cirencester. The Mendip area also has lead ore deposits at Banwell, Priddy, Charterhouse, Saint Cuthbert’s Without, and East Harptree (Welch, Crookall et al. 1948, 94, Green and Welch 1965, 163-5, Kellaway and Welch 1993, 153-5). These deposits are, however, that much further away. Round Bristol there are a number of caves, some which were used for lead extraction from the 17th century at least (Mullan 1993) if not the Roman period (Nicholls 1880).
Alternative suggestions to the West County sources may be the Peak District in Derbyshire, but given the distance, this remains a less likely possibility; or, finally, that the material could have been robbed from Roman sites in the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire areas. However, in respect of this last, somewhat fanciful, suggestion, it remains to be seen if there would be sufficient material to maintain the pottery industry.
The Fine Rolls (Maxwell Lyte 1911a, 80, 115-6) show that Edward I was resident at Brill manor, where he signed 6 writs, between 1277 and 1279. By the reign of Edward II it is apparent that the king’s manor at Brill is again being leased out. In 1314 the king issues a writ for a lease on the manor to cease as Richard of Arundell, the recipient, had died (Maxwell Lyte 1912, 219). A further group of writs in 1317 orders the manor to be granted to John de Trillowe, and that John de Norton is to deliver up Brill manor (Maxwell Lyte 1912, 319-21, 325). It is apparent from the last of the group of charters that the two men involved were both clerks of the king.
The manor had been alienated from the king in 1337 (Allen Brown, Colvin 1963a, 244). In 1340 the manor of Brill was granted to John de Moleyns (Maxwell Lyte 1901b, 400) and by 1417 the manor was enfoeffed to William Moleyns (Maxwell Lyte 1911b). There are three possible locations for the manor. The first, by association with the Moleyns family, is that the present manor site is on that of the medieval hunting lodge (Fig.1 30), which can be inferred from the VCH (1927, 15). There are two further possibilities; secondly that it was in the vicinity of the first site but on the other side of the Oakley Road (Fig. 1 31) as suggested by an estate map of 1713 (updated in 1756 and 1763) which shows this location as the site of the manor (Bucks RO Ma/27/4T). Thirdly, that it was located to the south of the Green (Fig. 1 32), where it is marked on the New College estate map of the late 16th or early 17th century (Bucks RO MaR/5/2), frequently referred to as the New College 1591 map. This location is of interest because a number of archaeological finds in the area may relate to the hunting lodge and later manor complex.
The manor of Brill descended with that of Stokes Prior until 1554 when Francis Earl of Huntingdon sold it to Thomas Dynham of Boarstall (VCH 1927, 16); Brill manor then descended with Boarstall manor. Custody of Brill Manor is known to have changed at various times; these are catalogued in the Victoria County History. Frideswide de Manyngham, daughter of Eleanor de Moleyns, brought the manor to her husband Thomas Oxenbridge in 1489, but in 1493 they surrendered their claim for an annuity. Dorothy, the daughter of Frideswide, married Sir Thomas Digby who unsuccessfully sued for the manor against the trustees Edward and Mary Hastings. Everard Digby tried to revive the claim c. 1565.
3 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
The Forest of Bernwood The Cartulary of Boarstall contains a number of bounds or perambulations of the Forest of Bernwood (Salter 1930, nos.572-3, 575-6, 608), which are variously dated to 1252, 1294, and 1315. A number of woodlands and pastures are identified as integral parts of the Forest, the woods of Hixhull, Utwode, Hidesdene, Malcombe and Arnegrove, and the pastures of Lechmere, Paunshale and Luewynslade.
The Patent Rolls contain two general grants concerning the king’s forest, in 1217 and in 1222, (Maxwell Lyte 1901a, 124, 360). The first refers to the parks and warrens in the forests of the Anglie. The second starts with an initial statement concerning the Forest of Dean and the New Forest, before briefly mentioning the fees of the other forests. The mention of warren generally in the king’s forests is of note, as at Brill, a field name on the tithe map of 1853 (Bucks RO Ref.63 AR 130/81) places this landscape on the east side of the village. This field is bounded on the east by a large curving fence line (Fig. 1), which continues to the north and west around the town, and may continue as part of the bounds of the common. A text of 1232 gives an account of the erection of fences in the Forest (Maxwell Lyte 1905, 235), but whether this is for assarting or pales for hunting is unclear.
The Close Roll of 1232 provides further significant detail concerning the running of the Forest of Bernwood and the manor of Brill. The forest’s deer are mentioned on a number of occasions (Maxwell Lyte 1905, 29, 84, 92, 206, 219, 266, 511) and hunting dogs were kept at Brill manor indicated in an account of 1343 (Salter 1930, no.610). As was the case in other royal forests, commoners held various rights, evidenced at Brill in 1366, for example (Salter 1930, no.611). The deer and the forest regime were protected; mention is made of a prison in 1232 (Maxwell Lyte 1905, 110) and gallows (Salter 1930, 183). The prison may have survived into the 19th century when there is mention of The Cage (Fig. 1 29).
The Rotuli Hundredorum refers to Brill as a caput of the king’s holdings in the forest (implied by the earlier material), during the reign of Henry III (Illingworth and Caley 1812, 21-2, 35-7, 46-7). Both the Cartulary of Boarstall and the Hundred Records mention Joh(ann)es fil(ius) Nigelli as a tenant of Derhide cu ballia foreste de Bronwode. John alias John Fitz Niel was keeper of Bernwood Forest in 1255 (VCH 1927, 11). The word Derhide referred to a hide of land set-aside for deer.
In these sources it is confirmed that he had custody of the king’s wood and that the 1 hide and vill where he had resided was located at Boarstall, not Brill, however, due to the associations between the two manors it is sometimes difficult to determine to which modern parish reference is made. A further significant tenant is also mentioned in this document as having 3 hides, which were located at Lutegershal in the fee of Brill (Maxwell Lyte 1923, 874). How these lands were demarcated in the Forest is unknown. That the keeper of the king’s forest held the manor of Boarstall would explain the origins of the two parishes and the complicated arrangement between Brill and Boarstall, and such an arrangement may have been in place from the time Boarstall is first mentioned at the start of the 12th century.
The supply of timber is one of the key resources in the forest landscape of Bernwood. Reference to the potters using small timber was indicated in 1254 (Illingworth and Caley 1812, 22), which is the earliest known reference to wood extraction; in this case they took the resources needed from the wood near the field of Boarstall. Timber from Brill was used for the construction of the hospital of Saint John at Oxford outside the East Gate (Salter 1917, xiv, VCH 1907, 158) and for the hospital at Wycombe, in addition to a further grant for the collecting of firewood by cart for the Abbey of Notley (Maxwell Lyte 1905, 483).
The Charter Rolls of Henry III for AD 1230 mentions the nuns of Sandford church who had one acre of land at Brehilla (Maxwell Lyte 1903, 117), which was a gift of Roger, but it is stated that Roger’s grandfather had originally obtained the acre at Brill. Such a small piece of land would invariably be enclosed, demonstrating that assarting was probably occurring already in the middle to late 12th century. It should be noted that the later church land at Brill covered an acre. In 1252 mention is made of acres of assarted land under the regime of Johannes filius Nigelli (Salter 1930, no.608).
A writ of 1315 informs us that assarting was ongoing in Bernwood Forest (Maxwell Lyte 1912, 229). There are leases of land across the Forest attached to the royal manor at Brill: 7½ acres at Wolfreschobbes, 28½ acres in the king’s demesne at Brill abutting Ludgershale, and 19½ acres at
4 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Paunshale called Waterplassh and Northcroft abutting the field of Boarstall. Rents were to be paid at Michaelmas and the land enclosed with small dykes. What is of interest here is the process of disafforestation that was occurring at exactly the same time that the embryonic pottery industry is established, and developing. The transformation of the forest landscape, would release commoners rights to be exploited in a new commercial manner.
A Commission for Assart Lands held in 1603 attempted to prove that the people who held land rights prior to that date in the Forest of Bernwood had imperfect claims (Broad and Hoyle 1997, 56). In 1622 attempts were made to disafforest and inclose the land around Brill (Bateson 1966, 6-7), but it was not until 1627 that the disafforestation decree was finally issued when the new properties were laid out. The humbler inhabitants felt that they had been cheated and started to pull down the fences. A second decree made further compensation to the inhabitants and awarded them 30 acres at a site called Brill Hills. In essence the Commission realised that there were too many of the poorer inhabitants of Brill that made their livelihood from the clay for potting. The area of Brill Hills became the area of Brill Common to the northwest of the town, where numerous clay extraction pits have been identified. Disafforestation continued in the area, as the neighbouring parish of Boarstall was cleared in 1633 (Porter 1984, 86-91).
The pottery industry References to the medieval pottery industry in textual sources come in several forms: notably, personal names and words for kilns (Le Patourel 1968, 99-126). Potter or le Potter are the most common form of personal names while the words noted for the kilns include: fornaces, rogus, turellum, hocum, domus ignea, and kiln. The earliest references to pottery production is in 1086, while that to a potter is the surname Radulphus Poter in 1170-75 (Salter 1930, no.1, Ivens 1981, 102), although there is no reason why this name should be associated with the parishes of Brill and Boarstall. However, there are references in the Boarstall Cartulary; to the potters Sampson le Poter and Walterus le Poter, which come from the same source dating from c. 1210-20 (Salter 1930, no.209).
Le Patourel (1968, 102) claims that although surnames may have started as descriptive, in later contexts they cannot necessarily, without ascription, be taken to indicate the presence of potters. The Boarstall Cartulary also refers to John Potter and more significantly Robert Potter (Salter 1930, nos.443, 491-2, 494-6, 533-5), which date from 1417-47. However, it is apparent that Robert Rothur is the proper name of this person and that Potter is a frequently used alias (Salter 1930, no.535) replacing Rothur, a nickname derived from his professional activity. Robert Rothur, alias Potter, owned land at Barnard’s and Stafford’s, neither of which have not been identified.
The Rotuli Hundredorum of 1254 states that there are ten or more furnaces on the land of the king and on that of Johes fil Nigelli (Illingworth and Caley 1812, 22, 46-7; VCH 1927, 11; Ivens 1981). The kilns referred to in the 13th century lay in the parishes of both Brill and Boarstall. There are potential other references to kilns at Brill in texts of 1190 (Stenton 1925, 139), 1202 (Anon. 1833, 342, Stenton 1937, 22), and 1204 (Stenton 1940, 9). The kiln is variously described as cremto, cremeto, cremento, or cremerto, an abbreviation of crematorium, a place of burning, usually used for a wood burner, or lime kiln (Latham 1981, 513). The word combustio de Bruhull is also used in 1202 (Stenton 1937, 292).
Excavation of four pottery kilns at Temple Farm (Fig.1 4) was carried out in 1953, which revealed three of the kilns to be superimposed, with the lowest kiln cut into a pre-existing dump of wasters, which sealed an earlier deposit of wasters (Ivens 1978, 102-106, Jope 1954, 39-42, Jope and Ivens 1981, 32-38). The types of kilns identified in 1954 were of a previously unrecognised design. Three superimposed, oval kilns (A, B C1 and C2) built of stone and potsherds were found. A fourth kiln (D) was circular and of superior build. The date attributed to the oval kiln sequence was between the late 13th and early 14th centuries. The isolated kiln was in use during the mid-14th century.
Further investigations were carried out again at Temple Farm in 1978 to excavate the remains of two kilns (kiln E) (Fig. 1 5) and extensive waster dumps (Ivens 1981, 102-106, Ivens 1982, 144-70, Jope and Ivens 1981, 32-38). A fluxgate gradiometer survey was also carried out. The kiln was formed of a rough oval oven and opposed flues, built of limestone, with kiln-bar and pottery. The superstructure was constructed of wattle and daub. Remains of a further kiln (F) were found robbed out, the east end and stoke hole of which were located under kiln E. The orientation of the two similar kilns determined that wind direction played no part in the design. It was impossible to determine if the wasters were
5
John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report contemporary with the kilns or not. Archaeomagnetic dating indicated that kiln E dated AD 1300- 1350. The pottery sealed in the kiln-structure is also 14th century. Excavation of the kilns indicated that the pottery industry at Brill was in full swing by the 13th century but that some of the pottery types must date back to the 12th century. No workshop or associated shed was revealed, suggesting that pot production area must lie in an adjacent location.
