Council News

Council met on the 10th February at the British Museum. The Secretary reported that he was unable personally to take up the invitation to attend the Council meeting of the Society for Medieval Archaeology. He sent instead a report of the Group’s activities together with assurances that we are willing to continue a closer association. The Secretary also reported that this meeting was his last, after a period of ten years as both an ordinary member and as Secretary. He thanked all those who had made his various tasks easier and acknowledged the enthusiasm and commitment of his colleagues over the years.

The Editorial Committee once more reported at length. Volume 21 of Medieval Ceramics should be published soon and may be enclosed with this Newsletter. Volume 22 is currently giving fewer problems and the Editors are aiming for publication in early summer. So far, two papers have been submitted which will go in volume 23, and a publication date coinciding with next year’s conference is a possibility.

The Occasional papers series is also occupying the Editors’ attention as we now need to approach English Heritage with costs for the publication of Paul Blinkhorn’s analysis of Ipswich Ware and we are also expecting a first draft of the Trondheim Redwares publication. Comments upon the Minimum Standards have also been received and a publication draft should soon be with the external editor. This will hopefully be in print this year and distributed free to all members, perhaps with the autumn Newsletter.

The build-up to the 1999 conference at Sheffield is encouraging and we are all looking forward to meeting with the Prehistoric Ceramics Research Group over what should be a very fruitful and thought-provoking two days. Council also turned its attention to next year’s conference. This will coincide with the Group’s 25th anniversary and we would like to put on a celebrationof 25 years of pottery studies. Watch this space!

Further plans for our 25th anniversary were discussed including the suggestion of a conference T-shirt! We mainly concentrated on the suggestions from our 25th Anniversary Working Party who had gathered together costings for the production of a postcard. Council has decided to produce a single image to put onto a celebration postcard. The inspiration for this came from the superb coverphotograph John Allan supplied for Everyday and Exotic Pottery. Our idea is to compose a similar shot of a ‘ceramic super-group’ composed of the greatest, most representative, most spectacular pots in the country (and abroad if that is possible). The Secretary will receive nominations and arrange for the collection of the vessels and their photographing. It was thought that it might still be possible to put together a touring exhibition as part of our celebrations but we need to find someone to organise this. Such an exhibition might consist of the same pots that appear on our postcard. Are there any volunteers? One further suggestion was that the Group needs a new, simpler logo for letter-heads and to go on the back of the postcard. See elsewhere in this Newsletter.

Finally, nominations for the new Council were discussed. The arrangement regarding the Editors’ posts, as set out in the last Newsletter, are going ahead. Katherine Barclay and Mike Hughes will be co-opted onto Council for a period of six months each in order to stagger the terms of office served by both editors. Further details of nominations to Council are enclosed with the Newsletter.

The next Council meeting is set for the middle of June where Lorraine Mepham will be Secretary; if you have any comments or wish to raise any issues please write to her.

Duncan H Brown, Secretary

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Regional Groups: Mellor Report

In the August 1998 newsletter it was noted that I, as regional groups officer, should undertake to review the recommendations of the Mellor Report which remained after the work of the implementation committee. To this end I wrote to the various regional groups suggesting that one of their roles might be to consider sections 8.3 and 8.4 of the report with a view to compiling regional surveys of ceramic potential and lists of key unpublished sites and assemblages. I received two replies, both noting the importance of the Mellor report proposals and the importance of the tasks. It seems, however, that the scale of the task is probably too great to be undertaken without adequate funding and support. In addition, issues of inter-regional compatibility in the type of data recorded and the format in which it should be presented, require some sort of national co-ordination. Both points seem entirely reasonable. If anyone has any comments or further suggestions about ways in which these issues might be addressed then I would be pleased to hear from them.

Chris Cumberpatch

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Ceramics and related courses

Materials and Technology

A week-long course (28th June–2nd July 1999) run by the Dept. of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford. The course can be taken as part of a postgraduate programme or Continuing Professional Development (CPD) if required (this assessed option costs £290, unassessed is £220). Places are limited to 20 participants. The course covers the technology of ceramics, glass, and metals. It will examine the practical and chemical processes involved in the conversion of raw materials to final product. For further details contact John McIlwaine, Co-ordinator for Continuing and Professional Education, Dept of Archaeological Sciences, University of Bradford, Bradford BD7 1DP, tel 01274 235428, fax 01274 235190

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Meetings and Conferences

Majolica and glass: from Italy to Antwerp and beyond

See previous newsletters for more detail. The conference will take place in Antwerp on 3rd-5th June 1999, and the fee will be approximately 1500 BEF. For further information contact Stad Antwerpen, Archeologie, Godefriduskaai 36, B-2000 Antwerpen, Belgium, tel/fax +32 3 232 9208.

