Aspects of Kentish Local History

COMPARATIVE POTTERY.

   In order to show the complete shapes of the main types made at the Tyler Hill kiln, some pots in the Maidstone Museum are here illustrated (Fig. 3). No. 1, found at Upchurch, is a good example of the tall slender jug, typical of the thirteenth century and well represented, for instance, in London.¹ Nos. 2-5 illustrate the more squat type of jug also common in the thirteenth century, and the cooking-pots and bowls in domestic use. These were found in laying the foundations of the Bently Wing of Maidstone Museum in 1889. The conditions of finding the pottery are not known, but all the pots are of about the same date and most likely they formed a group in a pit. The Bently Wing pottery was probably made locally, as a very considerable amount of medieval pottery was found in 1921 in circumstances suggesting a kiln-site in Week Street, Maidstone, only 150 yards distant from the earlier find.
   1. Jug of grey ware, surface grey on neck and light red above base. Light green glaze on neck and handle.

Tall slender shape with base thumbed down at edge. Rim thickly moulded. Handle round in section, stab-marked down sides. Decorated below rim and on upper part of body with bands of narrow girth-grooves.
   2. Jug of grey ware, roughish grey surface with buff tones. Squat ovoid shape with plain sagging base. Rim flat with slight moulding below. Strap-handle grooved down back and decorated with sloping tool-cuts. Body of jug decorated with sharply incised wavy lines.
   3. Cooking-pot of grey ware, roughish grey surface with buff tones. Rim broad and flanged. Wide sagging base.
   4. Bowl of grey ware with buff-grey surface. Thick flanged rim with internal bevel. On opposite sides of the rim are attached vertical strap-handles, both with stab-marks down the middle. Bowls with handles of this type are unusual, but examples have been found at Sandon, Essex, and at Cambridge.
   5. Deep bowl of grey ware, light grey surface with buff tones. Rim broad and flanged with internal beading.
   ¹. London Museum Medieval Catalogue, p. 212.