Pottery recovered from Deddington Castle, Oxfordshire, suggests that the earliest pottery at Brill was produced towards the end of the 12th century (Ivens 1982, 151-2). The early pottery at Deddington occurred with a cross penny of Henry II (1180-1189). This corresponds with finds from St Aldates in Oxford. The earliest group of pots (Jope and Ivens 1981, 35) seems to be experimental in nature with the nearest parallels in the West Country, and it is suggested that an individual moved from that area to establish the industry before the mid-14th century. The early types were quickly abandoned and more appropriate pots produced for the clay types available. Maureen Mellor (1994, 132) proposes that as early as the mid 13th century, the potters at Brill were under royal patronage, and that they drew on ceramic traditions from the Bristol area.
In 1989 pottery scatters were discovered in the northern part of the town of Brill (Fig. 1 2) and at (Fig. 1 7) (Anon. 1989, 230). The first scatter produced pottery wasters, indicating that a further kiln site was in the immediate vicinity; the second produced a scatter of pottery in addition to the remains of a kiln in section. The pottery, in both cases, dated from the 14th - 15th centuries. Opposite the junction of The Lawns, the site of Yeoman’s excavations, and Temple Street, trial-trenching revealed a 14th century kiln site on land adjacent to the former Magistrates Court (Fig 1 6). Further scatters were also recovered from allotments on the south side of Brill (Fig. 1 8), and from fields within ‘The Warren’ on the east side (Fig. 1 5), both of which have been adduced to indicate kiln sites.
Excavations were carried out on a kiln site to the rear of the fire station on Temple Street (Fig. 1 10) in 1983 (Anon. 1983, 172, Yeoman 1988). The kiln was initially detected during topsoil stripping, which uncovered brick fragments and sand. The surrounding area was subject to a magnetometry survey, which failed to detect further kilns. The features identified included fired clamp bases, pits, a spread of wasters and two kilns. The kilns lay to the east of the brick clamps. The first kiln had been largely destroyed by the construction of the second, and the walls of the latter survived to a height of 0.34m. Archaeomagnetic dating gave a date range in the later 15th or early 16th centuries (Clarke 1988, 152).
Just to the north of the excavations carried out by Yeoman at Temple Street, a quantity of 15th/16th century pottery, including wasters and saggars were found in a backgarden at 58 Temple Street (Fig.1 9), which has been inferred to represent a kiln site. At the west end of Windmill St, to the rear of the Pheasant (Moore 2005) an evaluation revealed pits filled with kiln waste (Fig. 1 12).
Excavation in 1974 at 40 Windmill Street (Fig. 1 13) uncovered the remains of a kiln site, previously dated to the 17th century (Farley 1979, 127-152), but which has been re-dated to earlier in the late medieval period (Blinkhorn, see below). The kiln was severely truncated, but the design of the kiln was a sub-rectangular with multi-flue type, with the base built of bricks.
During the digging of footings for a new build on Tram Hill (Fig.1 14), the remains of a brick kiln and two earlier kilns were identified (Farley 1979). The earliest evidence was for that of two kilns, or their stoke holes, which were labelled A and B. Both of these kilns produced glazed brick thought to have come from the kiln structures. The kilns were argued as being contemporary to each other but later than the kiln excavated in 1974 due to the bowl forms, through comparisons with other potteries in England for example Potters Bar and Potterspury amongst others. Paul Blinkhorn (see below) argues that a late 17th-century date is too late and the date could be brought back into the latter part of the 16th or early 17th century.
On the southeast side of the town, pottery has been found at Well Close (Fig. 1 15), which has also been taken to indicate a possible kiln site, despite there being no sure evidence for kiln-activity on site. To the west of Ludgershall Road, Jope located a post-medieval kiln in 1953 (Fig. 1 16).
Excavations in 1977 identified the remains of two post-medieval kilns operating in the early 18th century (Cocroft 1985; Fig. 1 18). The kilns were located at Prosser’s Yard on Temple Street, immediately adjacent to 7 & 9 Temple St. Kiln 1 was a substantial brick structure orientated towards the northeast. This structure survived to a height of 2.3m and the front retained some semicircular
6 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report brick vaulting. There was a flue tunnel that was slightly offset. The excavations were limited so the design of the kiln was only tentatively suggested. Kiln 2 post-dated kiln 1, and was badly damaged. It was believed to be a circular single-flued kiln, without permanent supports, that had been placed in foundations dug into the earlier kiln. The orientation was believed to be southeast to northwest and the front wall of kiln 1 may have been reused. No superstructure was found to indicate if the brick base had a brick or clay structure. After the site was abandoned it was used for dumping wasters. Kiln 1 was of a type often associated with the making of tiles.
A close parallel to kiln 1 is from the Fulham Stoneware Pottery, which is of a late 17th century date, although a 15th century tile kiln with inserted pot kiln was excavated at Leyhill, Latimer (Farley & Lawson 1990), which shares a number of morphological traits. A date of the late 17th to early 18th centuries was suggested for kiln 2 on the basis of a 1612 coin of James 1st and waster material made from clay pipe-stems dating to the 1720s. These finds could be intrusive and certainly only date the dumping of the waster material; moreover, it should be borne in mind that the original construction could have been two decades, or indeed more, earlier (see Stopford 1993). Moreover, kiln 1 remains undated (Cocroft 1985, 82).
A similar pit to those found at 7 & 9 Temple St (Fig. 1 11) as well as at The Pheasant (Fig. 1 12) was found with 17th century pottery at 28 Temple St (Fig. 1 17), which may be indicative of a further kiln- yard here. Similarly, an evaluation to the rear of the Sun Inn, Windmill St, also revealed evidence for a further kiln-yard (Fig. 1 19), dating from the latter part of the 17th or early 18th century. To the west, on South Hills, further evidence for a kiln-yard was found (Fig. 1 20)
Extraction pits for clay and sand are notable round the periphery of Brill (see below), in addition to quarrying having been carried out in the village itself, such as to the rear of The Pheasant (Moore 2005) (Fig. 1 12). Clay payment is a fee derived from the extraction of the clay from the ground, and would have been due, like other mineral payments, to the lord of the manor. Clay payments are first referred to in the Rotuli Hundredarium of c. 1254 where the value is 3d (Illingworth and Caley 1812, 22, 46-7, Le Patourel 1968, 123), while a reeve’s account of 1279 mentions 4s 6d claygavel. Gavel is a general term for mineral extraction. Further accounts of claygavel were paid in 1312-15 (Farley 1982, 117, Ministers Accounts, SC6/759/30-31) and in 1314-1317 in the Cartulary of Boarstall (Salter 1930, no.629), although this may be the same surviving account given the dates earlier as 1312-15.
The clay was extracted from the Purbeck formation, which underlies the Whitchurch Sand. The most accessible source of the clay is on Brill Common, though it is also apparent that some of the kiln sites are located on the Kimmeridge clays. The Purbeck formation comprises non-marine clay deposits. Many of the early identified kilns lie to the north of the town, and it is to the north of the town on Brill Common where the remains of most of the clay pits can be found (Jope 1954, 39-42). The following sites have been identified as locations from where clay is known to have been extracted from, those given a medieval origin (Fig. 1 1), or post-medieval (Fig. 1 27) but most are usually categorised as being on later post-medieval maps of the 19th or 20th centuries (Fig 1 27, 26, 22, 21, 23, 24).
The Boarstall Cartulary (Salter 1930, no.398) has a reference to Potteris Place, however, this is considered to be a corruption of Porters Place of Thomas le Porter in 1408. Robert Potter of Boarstall is granted two messuages and half an acre, though it cannot be confirmed that his surname indicates association with a pottery site (Le Patourel 1968, 102).
Certainly, the 15th-century kiln excavated at Leyhill, Latimer (Farley and Lawson 1990) demonstrated that the relationship between tile and pottery kilns was close, although the more recent work at Penn was less clear, suggesting that 17th century pottery production was carried out in the vicinity (Zeepvat 2009, 214). Yeoman (1988,132) noted that tile was probably being produced at Temple St in addition to pottery. In some instances the tile industry appears to have been carried out in conjunction or preceding pottery production. Farley & Lawson (1990, 56) make the point that brick was more than likely produced in clamps rather than kilns, which would have been located at ground-level unlike the tile and pottery kilns, which were sub-surface.
However, other 15th century sources are available which show that brick was being produced at Brill. An account of the materials used by masons in 1465/6 in the construction of Oxford records a Robert Mooswell, a paver and brick man, who was paid 5s for paving Saint Mary’s church and 10s for two brick loads carried from Brill (Gee 1952, 54-131). The brick was probably used on the great central
7 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report chimneystack of Tackley’s Inn. An account of 1541-2 in the history of the King’s Works mentions 2,700 paving stones from Brill brought for repair of the tennis court at the palace of Woodstock (Colvin, Summerson et al. 1982, 351), showing that during the 15th and 16th centuries the brick production at Brill was becoming as important as pottery.
A reference from 1622, concerning the attempts to inclose Bernwood, stated that Brill was located on a fruitful hill in the centre of the Forest, and the earth within that hill is described as making the best brick and earthen vessels (Bateson 1966, 6-7). Probate records refer to a brickmaker at Brill in 1619 called Thomas Haynes (Hunt, Bettridge et al. 2001, 190). In 1692 and 1713 John Scholey is described as a potter at Brill (Farley 1979, 129), he was probably related to three other recorded potters, Arthur Scholey in 1730 and 1746, another John Scholey in 1746, 1748 and 1753, and Philip Scholey in 1753 and 1770, all are identified in deeds (Bucks RO D104/14-15).
A deed of c. 1720 contains the name of a potter called Shipperley (Farley 1979, 129). A John Shiperle (sic) inscribed his name on a pot in 1764, and a Thomas Hubbocks a short time after this. The Posse Comitatus recorded Thomas Hubbocks as the only potter known in Brill in 1798, but also refers to four brickmakers called William Gibbons, James Norcott, James Norcott Snr. and William Norcott (Beckett 1985, no.22). The documentary data for the Brill ceramic industry indicates that the business had become dominated by brick production from at least the 17th century, and that the production of ceramic vessels only accounted for perhaps 20% of the ceramic business.
The estate map of Brill, started in 1713, but with additions of 1756 and 1763, also has indications of the pottery industry at Brill (Bucks RO Ma/27/4.T). On the part of the map, which was added in 1756, undulating ground is shown on the common (SP 653 142 and SP 654 144). Similar symbols are noted across the Clerk’s Land (SP 6550 1360 and SP 6540 1330), an adjoining field of which a part was known as Little Clerk’s Field (SP 6570 1345), and in a further field called Stone Pitts (SP 6580 1335).
Such documentary evidence confirms the acknowledgement of The Commission for Assart Lands that clay extraction was a significant local industry, and presumably that kiln sites could be located across the Clerk’s Land (presumably a clerk of the king). This is suggestive of the role of the Crown at Brill as being a controlling factor in part of the pottery industry at Brill. The possible reference to kilns as crematorium and combustio as assets providing the king with revenue, are perhaps indicative that this was the king’s clerk.
Potting and brick-making continued at Brill into the 19th century; the history of this has been dealt with at greater length by Farley (1979, 129), Lipscombe (1847), Sheahan (1862, 339) and the Victoria County History (1927). The Ordnance Survey First Series, sheet 45, of 1833 shows much of present Brill to the north of Temple St and east of Windmill St to be in yards (Fig. 2); these are undoubtedly brickyards, but the location of Yeoman’s excavations was located within the yard south of the lane that runs northwest from Temple St. The same yard is also shown on the Tithe Map of 1839 (not illustrated). There is still insufficient known about the development of the industrial quarter at Brill (Green, Giggins & Welch 2007, 19), but the possibility remains that these brickyards shown on early 19th century mapping may well have their origins as potters’ yards in the latter part of the medieval period, when over the course of the 14th and 15th centuries the de Moylens became first chief tenants and then latterly lords of the manor. As brick-making replaced pottery production during the 18th and 19th centuries, the yards were turned over to brick-yards.