Mineralogy of ceramics ancient and modern

There will be a meeting on this subject of the Applied Mineralogy Group at the Mineralogical Society, 41 Queen’s Gate, London SW7 on Thursday 17th June 1999. For further details, contact Andrew Middleton, Dept of Scientific Research, British Museum, Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3DG, tel 020 7323 8342

5th European Meeting on Ancient Ceramics (EMAC 99)

The main scope of the meeting, to be held in Athens on 18th-20th October 1999, is the presentation and discussion of recent developments in the field of ceramic studies, with special emphasis on integrated approaches of scientific and archaeological/typological methods. There are also five proposed topics: methodological considerations; chemical, physical and mineralogical characterisation for provenance and technology; study of kiln material and reconstruction of kiln function; data handling; developments on dating. Deadline for abstracts is 31st May 1999. Contact EMAC 99, c/o Laboratory of Archaeometry, Institute of Materials Science, NCSR Demokritos, Aghia Paraskevi, 15310 Attiki, Greece, tel +30 1 650 3392, fax +30 1 651 9430

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Miscellaneous Items

Pots required to form a ceramic ‘Supergroup’

As part of the Group’s 25th anniversary celebrations, we want to produce a postcard portraying a Ceramic Supergroup. We are looking for the most spectacular, representative or extraordinary pots; about a dozen to twenty of them to be photographed together in a one-off gathering. Vessels will be brought together at a museum under a recognised loans system (which should assuage concerns over security and validity) and photographed by a professional. The resultant image will be sold as a postcard by the MPRG at our conferences and other gatherings. We would also like to display the pots together at our 25th Anniversary Conference in May of next year, when the postcard will first appear.

Anybody wishing to offer candidates for the Ceramic Supergroup, or who wish to make further enquiries, should write to Duncan Brown at Cultural Services, Southampton City Council, Solent House, Town Quay, Southampton, SO14 0EF. Enclose a photo or reference to a publication if you can. We are not looking for nominations, only offers from those who are in a position to loan the actual vessels.

The deadline for offers is the 30th June 1999.

Competition! Design a Logo

The MPRG is looking for a new logo to appear as part of our 25th Anniversary celebrations. The logo will be used on letter-heads, appear on the back of our postcard, become the wallpaper for the Group’s web-site and appear anywhere else we can put it. The competition winner will receive a bottle of Champagne, to be presented at our conference next year.

The winner will be decided by the Council of the Medieval Pottery Research Group and their decision is final. The winning design will become the property of the MPRG for copyright and all other purposes.

The deadline for competition entries is the 30th September 1999. Send your designs to Lorraine Mepham, Wessex Archaeology, Portway House, Old Sarum Park, Salisbury, Wiltshire, SP4 6EB.

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Exhibition

Old Crocks and New Pots

Grosvenor Museum, Chester, 1st May-25th July.

Taking as its starting point surviving pottery from Chester’s past, this exhibition looks at how modern potters have re-interpreted traditional techniques to produce new pottery for use today. Work by John Hudson, Andrew MacDonald, Steve Harrison and various other potters will be featured. There will be prehistoric to 17th century ceramics on display, and repro and contemporary pots for sale.

Julie Edwards

Lion Salt Works & salt glazing

The Lion Salt Works Trust in Northwich, Cheshire, have recently been involved in producing salt for pottery glazing by artist potter, Steve Harrison. A sponsor is being sought to underwrite the production costs for a complete kiln of salt glazed stoneware pots, including bellarmine copies. Further information is available in their free newsletter – contact them at Lion Salt Works Trust, Ollershaw Lane, Marston, Northwich CW9 6ES, tel/fax 01606 41823.

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New CBM Group

Archaeological Ceramic Building Materials Group

This new study group was established at a recent meeting held at the Museum of London. It has been set up as a forum to organise research into archaeologically derived ceramic building materials (cbm), and related artefacts, obtained through excavation and survey. It covers material from the late Iron Age to the post-medieval period. The group intends to:

• produce guidelines and standards for the retention and recording of CBM
• develop minimum collections policies (both on site and for museums)
• encourage the formation of a national reference collection
• promote continental links with those involved in working with CBM
• liaise with related groups

If you are interested in joining, or would like further information, please contact Sandra Garside-Neville, Archaeological Ceramic Building Materials Group, 63 Wilton Rise, York YO24 4BT, tel 01904 621339.

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Staffordshire Ceramics – reports on a conference and a course

Pots, People and Processes, Stoke-on-Trent, 24th-26th April 1998

A joint conference of the Society for Post-Medieval Archaeology and the Northern Ceramics Society: The aim of the conference was to present a range of new workin post-medieval ceramic history and archaeology to a mixed audience of archaeologists, museum curators and collectors. As organiser, my primary aim – unstated – was to stress the importance of archaeology in the study of ceramics with a view to influencing approaches to ‘ceramic history’. New work there certainly was, with 30 papers being presented in a packed two-and-a-half days. Most of the speakers came from an archaeological background, but the range of subjects included kilns and firing technology, the evidence from a variety of production sites including the pottery producing centres of Buckley and Ticknall, consumption and marketing, and a more theoretical approach to the analysis of ceramics.

