Journal of Roman Pottery Studies
Journal of Roman Pottery Studies
V OLUME 17
Edited by
STEVEN WILLIS
Published by
for
The Study Group for Roman Pottery
Published in the United Kingdom in 2018 by
OXBOW BOOKS
The Old Music Hall, 106108 Cowley Road, Oxford, OX4 1JE
and in the United States by
OXBOW BOOKS
1950 Lawrence Road, Havertown, PA 19083
Oxbow Books and the individual authors 2018
ISSN: 0958-3491
Paperback Edition: ISBN 978-1-78570-934-0
Digital Edition: ISBN 978-1-78570-935-7 (epub)
Kindle Edition: ISBN 978-1-78570-936-4 (Mobi)
A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library
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Front cover: Pottery vessels from the site at Leybourne Grange, West Malling, Kent (see Paper 7)
Back cover: The back cover photographs show the processing of the Elms Farm, Heybridge, Essex, pottery assemblage in 1998 (see Editorial).
Top: Panorama view of the pottery processing room at Bocking Place, Braintree, Essex, in mid-summer 1998. The venue was then in use by Essex County Council Field Archaeology Unit. Photos: Joyce Compton, arranged by Lloyd Bosworth
Lower left: Joyce Compton holding a spouted strainer-bowl that was stratified in a mid-first century AD context. Photo courtesy of Joyce Compton
Lower right: Edward Biddulph gluing a cinerary urn from one of the second century cremation burials. Photo: Joyce Compton
Editorial Board of the Journal of Roman Pottery Studies
Dr Barbara Borgers University of Salzburg
Nicholas Cooper University of Leicester Archaeological Service
Dr Jerry Evans Barbican Research Associates
Dr Rien Polak Radboud University Nijmegen
Louise Rayner Archaeology South-East/UCL Institute of Archaeology
Dr Roberta Tomber Department of Science, The British Museum
Dr Peter Webster National Museum of Wales
Contributors to this Journal
E DWARD B IDDULPH
Oxford Archaeology
Janus House
Osney Mead
Oxford. OX2 0ES
J O C ARUTH
Suffolk Archaeology CIC
Unit 5, Plot 11 Maitland Road
Lion Barn Industrial Estate
Needham Market
Suffolk. IP6 8NZ
J ANE E VANS
Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service
The Hive
Sawmill Walk
The Butts
Worcester. WR1 3PD
E DGAR F ERNANDES
Praceta Dr Antnio Afonso Salavisa
N. 4, R/C Dt.
6000-426 Castelo Branco
Portugal
D R M ANUEL F IEDLER
Memlingstrae 16
D-12203 Berlin
Germany
D R T YLER F RANCONI
University of Oxford
Institute of Archaeology
36 Beaumont Street
Oxford. OX1 2PG
A LISON H EKE
Cheshire West and Chester Council
Grosvenor Museum
27 Grosvenor Street
Chester Cheshire. CH1 2DD
D R C ONSTANZE H PKEN
Ministerium fr Bildung und Kultur des Saarlandes
Landesdenkmalamt
Am BergwerkReden 11
D-66578 Schiffweiler
Germany
A NTONY M USTCHIN
Archaeological Solutions Ltd
6 Brunel Business Court
Eastern Way
Bury St Edmunds
Suffolk. IP32 7AJ
A NDREW P EACHEY
Archaeological Solutions Ltd
6 Brunel Business Court
Eastern Way
Bury St Edmunds
Suffolk. IP32 7AJ
R OB P ERRIN
54 Canadian Avenue
Salisbury
Wiltshire. SP2 7JN
B ETH R ICHARDSON
MOLA (Museum of London Archaeology)
Mortimer Wheeler House
46 Eagle Wharf Road
London. N1 7ED
D R J OHN S UMMERS
Archaeological Solutions Ltd
6 Brunel Business Court
Eastern Way
Bury St Edmunds
Suffolk. IP32 7AJ
D R R OBIN P. S YMONDS
Str. Ana Aslan 32A
810009 Braila
Romania
D R R OBERTA T OMBER
The British Museum
Department of Science
Great Russell Street
Bloomsbury
London. WC1B 3DG
D R P ETER W EBSTER
National Museum of Wales
Cathays Park
Cardiff. CF10 3NP
D R S TEVEN W ILLIS
Classical and Archaeological Studies
SECL Cornwallis Building North-West
University of Kent
Canterbury
Kent. CT2 7NF
J EROEN VAN Z OOLINGEN
Municipality of The Hague
Department of Archaeology
paJeroen van Zoolingen
Postbox 12 651
2500 DP The Hague
The Netherlands
Editorial
Pottery study is undertaken to collect information, understand, and to convey both the forthcoming data and their interpretation. Often, as many readers will well appreciate, this can take a long period of time and requires considerable dedication and tenacity to see a project through, not least due to the scale of the task in hand: many sherds to catalogue and process, often numbering in the thousands, and/or project timescales where so much else needs to be organized in addition to the pottery report. Project completion and finalized reports are to be celebrated for the achievement they represent, often the product of many months, even years of work. It has long been apparent that to make sense of artefacts and to communicate the information effectively shared criteria and standards are a necessity; typologies have therefore been a fundamental tool serving this end. One of the key workers to advance the typological categorization for Roman pottery in Britain was John Gillam and this year (2017) saw the John Gillam Prize of the Study Group for Roman Pottery advance into its second decade, following its introduction in 2006. The prize is awarded annually for an outstanding contribution in the field of Roman pottery study, an acknowledgement of the fulfilment of a major project, be it a commercial archaeology related pottery report or synthesis arising from such work, specialist study, PhD, or grant funded research. Winners of the John Gillam Prize are listed on the Study Groups website ( www.romanpotterystudy.org ). This year the prize went to the authors of the report on the pottery from Elms Farm, Heybridge, Essex, a site, said at the time by some, to be the largest open area excavation ever undertaken in Britain. The resultant pottery assemblage was huge and took years to process (see photos on the back cover of this volume). Often specialist reports on pottery, as with other artefacts, are completed long before the full site report is ready for publication; such was the case with Elms Farm. Pottery specialists are accustomed to taking the long view!