THE EXCAVATION (Figs. 3 - 6)
The site consisted of a rectangular parcel of land c. 104 sq metres in size to the rear of properties 7 & 9 Temple Street, Brill (NGR SP 65465 14030) (Figs. 1, 3 and 6). An evaluation had been carried out by John Moore Heritage Services in March 2009 (Hammond 2009), which located several postholes. As a consequence, further archaeological work was required by Buckinghamshire County Archaeological Service. The results of the first phase of work have been integrated into this final excavation report. During the evaluation, features were numbered ‘1/context number’. To ensure continuity with the excavation report, the ‘1/’ has been dropped. Therefore (1/1) is now (1).
The site was machined initially to the top of the subsoil (2). Despite cleaning, it was not possible to see any archaeological features as treeholes and rooting associated with the plot’s former usage as a garden
8 13 29 11 Animal 43 Burrow 13th Century
78 8 15th Century
22 16th Century 6 S 19 19th Century
34 S 1 Evaluation Trench 36 S 11 48 28 S 2 S 3 52 52 (3) 39 (50) 68 41 S 2 S 6 4 23 S 4 25 41 S 5 63 32 41
0 5 m John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report had caused much bioturbation. It was decided, after consultation with the Archaeological Planning Officer, Ruth Beckley, to continue machining until the archaeological features became evident.
Machining was taken to a depth of c. 1m below modern ground level, to deposit (3), which had been identified during the evaluation. This was a yellow to brown-yellow sandy silt, the Whitchurch Sand Formation. The interface between natural (3) and the base of the overlying deposit (45)/(50) was poorly defined due to it having been reworked by worming and rooting.
Prehistoric Two residual flint flakes were recovered from the fill of posthole 6, in addition to a further three during machining and cleaning of the surface of the natural (3), which as stated above was clearly a heavily bioturbated soil. The flints are all of an earlier prehistoric character, but without any associated finds, such as pottery, they cannot be closely dated.
13th/14th century (Fig. 3) A small pit 8, measuring 1.1m by 0.7m and 0.75m deep, was identified during the evaluation. It was filled with a lower fill of grey silty sand (9), which yielded late 12th to 14th century pottery, sealed by grey brown silty sand (10), yielding a 13th or 14th century date. It is possible that this may be residual material and that the cut is related to the later shed structure, but given the much greater depth of the cut, this seems unlikely.
A single posthole 4, located at the southwest end of the evaluation trench, was not apparently associated with any structure. It measured 0.73m long, 0.66m wide and 0.18m deep with fairly steep, slightly curving sides onto a relatively flat base. Its fill, (1/05), consisted of a silty sand that was dark reddish brown in colour with small patches coloured dark grey/black. A large rectangular stone block (0.42m x 0.31m x 0.16m) was noted within the fill, which yielded a single sherd of Brill/Boarstall ware indicating a date after the 13th century. No other features were observed in the vicinity which might clarify the function of the posthole.
Late 15th century (Figs. 3 - 7) The natural sand was sealed on the southeast side of the site by a deposit of red brown garden soil (50) up to 0.4m thick (Fig. 4, S 2; Fig. 7). This was not present on the north side of the excavation area. Cut through this deposit were a number of pits: 68, 48, 34, and 63.
The pit 68 was a poorly defined cut, roughly round in shape, with some straight edges; it was truncated by the slightly later pit 34, and cut to the south by pit 48 (Figs. 3; 4, S 1). Pit 68 measured c. 2m by 1.8m and was 0.42m deep. The fill (69) was red brown silty sand – similar to (50) – and apart from pottery was quite sterile; 50% of the pottery was residual, comprising fabrics which had fallen out of use by the mid 13th to 14th centuries.
The pit 34 (Figs. 3; 4, S 1) was a rectangular straight-sided cut measuring 1.8m long by 1m wide. It was over 1m deep with a flat base. Cut into the base on the northwest side was a rectangular socket 0.45m by 0.20m and 0.22m deep. The fill was firm black silty sand (37) sealed by the fill of 34. The fill of the pit 34 comprised a sequence of dumps of sands, which can be sub-divided into three groups. At the base dark brown black sand, tipping to the southwest, was sealed by a dump of white mortar rich sand, between 0.3m and 0.6m deep, which was almost sealed by a dump of clean yellow sand. Sealing this, were further tiplines of material, from northeast to southwest, comprising blackened and reddened sands, as well as further mortar-rich sands with clay lumps; pottery was recovered from the blackened and reddened sand. The final phase of filling comprised a clean layer of yellow sand over which had been dumped black brown sand and a dirty white brown mortar rich sand with wall and flooring brick as well as ridge and peg tile distributed through it (See Ceramic Building Materials report). It is possible that the socket at the base of the pit may well form part of a structure of internal coffering to prevent collapse, during the use-life of the pit. Although the use of the pit is not clear, it may have functioned to store materials – whether clay or sand is not clear – or, if the revetting were caulked, for clay processing. The posthole in the base would therefore have supported the floor to such a coffered pit.
The pit 48 (Figs. 3; 4, S 2; 7), which cut the south edge of pit 68, was partially removed on the north side during machining, although the pottery contained within it was recovered. It measured 1m by 0.4m and was oriented northeast/southwest. It was 0.28m deep. The fill was red brown sandy silt –
9 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report similar to (50) – containing saggars, burnt clay and lumps of unburnt clay (49). This deposit appears to represent the clearance of a kiln following firing, but in contrast to most of the other pits, lacked evidence for kiln furniture.
A single posthole 32 (Fig. 3) was present to the west, adjacent to the later pit 63. It was c. 0.3m in diameter. It could not be associated with any other feature.
On the northeast side of the site (Fig. 3) six postholes were observed to form a rectangular structure. The postholes 29 and 43 were on the northeast side and 19, 6 and 22 on the southwest side; the posthole 78 was located to the north between the south and the north lines of postholes. The structure extended beyond the edges of excavation. It is proposed that the building was a shed for drying and storing pots prior to firing.
The postholes were between 0.52m and 0.62m in diameter and between 0.13m and 0.29m in depth, although posthole 78, and perhaps 6, had undergone some bioturbation, possibly animal burrowing, resulting in more ovoid forms. Posthole 78, which was partly disturbed on its north side by animal burrowing, appears to represent a central roof post. The postholes along the south line of the structure were spaced at a distance of just over 1m apart, whereas those to the north were spaced at c.1.65m, and the two lines were c. 2.5m distant from one another. The cuts were well-defined with relatively flat bases.
The fills of the postholes varied from orange brown to pale brown, with clay streaking, comminuted ceramic building materials – which could be either brick or tile – occasional charcoal flecking and iron- panning. As noted above, no archaeological deposits were observed during machining between the top of deposit (2) and the natural sand (3)/(50). Consequently no internal floor surfaces associated with this building were present, and it must be assumed that internally the building did not have a prepared surface, but was rather bare earth. The overall dimensions of the shed exceeded 4m by at least 3.6m. It appears that the structure was a light workshop, which may well have had no sides, or at best a light wall on the side of the prevailing wind. The precise function of the structure cannot be elucidated as there were no in situ remains, but more than likely represents either the potting workshop or an associated building such as a drying shed.
Sealing the fill of pit 48 was a further layer (47)/(59) of garden soil (Fig. 4, S 2).
Mid 16th century (Figs. 3 - 7) In the centre of the excavation area was sub-circular pit 28 (Figs. 3; 4, S 3): it measured 1.2m in diameter at the top, and 0.3m at the base; the pit was 1.4m deep. The sides tapered as the pit increased in depth, but were relatively straight; a possible socket was excavated on the eastern side of the cut, extending approximately 0.15m into the natural sand (3). The pit contained three fills. The lowest deposit was soft black brown silty sand (31) c. 0.6m thick, sealed by a dump of clean yellow sand (76), a maximum of 0.14m thick tipping from west to east, overlain by soft black brown silty sand (27) c. 0.7m thick.
Immediately adjacent to the west of pit 28 was the square pit 23 (Fig. 3; 4, S 4), which measured 1.27m by 1.35m and a maximum of 0.70m deep, although its south edge was partly truncated by the later pit 25. On the north side of the pit was a socket approximately 0.1m deep and 0.4m long, which may have served for revetting of the pit. The fill (24) was a relatively homogenous dark brown silty sand, with occasional discrete pockets of yellow sand; pottery, bone and ceramic building material (CBM) were recovered from the fill. The CBM comprised flooring and wall brick as well as peg tile, two fragments of which had glaze splashing. The pit probably represents secondary disposal rubbish, which included kiln furniture.
To the southwest of pits 28 and 23 was pit 63 (Fig. 3; 4, S 5; 6), which extended beyond the edge of the excavation area. The north side was straight-edged, whereas the northeast side was characterised by a ledge in the lower third, which might indicate a recut, or that the pit was in some way revetted or lined to prevent collapse and to enable materials to be stocked within it. The lowest fill (66) was characterised by dark brown, dark yellow, white and reddened and blackened dumps of sands, with flooring brick, pottery and bone, tipping from the northeast to southwest. This may well represent the cleaning of a kiln. This was overlain by a dump of mortar containing peg tile and pottery (65). The uppermost fill (64) consisted of a sequence of microstratified bands of reddened and blackened sands,
10 NW SE NE SW 187.57 NE SW (69) (1) (1) (35) 68 34 188.18 (44) (44) 188.18 (44) 188.18 (45) (55) (57) (47) 46 (53) (59) (59) (73) 46 60 74 (49) (50) 54 (50) 60 (50) 52 56 Section 1 48 39 (70) Section 2 (3)
NNW SSE NNW SSE 187.64 187.68 White sand Yellow sand (27) (24) (26) Black red sand (76) 25 Black brown sand 23 Clay lump 28 Section 4 (31) Section 3
NE SW NW SE 187.74 187.60 Modern (70) Clay-rich (51) 38 (64) White mortar rich deposit 52 (71) (38) (65) Yellow sand 72 Red sand (40) Brown sand (67) Black red Mixed sand and mortar (3) (66) Black Section 6 63 0 2.5 m Section 5
John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report as well as dark brown and yellow sands, and clean white sands, with peg tile, wall and flooring brick; the peg tile exhibited partial lead glazing. The, albeit small, assemblage of tile and brick is indicative of their having been used as kiln furniture.
South of pit 28 and east of pit 63 was a group of intercutting pits 72, 41, 52 and 39 (Figs. 3; 4, S 2 and S 6; 7). The earliest of the pits, pit 41, was a large, probably square cut, which extended beyond the south edge of excavation. It measured 2.5m by at least 2m and was 1.1m deep. The initial backfilling of pit 41 comprised a compact layer of pale grey mortar with CBM and charcoal flecking, and some occasional small stone (67), measured between 0.67m and 0.20m thick, which tipped from the northwest to the southeast. This deposit, which may well be associated with lime-burning or kiln demolition, was sealed by a very compact dark grey brown loamy clay silt with iron pan, sandy pockets and charcoal flecking (40). Peg tile, ridge tile, brick, occasional bone, and many small sherds of Brill/Boarstall Ware were recovered from the fill.
The pit 52, which cut pit 41, was a much shallower feature measuring a maximum of 0.6m deep. It measured 1.60m by more than 2m, extending into the western edge of the excavation area. The fill was loose yellow sand, with brown sandy silt mottling and occasional small stone (51). No finds were recovered from the fill. The deposit may well represent sand tempering for pottery production, which has been contaminated with more humic soil, although this could not be demonstrated conclusively. Pit 52 cut the garden soil (47)/(59).
The pit 72 more than likely cut pit 52. It was not absolutely clear, as pit 72 itself was heavily truncated by the later pit 39, and only seen in section as a remnant feature. It appears to have been a straight- sided, relatively flat-bottomed cut, which was filled with clean yellow white sand (71), which may well represent the remains of a pit for the storage of sand for tempering pots.
The pit 39 was cut through the three earlier pits 41, 52 and 72. It too was a squared cut measuring 1.5m by more than 1.4m and 0.85m deep. The sides were initially straight, but at a depth of 0.20m there was a break of slope of 45° to the base, which was relatively flat. The fill (38) comprised a very compact dirty white chalk and mortar deposit with moderate charcoal and lumps of raw clay. Only a little pottery was recovered from it. A compact dump of greenish brown clay, with some chalk, charcoal and CBM flecking (70) overlay (38). This deposit was between 0.01m and 0.40m thick, tipping from northwest to southeast.
Cut into the top of pit 52 was a shallow scoop 46, which measured 1.47m (northwest/southeast) and 0.16m deep, with a gentle rounded base, was filled with mid to dark grey brown sandy loam, chalk and comminuted CBM (57)/(45).
