Our 2022 season at Little Millhams started with the completion of recording of Pit 62 left over from last year and the subsequent backfilling. As the backfilling proceeded we were fortunate to recover from the spoil heap a very unusual find. Although medieval pottery sherds occur regularly on site we were surprised to find a small piece of highly-decorated and glazed pottery in the medieval layer of Pit 62.
The two photographs to the left, taken by member Steve Fox, show the fragment, approximately 40mm square. It is glazed and decorated by a brown slip on which are applied pellets picked out in a greenish-yellow colour.
As shown by the lower photograph, the fragment appears to be a flake about 3mm thick from the outer surface of the original vessel. The broken surface reveals a fine chalky fabric with some quartz inclusions. It is altogether a much finer piece than the run-of-the-mill fragments of domestic pottery we are used to finding.
Steve Fox undertook the research on the find using internet resources. We are grateful to a very knowledgeable contributor to a Facebook group who gave us a convincing identification of the piece, accompanied by a photograph of a similarly-decorated complete jug from his own collection
It would appear that the sherd comes from an item of Rouen ware – “jugs made in Rouen in Normandy imported along the English south coast during 13th century, quite possibly as part of the wine trade”. In open publications, images most closely resembling these items can be found, for example, in the British Museum collection. The suggested dating fits quite well with the few other definite dates we have been able to obtain for the site, most notably from a coin (early 14th century) and the tree-ring dating on the buried remains of the oak timber mill frame (felling date circa 1280). Quite an encouraging early result from the start of our 2022 season!
The Christchurch Antiquarians 