19th-century (Figs. 3 & 7) A layer of garden soil (2)/(44) sealed the scoop 46 (Figs. 3; 4, S 2; 6). Nineteenth-century pottery was recovered from the deposit, which was 0.15-0.20m thick. Cut through the garden soil (44) were a number of pits. In the central area of excavation, the pit 25, which cut the earlier pit was a roughly trapezoidal cut, measuring 1.5m by 0.85m and 0.52m deep. It had straight sides and a relatively flat base, filled with dark brown silty sand (26). Pottery, bone and some residual kiln furniture were present in the fill.
There were three other 19th century pits, seen in section, which all cut (44). Pit 54 was filled with dark grey loam (53), and was cut by pit 56, filled with black brown loam (55) (Fig. 3 S.2). Southwest of these two pits was pit 74, filled with black clay loam (73). No dating was recovered from any of these pits.
Undated During the evaluation several undated features, 13, 15 and 17 (not illustrated), were seen in section and investigated. No further dating was recovered from them during the excavation. As the pits were cut through the uppermost part of the garden soil, they were probably 19th century in date. The scoop 11 was not identified during the excavation.
11 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
DISCUSSION The archaeological results indicate residual prehistoric, some 13th century activity, and two main phases of interest in the late 15th and mid 16th centuries, followed by abandonment until the 19th century. Flint flakes attest to activity at Brill hill in early prehistory. Although some 13th century activity is evidenced it is inconclusive, comprising two postholes or small pits. During the 15th and 16th centuries the site was used for pottery production. After the latter part of the 16th century the site appears to have been left as garden space, and only in the 19th century was any further activity carried out. The prehistoric activity, the 13th and the 19th-century features do not form part of this discussion.
The group of postholes, which form the workshop located in the northeast corner of the site, lacked any associated floor surface. This is possibly due to the marked bioturbation observed during machining, although as Moorhouse (1981, 105) notes it is a common feature of such workshops to leave very ephemeral traces if any, as in most cases, any floor would no doubt have been a beaten or worn earth surface. It is more than likely that such a timber structure would have been clad with weatherboards, rather than a more permanent brick or stone structure (see McCarthy & Brooks 1988, Fig. 11 No.4; but also Zeepvat et al 2009). The structure, which measured at least 4m by 3.6m, extended beyond the edges of excavation, toward the location of the kilns excavated by Cocroft (1985), which were less than 20m away.
Although Cocroft dated the kilns excavated to the 17th century, the use-life of the site is unknown: Cocroft (1985, 72) also reported the memory of a third kiln at the site revealed sometime in the late 1910s. Moreover, the dating of kiln 1 was based on a James I coin of 1612 and waster material dating from 1722 within kiln 2. A ceramic mug was found in a niche in kiln 1, but may be intrusive, which given the proximity of kiln 2, is possible. The potential life-span of kilns is currently estimated c. 20 years – although possibly up to 60 years (Stopford 1993, 100); in which case an earlier date is very possible, and may well be broadly contemporary with the later material from 7 & 9 Temple St.
Clearly, however, it is not easy to demonstrate that the structures recorded by Cocroft are necessarily associated with the pits reported here, as the brick dimensions do not readily correspond: Cocroft (1985, 72) gives dimensions of 57mm x 110mm x 205mm, whereas those, albeit incomplete, dimensions from 7 & 9 Temple St are 50mm x 115mm; the length is unknown. However, further, somewhat circumstantial, evidence of a proposed late 15th century kiln being located to the northeast, is adduced from the tiplines in some of the early pits (i.e. pit 34), which indicate that they are being filled from the east, as too is evidenced in some of the later pits (i.e. pit 63).
Moreover, these discrete and well-defined tiplines point to a reasonably close source for the back- filling material; were the source at any significant distance, we should not unreasonably expect the deposit to be quite homogenous as the kiln cleaning material became mixed and sorted during carriage to the pits. The defined nature of relatively small discrete deposits suggests buckets or barrows of waste, rather than carts, which a distance of a couple of hundred metres would be more likely to entail. It therefore seems likely that Cocroft’s unreported kiln 3, if not kiln 1, was associated with the late 15th – early 16th century kiln debris reported above.
The pits excavated at 7 & 9 Temple St are evidenced in both the historical and archaeological records (Plot 1686; Yeoman 1988; Moore 2005). Robert Plot, writing in 1686, comments on the preparation of the potter’s clay: “neither of which clays or Slips must have any gravel or Sand in them; upon this account, before it be brought to the wheel they prepare the clay by steeping it in water in a square pit, till it be of a due consistence”, which while relating specifically to the Staffordshire potteries are more than likely indicative of a general practice.
The natural Whitchurch Sand at Brill does not hold water and would therefore require a caulked revetment within the pits to hold the potting clay prior to it being ready for use. The sockets observed in the pit-edges and base of at least one of the cuts may well be indicative of such an internal coffer structure for the pits. Yeoman when excavating at the adjacent site observed vertical-sided, flat- bottomed pits, although those which he reports (Yeoman 1988, 126-8), are characterised by ‘homogenous unitary fillings of pot and tile’ (Yeoman 1988, 127) and clay lumps (ibid), but do not appear to be as regularly shaped as those investigated at 7 & 9 Temple St.
It is apparent that the recently excavated pits were in the final stage of their use-life used for dumping material following firings. Pit 34 in particular evidences saggars, brick and tile, unfired clay, reddened
12 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report and blackened sands as well as the cleaning away of mortared kiln floors. Yeoman (1988, 129) observed moreover where the brick floor was not mortared the bricks were splashed with glaze (see also Smith 2005). The glaze-splashed flooring bricks recovered from 7 & 9 Temple St indicate that the backfilling of the pits can be associated with kiln refurbishment.
An evaluation on land adjacent to The Pheasant, Windmill St (Moore 2005), which is close to 40 Windmill St (Farley 1979) (Fig. 1 12 and 13), revealed similar evidence of straight-sided and flat- bottomed pits with sandy fills and mixed assemblages of roof, ridge and floor tile, and brick dating from the late 15th or early 16th centuries. Although some of the tile and brick is identified as over-fired and poorly glazed, ‘The other has spots of splash-glaze, but these are very inconsequential – they could hardly have shown on a finished roof – and may therefore be accidental’ (Smith 2005, 10), it may well be that rather than this being the product of a brick and tile works – which would be an unusual (see Moorhouse 1981, 108 and Drury 1981, 132, on the closeness of the tile and pottery industries; also Farley & Lawson 1990), though not impossible, combination – it is instead a further example of the yard of a workshop to a kiln, the cleaning out of which resulted in burnt and distorted tile and brick being dumped in pits formerly used for clay processing, as at 7 & 9 Temple St. That some of the tile had traces of mortar still present only further indicates the strong probability of this being rubble associated with maintenance of a kiln following firing. Furthermore unfired clay was also recovered from the pit fills. The site was quarried for sand shortly after the 16th century.
While it is possible that these square, straight-sided pits might be associated with quarrying for sand, the author does not accept such an interpretation, as elsewhere at Brill, quarrying has tended to follow the more traditional route of opencast quarrying, as evidenced both on the periphery (Fig. 1 21-27), as well as in the village itself (Fig. 1 12 and 19).
Paul Blinkhorn (see below) has proposed a re-dating of the kilns excavated by Farley (1979) and associated the previous excavations at Temple St, (Yeoman 1988) with those at 7 & 9 Temple St. The results of the recent work carried out at 7 & 9 Temple St suggest that the 17th-century date proposed for the kiln at 40 Windmill St was too late and that it could be drawn back into the late 15th – early 16th centuries. The results from Yeoman’s excavation at Temple St in 1983 accord well with the material from 7 & 9 Temple St, however, the excavations are approximately 200m distant from one another. This would seem to indicate that a direct relationship between the kiln-site (Yeoman 1988) and this workshop area is tenuous, although were clearly operating within a similar time-frame. Later map evidence suggests that there may well have been at least one yard, if not several, between Prosser’s Yard and Yeoman’s Temple St site.
The New College map of 1591 shows little of the northern end of the village, nor does it show the line of Windmill St, which was clearly producing pottery from at least a century earlier. This does not assist with any understanding of the putative development of an industrial quarter at Brill in the early post-medieval period. However, the Ordnance Survey First Series of 1833 (Fig. 2) indicates several apparently open yards to the north of Temple St and east of Windmill St, both of which evidence buildings fronting onto the streets.
The present internal layout to the rear of these buildings is very much broken up with, largely, 20th century and later development. However, it is apparent that in the early 19th century there were what appear to be yards, including one which would appear to be that where Yeoman excavated in 1983, as well as Prosser’s Yard (Cocroft 1985). It should be noted that watching briefs carried out on the east side of Temple St (Lowe 2004; Pine & Mundin 2007) revealed only limited archaeological remains, only the former of which indicated the possible presence of pottery production (Fig. 1 17).
The earliest pottery industry at Brill appears to be that identified by Jope and Ivens (1981, 35), just predating the first indications of the 13th-century industry, and which is argued to find its roots in the West Country (Jope and Ivens 1981, 35; Mellor 1994, 114, 132). The evidence for the movement of goods and services between manors, such as that in Hampshire between manors owned by the Bishops of Winchester (Hare 1991) or between burgesses and manors owned by Deerhurst Priory (VCH 1988), can be paralleled throughout England. Such a policy of the transfer of goods and services would not only explain the Bristol region origin of Brill/Boarstall as proposed by Jope and Ivens (1981) and Mellor (1994) but may well indicate a possible source for the lead used in the pottery industry.
13 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
North of Bristol lies Kingswood, where a number of lead-ore outcrops are available. The main royal manor here was in the manor of Barton Regis, which encompassed the city of Bristol. Lead extracted from Kingswood may well have provided the Bristol and Bath potteries with the raw material for glaze. Certainly during the 17th century lead ore - galena – sources in Bristol itself, such as Pen Park Hole (Mullan 1993) were being explored for exploitation. As Jope and Ivens (1981, 34) note, while galena is less suitable for glazing than a prepared lead monoxide, the latter could be prepared by simply heating the galena. These sources are provided with access to the east below the Cotswold Ridge and the Bath to Cirencester road, leading to Oxford, as well as other important potteries such as Minety. Clearly, the Crown, as much as any lord of a manor, was of a mind to extract revenue to its best benefit. As is noted in the Historical and Archaeological Background (see Steve Yeates above) to this report, materials were shipped to Brill from the Forest of Dean by the Crown.
While the sources of galena remain unknown as yet, it is clear that further work on the Brill glazes, as a whole, is required in order to further understand the processes of medieval trade networks. Maureen Mellor (1994, 139) states that the finished products were ‘almost certainly… [moved] by middlemen, who collected the vessels from the potter’s workshops … and transported the goods to market’ (ibid), which in north Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire may well have also been tied into the distribution network for Pottersbury ware (ibid, 141). What is not clear is whether materials such as raw galena would form part of a regularised supply network or whether the distribution would be of a more ad hoc nature dependent on supply and demand, the former of course being in the gift of the lord of the manor in which it was extracted.
The manor was alienated from the king in 1337, although had been returned to Parliament as a borough only twenty years previously. Some years later, in the 1340s, the manor was granted to the de Moleyns family; in the early 15th century they were enfeoffed of the manorial estate. The role of manorial lords in the development of ‘industrial estates’ should not be underestimated (see Moorhouse 1981, 111). “The administrative organisation of land and people was based on the manor, a unit whose primary purpose was to extract revenue from both for the benefit of the lord.” (Taylor-Moore & Dyer 2007) was the principal governing medieval economic life; such a manorial origin for the Brill/Boarstall production would clarify the nature of the later industrial quarter proposed in the post-medieval research assessment (Green, Giggins & Welch 2007, 19).
Between the middle of the 13th century and the beginning of the 15th century money rents replaced labour service (Stopford 1992, 359), which accords with the diminishment of the Brill potting industry over the course of the 14th century when the Crown granted the manor to the de Moleyns (Mellor 1994, 139). The subsequent refocusing of the Brill industry within a possible ‘industrial quarter’ within the town, rather than on the outskirts may have been an attempt by the de Moleyns’ to kick-start what appears to have been a potentially dying industry (ibid).
While the manor was a royal estate the Brill pottery industry had enjoyed efflorescence, supplying Oxford and a number of centres within c. 20 miles of Brill (ibid). As a borough, those trading from it as burgesses would enjoy freedom from dues on goods traded in the borough, as well as the right to a land-holding (Dyer 2002, 145); Brill’s status as a borough, which is of uncertain origin, may well have functioned as a tax-break, to induce potters to move to the town. The burgess’ role was primarily commercial and was key to economic development through finance and credit (Bloch 1962, 353).
Royal patronage of the pottery industry at Brill (Mellor 1994, 132) would then be the reason for the earlier kiln sites having been located in what is now Brill Common, but which appears to have formed part of the same emparkment as the enclosure, marked ‘The Warren’ on the tithe map of 1853, on the east side of Brill. It is worth noting here that pottery was also produced in the former royal forest of Wychwood, a tradition that ‘may [have also] be[en] managed within a manorial estate, which would explain the confined nature of this ceramic industry’ (ibid, 148) – in stark contrast to that at Brill.
During the 14th century the influence of Brill/Boarstall wares had diminished, however by the 15th century, when the de Moleyns hold the manor, there are a number of new kilns, located away from Brill Common, within the town, centred on the north and west sides of Windmill St and Temple St, respectively. The apparent yards visible on the 1839 Tithe Map for Brill and the, roughly contemporary, Ordnance Survey First Series map may well be indicative of the refocusing of pottery production closer to the centre of Brill by the de Moleyns family after the middle of the 14th century.
14 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
It is possible that Sir John Fastolf’s development of Castle Combe (Hare 1991, 97-98), for example, while not necessarily providing a model, corresponded in intention with the de Moleyns development of Brill. Sir John Fastolfe acquired Castle Combe, Wilts., in 1409 and proceeded to develop the cloth industry there ‘placing considerable military orders for local red and white cloth’ (Rowley 1988, 201; also Hare 1991, 97-8), a process which has also been observed to have occurred in respect of manors in Hampshire held by the Bishops of Winchester where tile kilns appear to have been built under the aegis of the lord of the manor (ibid). While such industries were initially supported, with the products being shipped some distance where they were to be used, at the expense of more local facilities, it would appear that they were not supported indefinitely, and were expected to engage with local markets and generate a profit (ibid, 98).
The issue of seigneurial patronage observed at Castle Combe, is paralleled elsewhere across England, for example, the manor of Penn. The de la Penne family established a tradition of service at the royal court over the course of the 13th and 14th centuries, when Penn tiles were at the height of production, used at Windsor, the Tower, the Royal Palaces of Sheen and of Westminster (Green 2005, 127-9). It is not known the role of the de la Penne family in setting up the tile industry, and yet they would have been beneficiaries of fees, such as claygavel, and rents. Moreover, just as Sir John Fastolfe managed to turn state contracts to provide cloth, to his financial advantage, so too must it be expected of such as the de la Pennes, where they are providing access to goods and services. By way of contrast, it would appear that the Knights Templar sold the raw potter’s clay themselves at Heath End, Chilvers Coton (Mayes and Scott 1984, 34).
Nonetheless, such patterns of exploitation of a manor’s resources seem, historically, perfectly appropriate, where the revenue of a manor is for the economic benefit of the lord. It might not, then be a coincidence, that both Boarstall and Ludgershall, which are indicated as royal estates (Maxwell Lyte 1923, 874, 1358, 1373 (Boarstall); Illingworth and Caley 1812, 24, 46; Maxwell Lyte 1923, 874 (Ludgershall)), have both yielded evidence for pottery production (Farley 1982; Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003). The latter previously being the sole ‘manufactory of the period at this time’ (Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003, 139). A number of waster sherds and a saggar with a bright green glaze stacking scar evidence the production of ‘Tudor Green’ wares at 7 & 9 Temple St, also. The excavation at 7 & 9 Temple St has added to the known sources of ‘Tudor Green’ wares from the Brill/Boarstall production sites, forming a complementary late 15th century body of material to the earlier material from Ludgershall.
What appears to be clear from even such a cursory examination of the evidence is that by the late 15th and early 16th centuries the pottery industry in Brill itself has concentrated largely in the area north of Temple St and Windmill St. The earlier medieval industry, notwithstanding the possible kiln-site in the present allotments south of Church St, appears to have been largely concentrated on the north side of the town – a consequence of the prevailing wind, no doubt – but also perhaps due to the royal land- holding, where Brill Common now lies.
The site of what is today Brill Common, and which was in use during the 19th century for brick-making and previously between the 13th and 15th for pottery production has evidenced little in the way of late 15th to 18th century kilns. This would seem to indicate that in the early stages of production at Brill, clay extraction and firing – which necessitates the inference that pot production, also – were being carried out within the enclosed area of Brill Common. There is no evidence for a bank, which might be associated with the proposed emparked land of the Crown. There is a 13th century reference to the building of fences within Bernwood Forest (Maxwell Lyte 1905, 235), which may relate to assarting or to the erection of a pale. Were this to refer to the field known in the 19th century as ‘The Warren’, then it is possible that no bank was ever erected and that it was only ever fenced-in.
The 15th century witnesses a refocusing of the industry. Where previously it appears to have been driven by royal patronage, the enfeoffment of the de Moleyns family appears to have led to the development of an industrial quarter, as suggested in the ‘Post-Medieval’ section of the Thames-Solent Research Agenda (Green, Giggins & Welch 2007), within the centre of the present town. It would appear, however, that even during the earlier 13th and 14th century Crown manor industries, an industrial quarter was in operation on what is now Brill Common. However, the industry recovered from its later 14th century decline, although never enjoyed the same market-penetration. The excavation carried out at Prosser’s Yard (Cocroft 1985) and the evaluation on the south side of Windmill Street, to the rear of the Sun Inn, which produced traces of post-medieval pottery production,
15 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report including dumps of clay, pottery wasters and kiln furniture (Murray 2001) of a similar date, indicate that the early post-medieval concentration of kilns and pottery production within the town continued into the 18th century. Notwithstanding the kiln excavated by Farley (1979), brickmaking then seems to have been largely the focus of activities on the outskirts of the town, in the area of Brill Common, rather than pottery production.
The results of the excavation carried out 7 & 9 Temple St have proved significant in identifying the location of a workshop at Brill, dating from the 15th century and production pits reused to dump kiln waste, dating from the 15th and 16th centuries. Prosser’s Yard may also have been slightly larger than today, with areas within the yard being abandoned at times, or only being used above ground, as excavation suggested. The workshop identified was clearly a light structure, but there is no reason why there should not be more permanent structures similar to that found at Penn (Zeepvat 2009) as well elsewhere within the property. To the east of the site, fronting onto Temple St, a pair of 16th century houses (HER 1166800000; SP 65515 14031) contemporary with the 1977 kilns excavated by Cocroft form the street frontage to Prosser’s Yard.
Research indicates that Brill falls into a recognisable pattern of manorial exploitation, which although best evidenced there from the latter part of the 14th and early 15th centuries, found its roots in the earlier medieval period when the Crown enabled the development of the industry, possibly through its status as a borough. The results of the work at 7 & 9 Temple St indicate that further work needs to be carried out on the provenance of galena, through lead isotope analysis, and that the development of the pottery industry at Brill, which was already known to be polyfocal, is far more complicated than previously thought. Further work on the historical records might clarify the relationships between the manors and the kiln sites at Boarstall and Ludgershall to provide a comparative dataset to that at Brill.
FINDS POTTERY (Figs. 8 – 11) By Paul Blinkhorn
The pottery assemblage comprised 617 sherds with a total weight of 20,828g. The estimated vessel equivalent (EVE), by summation of surviving rimsherd circumference was 5.86. It mainly consisted of a group of manufacturing waste of probable late 15th – 16th date, with a large proportion of the assemblage comprising fragments of saggars, which appear to have been used in the firing of Cistercian ware saggars and ‘Tudor Green’-style cups or drinking jugs along with a single residual Romano- British sherd. A single, near-complete post-medieval bowl made up a significant part of the evaluation assemblage by weight.
The Fabrics The assemblage was recorded using the coding system of the Milton Keynes Archaeological Unit type- series (e.g. Mynard and Zeepvat 1992; Zeepvat et al. 1994), as follows:
MC1 (OXBK): Shelly Coarseware. AD1100-1400. 3 sherds, 32g. MS6: Potterspury Ware, AD1250 - 1600. 1 sherd, 22g, EVE = 0.07. MS9 (OXAM): Brill/Boarstall Ware. 1200-?1600. 469 sherds, 15,505g, EVE = 5.00. MSC1: Sandy and Shelly ware, late 11th – mid 13th century. 2 sherds, 82g. MSC 3 (OX234): Banbury ware, late 11th – late 14th century. 4 sherds, 48g. TLMS17: Brill/Boarstall Tudor Green type. 15th – early 17th century. 62 sherds, 836g, EVE = 1.39. PM5: Trailed slip-ware 17th century. 3 sherds, 108g PM8 (OXDR): Red Earthenware 16th – 19th century. 47 sherds, 3786g. PM15: Cistercian ware, AD1470-1550. 4 sherds, 11g. PM25: White Earthenware. Late 18th – 20th century. 3 sherds, 150g. PM28: English Stoneware. Late 17th C+. 1 sherd, 19g.
In addition, the following wares, not included in the Milton Keynes type-series, were noted:
OXY: Oxford ware: Late 11th – 14th century. Oxfordshire fabric OXY ((Mellor 1994)). Abundant sub-angular quartz with some rounded clay pellets and occasional polycrystalline quartz. Glazed tripod pitchers common. 10 sherds, 123g, EVE = 0.09.
OXAW: Early Brill/Boarstall ware, c AD1180 – 1250 (Mellor 1994). 7 sherds, 98g, EVE = 0.05.
16 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
The pottery occurrence by number and weight of sherds per context by fabric type is shown in Table 1. Each date should be regarded as a terminus post quem. Where necessary, the context-specific dating has been adjusted with reference to the stratigraphic matrix.
The bulk of the assemblage consists of manufacturing waste, particularly saggar fragments, from a late 15th – 16th century pottery manufactory. Earlier medieval pottery, probably of late 11th – 13th century date, is present in small quantities, but nearly all of it appears redeposited, and certainly most of the sherds of that date are somewhat abraded, which fits with such a scenario.
OVERVIEW: THE LATE MEDIEVAL BRILL/BOARSTALL POTTERY INDUSTRY The medieval and late pottery industry centred in and around Brill, and also the nearby villages of Boarstall and Ludgershall, is one of the most important in the south midlands. The products of these manufactories have a wide distribution, from the Thames Valley to Gloucestershire in the west and south Lincolnshire, Northamptonshire and Cambridgeshire in the east. The first of several known medieval kilns at Brill, dated to the 13th and 14th centuries, were excavated over 50 years ago (Jope 1954), and others since (eg. Ivens 1982); field survey has identified kilns at Boarstall (Farley 1982). Despite this, the manufactories of the late medieval (ie 15th – 16th century) industry had proved somewhat elusive, until a fairly large group of kiln waste of late medieval date was excavated at Ludgershall (Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003). There was no evidence of a kiln at the site, and saggars, which are numerous at this site, were entirely absent, despite fine ‘Tudor Green’-style mugs and cups comprising a sizeable portion of the assemblage. Cistercian ware, which was made at the 7 & 9 Temple St site, was not noted in any quantity amongst the Ludgershall material. The lack of saggars and Cistercian ware at Ludgershall seems likely to be related to chronology; saggars only appear to have been first used in the manufacture of Cistercian ware (McCarthy and Brooks 1988, 45), so it seems likely that the Ludgershall material, dated to the mid-late 15th century (Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003, 133-4) is slightly earlier than the manufacturing waste from this site.
Previous excavations at Temple Street in 1983 (Yeoman 1988) produced both saggars and Cistercian ware cups (Hurman 1988), and it seems very likely that the pottery manufacturing waste from this site is contemporary with that from the 1983 excavation. There is a documentary reference to a potter working in Temple Street dated to 1580 (McCarthy and Brooks 1988, 435), but this assemblage and that from the 1983 excavations appears earlier. The assemblage from the 1983 excavations was dated to the early 16th century, which appears perfectly reasonable given the range of vessels noted, and a similar date would fit this group.
A Suggested Re-dating of a ‘Post-Medieval’ kiln from Windmill Street, Brill A kiln and corresponding manufacturing waste was excavated at 40 Windmill Street in Brill in 1974, and another at Tram Hill in 1975 (Farley 1979). They produced a range of vessel types, including fairly large quantities of saggars, but only the 1974 kiln produced any evidence of Cistercian ware production, and then very little, which was noted at the time (ibid. 142), despite the fact that these were the only vessels found which would have been small enough to fit into the saggars. A similar picture is seen here; only one sherd of Cistercian ware was recovered from the site, but it was a complete base, fused to the roof of a saggar, leaving no doubt that such pottery was fired using these vessels. One can only conclude that the lack of Cistercian ware is due to very low wastage rates brought about by the protection the saggars offered in the kiln.
Farley tentatively dated the 1974 kiln and its products to the early 17th century on the basis of a piece of clay pipe-stem which was found in the stoking area, although he did not rule out that it may have been intrusive. Certainly, with the benefit of 35 years’ hindsight and a lot more evidence from more recent excavations, it appears that a date of the late 15th – early 16th century may be more appropriate, and that the clay pipe was indeed intrusive. The kiln was built of bricks of similar size and date to those noted here, ie 15th – early 17th century (Peachy, this report), the saggars are of a similar form to those from an early 16th century Cistercian ware kiln at Potterton in Yorkshire (Farley 1979, 134), and the main vessel forms (pancheons, jars/cisterns, and small jugs) is generally similar to those from this site. A few other vessel forms, particularly two fragments of chafing dishes, were noted which were not present here. Such vessels are generally post-medieval in date, but fragments of Brill examples have been noted in Oxford in contexts as early as the late 15th century (eg. Mellor 1994, Fig. 54 no. 15). Another extremely rare Brill vessel type, a costrel, was also noted amongst the waste from the 1974 kiln. Very few parallels for this exist, but a fragment of such a vessel occurred in Oxford, in a 15th century context (Mellor 1994, Fig. 55 no. 11), and another occurred in the city in a deposit dated to the late 15th century
17 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
(ibid. Fig. 67, no 8). Lugs from a probable costrel were also present amongst the kiln waste from Ludgershall (Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003, Fig. 4 no. 22). Thus, the clay pipe aside, there seems little to suggest that the 1974 kiln and its products date to any later than the early-mid 16th century, and could comfortably be as a early as the late 15th century.
The dating of the 1975 kiln and its products at Tram Hill could perhaps also benefit from reconsideration. Farley (1979, 134) noted that the range of products appears later than those of the 1974 manufactory, and this observation certainly appears true. However, his date of late 17th century for the 1975 kiln appears a little late, primarily on the grounds there was a complete lack of slipware from the site. If the re-dating of the 1974 kiln is accepted, the 1975 kiln, which produced some evidence for Blackware production, a number of saggars and some fairly typical early post-medieval vessels such as large bowls and handled jars (‘chamber pots’), could comfortably be dated to the late 16th – early 17th century, if not even a few decades earlier. .
THE ASSEMBLAGE
The Saggars As noted, a large proportion of the manufacturing waste from this site comprises saggars, simple vessels used in the kiln to contain fragile pots such as cups during the firing process. In the past, groups of saggars have been noted at Brill, particularly during the excavation of kilns at Windmill Street and Tram Hill (Farley 1979, Figs. 9, 12 and 15). These were originally dated to the 17th century, but it is argued above that a date of the early 16th century is probably more appropriate, and thus they are broadly contemporary with the material from this site. They will be regarded as such in this report.
There are two main groups of saggars, from contexts [35] and [49], and while they are likely to be contemporary, there does appear to be differences in terms of size and style. The saggars from context [35] have a mean rim diameter of 204.4mm, those from [49] have a mean diameter of 175.0mm. The rim diameter occurrence shows a very difference size distribution pattern; those from context [35] favour the larger size, whereas those from [49] favour the smaller examples, with vessels with rim diameters greater than 180mm entirely absent (Fig. 8 and 9). In both cases, this is very different to the size distribution of the saggars from the Windmill Street kiln, which saw two favoured size ranges, the primary peak being around 120-140mm, and a secondary one around 180-200mm (Farley 1979, Fig. 9). However, when the data is combined for all the saggars from this site, a broadly similar pattern to that from Windmill Street emerges (Fig. 10). Only one saggar could be constructed to a full profile (Fig. 11 no. 3), although this and the fragments of other vessels suggest that one type was relatively squat and other fairly tall, with the squat examples having rounded cut-outs to allow the kiln gases to flow freely, while the cut-outs on the taller vessels were long and squared (e.g. Fig. 11 nos. 4 and 5). Some of the rims from what appears to be the squat saggars have shallow cut-aways on the rim (eg. Fig 11 no. 6).
The bases also seem to reflect this pattern, and so it seems likely that the two dumps of waste represent either two different kilns, or two different production phases. Given that the saggars are likely to have been used to fire the Cistercian ware vessels, which are relatively squat, it may be that one sort was used for these, and the taller, narrower saggars for drinking jugs. A single small rimsherd from a Brill ‘Tudor Green’ drinking jug was noted in context [20], and handles from three vessels of this type were present in contexts [35] and [49], along with a number of bodysherds which appear likely to be from such vessels (eg. Fig. 12 nos. 10 & 11). One saggar base has a complete Cistercian ware cup base attached (Fig. 11 no. 1) and another (Fig. 11 no. 2) has a stacking scar with bright green glaze on it, and is from a ‘Tudor Green’-type vessel, also probably a cup
18 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
70
60
50
40
30
20
10
0 121-140 141-160 161-180 181-200 201-220 221-240
Figure 8. Saggar rim diameter, in EVE, per 20mm diameter class, context 35
60
50
40
30
20
10
0 121-140 141-160 161-180 181-200 201-220 221-240
Figure 9. Saggar rim diameter, in EVE, per 20mm diameter class, context 49
120
100
80
60
40
20
0 121-140 141-160 161-180 181-200 201-220 221-240
Figure 10. Saggar rim diameter, in EVE, per 20mm diameter class, all contexts
In all cases, the outside of the ‘base’ of each saggar was thickly covered in glaze (Fig. 11 nos. 1,2 , 4 & 5), many with scars where pots had stuck during firing, showing that the vessels were used open-side down, and placed over the vessels, rather than the vessels being placed within them, as covers rather than containers. Many of the rims also had similar ‘sticking-marks’.
The Pottery The pottery assemblage comprised a mixture of late medieval Brill-type earthenwares and ’Tudor Green’ type vessels, along with a small quantity of earlier medieval material, most of which dated to the late 11th – 13th centuries, and was redeposited. This is similar to the pattern observed in the material from the evaluation excavation and suggests that the site was lightly occupied from not long after the Norman Conquest until the 13th century, and then abandoned until it became utilized for potting in the 15th century.
19 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
The kiln waste, saggars aside, show that the production at 7 & 9 Temple Street comprised a mixture of jars (eg. Fig. 11 no. 7), large bowls or pancheons Fig.11 nos. 8 & 9) and ‘Tudor Green’ drinking jugs and cups (Figs. 11 nos. 10 & 11). It is possible that some of the jar rims are from cisterns, but bungholes were entirely absent from the assemblage from here, despite being present at the Windmill Street, Ludgershall and the 1983 Temple Street kiln. Another typical late medieval form, which was not noted amongst this assemblage, was the bifid-rim jar. These were present at Ludgershall and the 1983 Temple Street kiln. Such rims occur in Oxford from the late 14th century onwards (Mellor 1994, Fig. 52 nos. 31-3).
Brill Vessel Rims (by EVE):
Jars = 0.60 (30.5% of the rim assemblage) Pancheons = 0.98 (49.7%)
Brill ‘Tudor Green’ Rims:
Jugs = 0.16 (8.1%) Cups = 0.23 (11.7%)
The assemblage here is considerably smaller than that from Ludgershall, and so detailed analysis is not possible, but some general trends are worthy of note. The proportions of Brill vessel types shows some differences to those observed at Ludgershall (Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003, Table 1). Jugs are far less common here; such vessels comprised around 50% of the Brill-type vessel assemblage at Ludgershall. Jars/cisterns are present in roughly the same proportion, as are cups, but pancheons are much more common here, but made up only around 20% of the rim assemblage from Ludgershall. At the 1974 Windmill Street kiln, bowls and jars/cisterns each comprised around one-third of the identifiable vessel types, with jugs making up around 15%.
Although the assemblage is very small, both the jugs and the large bowls from this site have a very similar size-range to that from Ludgershall, with the bowl rims clustering around the 300-320mm diameter range, and the jugs around 120mm (Blinkhorn and Saunders 2003, Figs 6 and 7).
20
John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Table 1: Pottery occurrence by number and weight (in g) of sherds per context by fabric type.
RB MC1 OX234 OXY OXAW MSC1 MS6 MS9 TLMS17 PM15 PM8 PM5 PM28 PM25 Date Ctx No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt No Wt 0 5 381 1 77 U/S 2 1 18 1 12 1 22 8 74 6 2802 1 31 1 143 19thC 3 1 22 2 40 4 32 L15thC 5 1 1 13thC?? 7 2 10 3 30 15 101 1 1 L15thC 9 1 5 10 1 7 2 24 1 4 20 2 11 12 93 6 18 2 6 M16thC 24 23 324 4 11 5 60 M16thC 26 5 39 2 16 6 208 2 77 1 19 2 7 19thC 27 10 75 M16thC 30 10 363 1 32 1 15 L15thC 31 2 45 12 114 1 14 6 172 M16thC 33 2 19 L15thC? 35 144 6891 10 136 L15thC 38 6 46 2 11 7 62 M16thC 40 124 692 26 67 4 11 M16thC 42 5 83 L15thC 49 57 5749 3 494 L15thC 50 3 40 7 80 L15thC? 64 3 55 8 143 M16thC 65 1 98 L15thC 66 2 36 2 5 L15thC 67 8 79 5 241 M16thC 69 3 27 1 17 2 82 4 76 2 26 L15thC Total 1 7 3 32 4 48 10 123 7 98 2 82 1 22 469 15505 60 831 4 11 47 3786 3 108 1 19 3 150
21 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
The Ceramic Building Materials Andrew Peachey
Excavation recovered a total of 306 fragments (52.5kg). A representative sample of the ceramic building materials (CBM) comprising 188 fragments (22180g) was analysed by Andrew Peachey of Archaeological Solutions. For ease of reference within the report, brick and tile is referred to as CBM. It had been almost entirely deposited in late 15th to mid 16th century pits, with a notable concentration in pit 34, from layer (35), which accounts for 51.1% of the assemblage by weight (Table 2). The CBM is in a fragmented but only slightly abraded condition and almost certainly represents material discarded from a nearby kiln either as waster material or after being used as kiln furniture. The CBM includes fragments of peg tile, ridge tile, brick and flooring brick, which are outlined below, and are consistent in dimensions and character with the 15th to 16th century chronology provided by the pottery.
Date of Feature Type & No. of Fragment Count Weight (g) Features Late 15th century Pit F34 (35) 66 11330 Late 15th century 4 Pits 15 789 Mid 16th century 6 Pits 96 9492 19th century 1 Pit 11 569 Total 188 22180 Table 2: Quantification of analysed CBM by feature type and date
The CBM was quantified by fragment count and weight (g) with fabrics examined at x20 magnification. Any extant dimensions and decoration were recorded, and all data was entered into a Microsoft Excel spreadsheet that forms part of the site archive.
The Fabrics A single fabric, Fabric 1, defined all the CBM in the assemblage although the degree of coarseness was noted to vary in some examples according to form (Fabrics 1a and 1b). The fabric identified for the CBM is comparable to the variants previously identified for late 15th to 16th century tiles from Brill (Lilley 1988, 144) and also to finer fabrics used for early post-medieval Brill pottery (Farley 1988, 137).
Fabric 1: The intended product appears as oxidised red (2.5YR 5/4-5/8) throughout with the core fractionally darker than the surfaces, although un-fired fragments may be a pale brown and over-fired fragments a dark red, sometimes with a reduced core. Inclusions comprise common sub-angular/rounded quartz (generally <0.2mm, occasionally to 0.5mm), sparse red and white clay pellets/grog (0.5-5mm), sparse haematite (0.25-1mm, occasionally larger) and sparse to occasional streaks of white clay. Fabric 1a: As Fabric 1 but with coarser, sparse to common clay pellets and haematite (0.5-10mm). Used for bricks only. Fabric 1b: As Fabric 1 but with common to abundant quartz and only occasional clay pellets and haematite. Used for floor tiles only.
The Forms
Peg Tile Peg tile in Fabric 1 accounts for 122 fragments (11693g) of the CBM assemblage or 64.9% (52.7%) and is near ubiquitous in contexts that contained CBM, although the largest concentration was in pit 34, layer (35), with slightly smaller concentrations in pit 41, layers (40) and (67), as well as pit 63, layers (64) and (65). No peg tile survives complete but the fragments present have a reconstructed width of 160-170mm and a thickness of 15-18mm, with a sanded base and two circular peg holes in the corners at one end. The peg holes (diameter 15mm) were formed before the tile was fired and taper towards the base. The dimensions of the peg tile match the late 15th to 16th century examples produced in the kiln on Temple Street (Lilley 1988, 145), where it was noted the measurements conformed to a 1477 statute to standardise tile production (Salzman 1952, 233). Similar peg tile was also recorded in the mid 17th century kilns at Prosser’s Yard (Cocroft 1985, 79).
None of the peg tile in the assemblage appears to have been used for roofing, and appears to represent CBM discarded after being used in the structure of a nearby kiln, or waster material that broke during the firing of a nearby kiln. In the kilns at Temple Street and Prosser’s Yard it was noted that the peg tile was used as spacers and to rest pottery upon (while remaining as a product itself). The peg tile in this assemblage, notably in pit 34, layer (35), displays several traits that suggest this was the case, including numerous fragments with splashes or drips of lead glaze from deliberately glazed vessels, under and over-fired fragments, partially oxidised surfaces due to stacking, and a single fragment with
22 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report a partial circular impression where a pottery vessel or saggar may have been stacked on the un-fired tile.
Ridge Tile
Ridge tile accounts for 12 fragments (1099g) of the assemblage, with the bulk of these fragments contained in pit 34, layer (35). The ridge tile was 15-18mm thick and has a sanded base from the manufacturing (moulding) process. Similarly manufactured ridge tile was recorded in the late 15th to 16th century kiln at Temple Street (Lilley 1988, 145), but there was no evidence for any crested tiles in this assemblage.
Brick
A total of 37 fragments (6762g) of brick in Fabric 1a were present in the assemblage, the bulk contained in pit 34, layer (35). Surviving dimensions include a width of 115m and a thickness of 50mm. Other characteristics include a flat base, slightly rounded arrises and often faint pressure marks or sunken margins where the brick was pressed into a mould. These characteristics are typical of bricks manufactured between the 15th and early 17th centuries (‘Tudor Place Bricks’). ‘Rectangular’ brick, probably similar to these examples, was used in the kilns at Prosser’s Lane as part of the kiln structure and as kiln furniture (Cocroft 1985, 79).
Flooring Bricks
The assemblage includes 37 fragments (6762g) of 35-40mm brick with traces or remnants of a deliberately applied white-grey or blue-grey lead glaze on their upper surface and sides. No further dimensions of these bricks survive, but they appear to have been manufactured as flooring bricks and have much sharper, regular edges than the traditional bricks outlined above. The bulk of these fragments: 17 fragments (4863g) were contained in pit 34, layer (35), associated with other probable kiln debris (peg tile, brick etc). Flooring bricks have not been identified in the CBM assemblages from any of the nearby kilns, although white-grey and blue-grey lead glazes were noted splashed onto peg and ridge tile at the Temple Street kiln (Lilley 1988, 148). These fragments may have been discarded as waster material after the glaze on the flooring bricks flaked away during firing.
23 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
BRTS09 (2009.30) Brill, Bucks CBM data Total Fabric 1 Fabric 1 Fabric 1a Fabric 1b CBM Form 1 Form2 Form 3 Form 4 Peg tile Ridge tile Brick Floor tile F L Date F W F W F W F W F W Comments 6 7 L15th C 1 18 1 18 \ 19 20 M16th C 9 476 8 440 1 36 \ 23 24 M16th C 10 787 8 503 1 242 1 42 2 fragments of peg tile exhibit splashes of glaze 25 26 19th C 11 569 9 401 2 168 1 fragment of peg tile has splashes of glaze 28 27 M16th C 3 218 3 218 \ 19 30 L15th C 4 53 4 53 \ 28 31 M16th C 16 465 12 355 4 110 \ 34 35 L15th C 66 11330 30 4762 8 891 17 4863 11 814 includes 2 fragments of peg tile with splashes of blue-grey glaze, 3 fragments of un-fired peg tile, 2 fragments of underfired peg tile, 1 fragments of peg tile with 'kiss marks' where it was stacked and not fired properly, and 1 fragment of overfired brick 39 38 M16th C 11 1138 6 722 3 156 2 260 \ 41 40 M16th C 7 176 5 110 1 52 1 14 \ 41 67 M16th C 17 2769 10 1810 7 959 \ 43 42 L15th C 3 72 1 27 2 45 \ 48 49 L15th C 7 646 7 646 (+3 fragments, 85g of organic (straw/grass) tempered daub, possibly kiln lining/furniture) 63 64 M16th C 16 1914 11 1031 2 423 3 460 4 fragments of pegtile have partial lead glaze, probably run-off (a fragment of pumice like lead glaze was also recovered) 63 65 M16th C 4 1243 4 1243 \ 63 66 M16th C 3 306 3 306 \ 188 22180 112 11693 12 1099 37 6762 27 2626
Fabrics Tile CBM Fabric 1: Oxidised red (2.5YR 5/4-5/8) throughout with the core fractionally darker than the surfaces. Inclusions comprise common sub-angular/rounded quartz (generally <0.2mm, occasionally to 0.5mm), sparse red and white clay pellets/grog (0.5- Context Fragments Weight (kg) Context Fragments Weight (kg) 5mm), sparse haematite (0.25-1mm, occasionally larger) and sparse to occasional streaks of white clay. 20 17 1 35 57 11 24 30 2 38 8 0.5 Fabric 1a: As Fabric 1 but with coarser, sparse to common clay pellets and haematite (0.5-10mm). Generally used for bricks. 27 8 0.5 64 7 1 Fabric 1b: As Fabric 1 but with common to abundant quartz and only occasional clay pellets and haematite. 35 101 17 65 16 3 38 43 2.5 66 7 1 Forms 64 68 4 67 18 3 Form 1: Peg tile. Flat tile (15-18mm thick, c.165-70mm wide) with two pre-firing circular peg holes (15mm wide, tapering to 67 27 6 Total 113 19.5kg base) in the corners at one end. Total 193 33kg Form 2: Ridge tile. Curved tile (15-18mm thick) Form 3: Brick. (?x115x50mm), flat base, slightly rounded arrises. May exhibit faint striations and/or pressure marks/sunken margins on upper surface. Form 4: Floor tile. Flat tile (35-40mm thick), Blue-grey glaze (appears greener were under-fired) on upper surface and sides, sharp edges
24 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Flint (By David Gilbert)
Five pieces of struck flint were recovered during the evaluation and excavation.
Two pieces were recovered from context (07) during both evaluation and excavation. The first was a blade measuring 35mm by 14mm by 2mm thick. It was a mid grey-brown in colour and had been snapped at the proximal end. The second was a broken flake or perhaps a scraper edge. This showed abrupt retouch along one edge and had been broken in antiquity and again more recently. It displayed a pale grey-white patina and measured 26mm by 5mm by 2mm thick.
Three pieces were recovered from the top of the natural. Heavy rooting and worm action in a soft sandy natural has meant that finds have moved within the soil matrix. The first was a blade, found during the evaluation that had been damaged in antiquity. It displayed a pale grey-white patina and measured 31mm by 9mm by 2mm thick. The other two pieces were recovered during the excavation, consisting of two secondary flakes, the first measuring 42mm by 28mm by 3mm thick with a pale grey- white patina. Some later damage had occurred to the proximal end. The second flake was broken and measured 35mm by 33mm by 2mm. It was a mid grey-brown in colour and had been trimmed at the proximal end.
Obviously with such a small assemblage it is difficult to accurately date the associated activity, but these pieces are likely to be Neolithic.
Appendix 1 Catalogue of sites in Fig. 1
Site BCAS NAME NGR ID HER (SP) 1 0071900000 Brill common, medieval clay pits (11th-18th C) 65500 14400 2 0568100000 Pond Walk Field, pot scatter: possible kiln? (11th-16th C) 6556 1427 3 0505800000 East of Temple Farm, sand pits (11th-16th C) 65930 14220 4 0057600000 Temple Farm 1953, kilns (13th-14th C) SAM 144 6566 1427 5 0439400000 Temple Farm 1978, kilns (14th C) SAM 144 6566 1427 6 0571200000 Adjacent to Magistrate’s court, kiln (14th) tile & pottery kilns 65596 14066 7 0567800000 Temple Farm 1989, sand pits, kiln remains (14th/15th C) 65644 14170 8 0247800000 Church St allotments 1978, wasters etc. kiln site (14th/15th C) 6548 1370 9 0567803000 58 Temple St, wasters & saggars (15th-16th C) 65626 14164 10 65520 14130 Temple St 1983, kilns (15th-16th C) 6554 1412 11 0988700000 7&9 Temple St, workshop & pits (15th/16th C) 12 0853200000 Land adj The Pheasant, Windmill St, pits (15th/16th C) 65326 14100 13 0212900000 40 Windmill St, 1974 kiln (15th/16th C) 65380 14070 14 0223500000 Tram Hill, 1975, kiln (16th/17th C) 65590 14230 15 0249900001 Well Close, pottery (16th – 17th C) 65830 13750 16 0676000000 West of Ludgershall Road, kiln (16th-18th C) 6555 1425 17 0848000000 28 Temple St, pits (17th C) 65553 14024 18 0215300000 Prosser’s Yard, kilns (17th/18th C) 65484 14038 19 1164701000 Land to the rear of the Sun Inn, wasters, kiln furniture, pits 6539 1400 (17th/18th C) 20 0448000000 Sails Cottage, kiln (18th C) 65200 14040 21 0905300000 North Hills, quarry pit (n.d.) 65191 14301 22 0905200000 E Temple Farm, quarry pit (n.d.) 65772 14257 23 0905400000 E of the Windmill, quarry pit (n.d.) 65223 14152 24 0905500000 Temple Manor House, quarry pit (n.d.) 65388 14195 25 0994300000 Rear Brae Hill Road, quarry pit (n.d.) 65293 14032 26 0905100000 South Hills, quarry pit (n.d.) 65097 13935 27 0905000000 South Hills, quarry pit (n.d.) 65113 13870 28 0231002000 Royal hunting lodge (Centroid) 65500 14000 29 0526600000 The Cage 65430 13750 30 0219600000 The Manor House, II*, possible site of medieval hunting 65330 13720 lodge 31 - Possible site of hunting lodge/manor 6542 1370 32 - Possible site of hunting lodge/manor 6564 1370
25 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Bibliography
Allen Brown, R, Colvin, H M and Taylor, A J 1963a The History of the King’s Work, volume 1: The Middle Ages (HMSO, London)
Allen Brown, R, Colvin, H M and Taylor, A J 1963b The History of the King’s Work, volume 2: The Middle Ages (HMSO, London)
Anon. 1833 Rotulus Cancellarii, vel Antigraphun Maqu’ Rotuli Pipæ de Tertio Anno Regn Regis Johannis (Record Commission, London)
Anon. 1983 ‘Archaeological notes from Buckinghamshire County Museum’, Recs Bucks. 25, 168-175
Anon. 1989 ‘Archaeological notes from Buckinghamshire County Museum’, Recs Bucks. 31, 226-233
Barlow, F 1962 The Life of Edward who rests at Westminster Medieval Texts Series
Bateson, FW 1966 Brill: A Short History (Brill Society, Brill)
Beckett, IFW 1985 The Buckinghamshire Posse Comitatus 1798 (Bucks Record Society, vol. 22)
Blinkhorn, PW and Saunders, MJ 2002/3 ‘A late 15th manufactory of the Brill/Boarstall pottery industry at Ludgershall, Buckinghamshire’ Medieval Ceramics 26/7, 131-141
Bloch, M 1962 Feudal Society (Routledge & Kegan Paul, London)
Broad, J and Hoyle, R 1997 ‘Bernwood: The Life and Afterlife of a Forest’ (University of Central Lancashire/Harris Papers 2, Preston)
Bucks RO 1591 Bucks Record Office: MaR/5/2, an early estate map of New College lands at Brill, dated late 16th-early 17th century, often given 1591
Bucks RO 1713 Bucks Record Office: Ma/27/4.T, estate map of 1713 with two additional alterations in 1756 and 1763
Bucks RO 1768 Bucks Record Office: Ma/27/2.T, estate map of the village of Brill
Bucks RO 1768b Bucks Record Office: Ma/27/1.T, estate map of Brill
Bucks RO1768c Bucks Record Office: Ma/27/3.T, estate map of Brill with editions of 1812
Bucks RO 1786 Bucks Record Office: Q/H/120, course of road alterations by Brill Manor
Bucks RO 1852-3 Bucks Record Office: Ref.63 A130/81, tithe map and apportionment
Bucks RO VD Bucks Record Office: D104/14-15, deeds
Clarke, AJ 1988 ‘Archaeomagnetic Dating’ in Yeoman 1988
Cocroft, WD 1985 ‘Two Post-Medieval pottery kilns and associated products from Prosser’s Yard, Brill, Buckinghamshire’ Recs Bucks 27, 72-93
Colvin, HM, Summerson, J, Biddle, M, Hale, JR, and Merriman, M 1982 The History of the King’s Works, volume 4, 1485-1660 (part II) (HMSO, London)
Drury PJ 1981 ‘The production of brick and tile medieval England’ in Crossley DW Medieval Industry CBA Research Report 40 126-142
Dyer, C 2002 Making A Living in the Middle Ages The People of Britain 850-1520 (YUP, Yale)
26 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Ekwall, E 1960 The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names (OUP, Oxford)
Farley, M 1979 ‘Pottery and pottery kilns of the post-medieval period at Brill, Buckinghamshire’ Post-Medieval Archaeology 13, 127-52
Farley, M 1982 ‘A Medieval Pottery Industry at Boarstall, Buckinghamshire’ Recs Bucks 24, 107-17
Farley, M 1990 ‘Archaeological Notes’ Recs Bucks 32 149
Farley, M., and Lawson, J., 1990 ‘A Fifteenth Century Pottery and Tile Kiln at Leyhill, Latimer, Buckinghamshire’ Recs Bucks 32 35-62
Gee, EA 1952 Oxford Masons: 1370-1530, The Archaeological Journal 109, 54-131
Green, D, Giggins, B & Welch, C 2007 Buckinghamshire: Post-medieval Draft Period Assessment, Solent Thames Historic Environment Research frameworks. URL: http://www.thehumanjourney.com/pdf_store/sthames/Bucks%20Post%20Medieval.pdf Accessed: 02/08/2010
Green, GW & Welch, FBA 1965 Geology of the Country around Wells and Cheddar (HMSO, London)
Green, M 2005 ‘Medieval Tile Industry at Penn’ Recs Bucks 45 115-160
Hammond, S 2009 ‘An Archaeological Evaluation on Land to the Rear of 7 & 9 Temple St, Brill, Buckinghamshire’ John Moore Heritage Services Unpublished Client Report
Hare, JN 1991 ‘The Growth of the Roof-tile Industry in Later Medieval Wessex’, Medieval Archaeology 35 86-103
Hunt, J, Bettridge, R and Toplis, A 2001 Index to Probate Records of the Archdeaconry Court of Buckingham 1468-1660 and the Buckinghamshire Peculiars 1420-1660 (Bucks Record Society, vol. 32)
Hurman, B 1988 ‘The Pottery’ in Yeoman 1988
Illingworth, W & Caley, J 1812 Rotuli Hundredorum Temp. Hen. III and Edw. I in Turr’ Land’ et in Curia Receptae Scaccurij Westm. Asservati., volume 1 (Record Commission, London)
Ivens, RJ 1981 ‘Medieval Pottery Kilns at Brill, Buckinghamshire’ Recs Bucks 23 102-106
Ivens, RJ 1982 ‘Medieval Pottery from the 1978 Excavations at Temple Farm, Brill’ Recs Bucks 24 144-70
Jope, EM, 1954 ‘Medieval Pottery Kilns at Brill, Buckinghamshire: Preliminary Report on Excavations in 1953’ Recs Bucks 16, 39-42
Jope, EM & Ivens, RJ 1981 ‘Some Early Products of the Brill Pottery, Buckinghamshire’ Recs Bucks 23, 32-38
Kellaway, GA & Welch, FBA 1993 Geology of the Bristol District (HMSO, London)
Latham, RE 1981 Dictionary of Medieval Latin from British Sources, fascicule II C (The British Academy/Oxford University Press, London)
Le Patourel, HEJ 1968 ‘Documentary evidence and the medieval pottery industry’ Medieval Archaeology 12, 101-126
Lilley, J.M. 1988 ‘The Tile’ in Yeoman 1988
Lipscomb, G 1847 The History and Antiquities of the County of Buckingham (J & W Robins, London)
27 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Lowe, J 2004 ‘28 Temple Street Brill An Archaeological Watching Brief’ Thames Valley Archaeological Services (unpublished client report)
Mawer, A & Stenton, FM 1925 The Place-Names of Buckinghamshire (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1901a Patent Rolls of the Reign of Henry III, AD 1216-1225 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, H C 1901b Calendar of the Close Rolls, Edward III, AD 1339-1341 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1903 Calendar of Charter Rolls, volume 1, Henry III, AD 1226-1257 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1905 Close Rolls of the Reign of Henry III, AD 1231-1234 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1911a Calendar of the Fine Rolls, volume 1, Edward I, AD 1272-1307 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1911b Calendar of the Patent Rolls, Henry V, volume 2, AD 1416-1422 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1912 Calendar of the Fine Rolls, volume 2, Edward II, AD 1307-1319 (HMSO, London)
Maxwell Lyte, HC 1923 Liber Feodorum: The Book of Fees commonly called Testa de Nevill, part 2, AD 1242-1293 (HMSO, London)
Mayes, P & Scott, K 1984 Pottery Kilns at Chilvers Coton, Nuneaton The Society for Medieval Archaeology Monograph Series No. 10
McCarthy, MR & Brooks, CM, 1988 Medieval Pottery in Britain AD900-1600 (Leicester University Press, Leicester)
Mellor, M 1994 ‘Oxford Pottery: A Synthesis of middle and late Saxon, medieval and early post- medieval pottery in the Oxford Region’ Oxoniensia 59, 17-217
Morris, J 1978 Domesday Book: Buckinghamshire (Phillimore, Chichester)
Moore, J 2005 An Archaeological Evaluation of Land Adjacent to The Pheasant, Windmill Street, Brill, Buckinghamshire John Moore Heritage Services (unpublished client report)
Moorhouse SA 1981 ‘The medieval pottery industry and its markets’ in Crossley DW Medieval Industry CBA Research Report 40 96-125
Mullan GJ 1993 ‘Pen Park Hole: A Reassessment’ Proc. Univ. Bristol Spelaeol. Soc., 1993 19 (3), 291- 311
Murray, J 2001 An Archaeological Evaluation: Land to the rear of the Sun Inn, Brill Hertfordshire Archaeological Trust (unpublished client report)
Mynard, DC 1984 ‘A medieval pottery industry at Olney Hyde’ Recs Bucks 26 56-85
Mynard, DC and Zeepvat RJ, 1992 Great Linford Bucks Archaeol Soc Monog Ser 3
Nicholls, FJ 1880 ‘Pen Park Hole. A Roman lead mine’ Transactions of the Bristol and Gloucestershire Archaeological Society 4 320-8
Pevsner, N & Williamson, E 1994 The Buildings of England: Buckinghamshire (Penguin, London)
28 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
Pine, J & Mundin A 2007 52 Temple Street Brill An Archaeological Watching Brief Thames Valley Archaeological Services (unpublished client report)
Plot, R 1686 The Natural History of Stafford-shire
Porter, S 1984 ‘The Civil War destruction of Boarstall’ Recs Bucks 26, 86-91
Reed, M (ed.) 1997 Buckinghamshire Glebe Terriers 1578-1640 (Bucks Record Society, vol. 30)
Round, JH (ed.) 1905 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Twenty-Third year of the Reign of King Henry the Second, AD 1176-1177’ Pipe Roll Society 26
Round, JH (ed.) 1910 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Twenty-Eighth Year of the Reign of King Henry the Second, AD 1181-1182’ Pipe Roll Society 31
Rowley, T The High Middle Ages 1200-1550 (Paladin, London)
Salter, HE 1917 ‘Cartulary of the Hospital of saint John the Baptist’ Oxford Historical Society 3
Salter, HE 1930 ‘The Boarstall Cartulary’ Oxford Historical Society 88
Salzman, LF 1952 Building in England down to 1540: a documentary history (Oxford University Press, Oxford)
Sheahan, JJ 1862 History and topography of Buckinghamshire: comprising a general survey of the county, preceded by an epitome of the early history of Great Britain, London (Longman, Green, Longman, and Roberts, London)
Smith TP 2005 ‘Ceramic Building Material’ in Moore 2005
Stenton, DM 1925 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Second year of the Reign of King Richard the First: Michaelmas 1190’ (Pipe Roll 36), Pipe Roll Series NS 1
Stenton, DM 1928 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Sixth year of the Reign of King Richard the First: Michaelmas 1194’ (Pipe Roll 40), Pipe Roll Society NS 5
Stenton, DM 1937 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Fourth year of the Reign of King John: Michaelmas 1202’ (Pipe Roll 48), Pipe Roll Series NS 15
Stenton, DM 1940 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Sixth year of the Reign of King John: Michaelmas 1204’ (Pipe Roll 50), Pipe Roll Series NS 18
Stenton, DM 1953 ‘The Great Roll of the Pipe for the Thirteenth year of the Reign of King John: Michaelmas 1211’ (Pipe Roll 57), Pipe Roll Society NS 28
Stevenson, J (ed.) 1858 Chronicon Monasterii de Abingdon Longman, Brown, Green, Longmans, & Roberts
Stopford, J 1992 ‘The organisation of the medieval tile industry’ Oxford Journal of Archaeology 11(3) 341-363
Stopford, J 1993 ‘Modes of production among medieval tilers’ Medieval Archaeology 37 93-108
Taylor-Moore, K. and Dyer, C. 2007 Medieval Buckinghamshire Draft Period Assessment (AD1066- 1540), Solent Thames Historic Environment Research frameworks. http://www.buckscc.gov.uk/assets/content/bcc/docs/archaeology/A_ST_Bucks_7%20Resourc e%20Assessment2_BucksMed.pdf Accessed 15/06/2010
VCH 1907 The History of the County of Oxfordshire, volume 2, London: Saint Catherine’s Press
29 John Moore HERITAGE SERVICES 7 & 9 Temple St., Brill BRTS 09 Excavation Report
VCH 1927 The History of the County of Buckinghamshire, volume IV, London: Archibald Constable
VCH 1988 ‘Medieval Gloucester: 1066 – 1327’, A History of the County of Gloucester: Volume 4: The City of Gloucester (1988), pp. 13-18. URL: http://www.british- history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=42269 Date accessed: 02 August 2010.
Welch, FBA, Crockall, R and Kellaway, GA 1948 British Regional Geology: Bristol and Gloucester District (2nd edition) (HMSO, London)
Williams, A & Martin, GH 1992 Domesday A Complete Translation Penguin London
Yeoman, PA, 1988 Excavation of an early post-medieval kiln at Temple Street, Brill, 1983 Recs Bucks 30, 123-55
Zeepvat, R., (ed) 2009 Rose Cottage, Tylers Green: excavation of a 15th to 17th century tilery. Recs Bucks 49 189-218
Zeepvat, RJ, Roberts, JS and King, NA 1994 Caldecotte, Milton Keynes. Excavation and Fieldwork 1966-91 Bucks Archaeol Soc Monog Ser 4
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Thanks to Duncan Harding for commissioning the work; to BCAS for monitoring the fieldwork and post-excavation analysis; to my colleagues, Eoin Fitzsimons & Charlotte Haines for their work on site; to Paul Blinkhorn for providing invaluable discussion; to Paul Hughes & Eoin Fitzsimons for their work on the illustrations; to Stephen Yeates for his work on the historical background and invaluable discussion; and to John Moore for pressing forward the publication of this site.
30