There was a definite bias towards the refined wares of the 18th and 19th centuries, which simply reflected the nature of the work being undertaken and the expanding interests of the archaeological community. The archaeology of a major 19th century pottery factory – J & P Bell’s Glasgow factory – provided a remarkable focal point for the second day, and was a clear statement of the potential of the archaeology of the recent past. Julie Edwards and Keith Matthews developed this theme in concluding with their discussion of the excavations at Hamilton Place, Chester, and the ceramic finds from 19th century dwellings which were demolished in 1939.

The conference brought together around 150 people from all walks of life, whose common interest was ceramics, all of whom left with the knowledge that their subjects could be approached from many different angles, all of which were valid. Indeed, the great achievement of the conference was the enthusiasm generated and the communication amongst the group. We might have allowed more time for questions, but this would have been at the expense of information.

Synopses of the papers are available from David Barker at the Potteries Museum, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent, ST1 3DE (please include A4 or A5 SAE or international reply coupon), and it was important that everyone present had the best value for money.

David Barker

Staffordshire Ceramics, first session 15th-16th March 1999

An English Heritage-sponsored course at the Potteries Museum: A small group of Prehistoric, Roman and post-Roman pottery specialists with a wide range of ceramic experience attended the first of two courses run in the same week. We were all made to feel very welcome by David Barker and his team.

The course started at a relatively leisurely pace, covering early post-medieval yellow wares from the Staffordshire and Midlands areas, and making brief comparisons with material from the Surrey-Hampshire border. Other ‘coarse’ wares including slipwares and Midlands Purple Ware were also covered in depth, with samples being passed around and compared with similar material oflater dates.

Mention Staffordshire ceramics, and I immediately think of the slip-decorated press-moulded flatwares and hollow wares of the late 17th and 18th centuries. We looked at both common and rare forms of these and compared them with samples of similar wares made in Bristol.

The first evening was rounded off with an excellent Chinese meal in a local restaurant (the second group sampled an Italian establishment), and a brief session in the bar of the motel where accommodation had been arranged for the course.

The second day was more intensive, covering material which many of us had less or no experience of, the refined wares (earthenware, stoneware and porcelain) of the 18th and 19th centuries. Common types were looked at, including the decorative techniques of transfer printing, under- and over-glaze painting, enamelling, and applied relief moulding.

Although there was a huge amount of information to cover, with several participants suggesting a three- rather than two-day course in future, the excellent handouts prepared by the tutors helped considerably and will be constantly referred to when working on assemblages of this fascinating period of ceramic history.

Further courses will be run if Sarah Jennings receives enough letters from those interested in attending. Write to her at CAS, Fort Cumberland, Eastney, Portsmouth, PO9 4LD, fax 01705 838060.

Sue Anderson

Council News

Council met on the 26th of October at the Education Department of the British Museum. The Secretary reported on an invitation from the Society for Medieval Archaeology, asking Council to send, once a year, a representative to their own Council meetings. The MPRG is happy to accept this invitation in principle although none of the Council members present could easily attend the meeting in question. We do welcome this approach from the Society and look forward to future fruitful co-operation.

Most of the meeting was, as ever, taken up with the report from the Editorial Committee; their projects and responsibilities seem neverending. At present the editors are finalising Medieval Ceramics 21, beginning Medieval Ceramics 22, taking orders for the Guide and clearing the decks for publication of the Minimum Standards document. It is therefore perhaps fortunate that progress on the anticipated Occasional Papers on Ipswich Ware and Trondheim Redwares has slowed, for it seems the Editors have enough on their plates as it is! The delays in producing Medieval Ceramics were discussed by Council. It seems the introduction of refereeing has unavoidably slowed the process but we are of the opinion that deadlines for contributions must be set and stringently applied, even at the risk of publishing a slimmer volume than usual.

A draft of the Minimum Standards document was submitted to Council. It was agreed that this should be circulated for comment among the regional groups of MPRG and if you are interested in seeing it a copy should soon be with your regional groups secretary. It is hoped that the finished document will be published and circulated with Medieval Ceramics in May 1999.

Anne Jenner provided a report on the forthcoming conference in Sheffield and you should find a preliminary programme with this Newsletter. It looks as like this will be a very interesting meeting and I, for one, am very much looking forward to exchanging views with specialists in other periods.

Chris Cumberpatch, the Regional Groups Officer, raised the issue of those recommendations arising from the Mellor Report that might be addressed at a local level. It was felt that regional groups could be involved in setting up lists of important collections and sites and that this might stimulate activity in some groups which have been rather quiet in recent years. Further details will appear in the Newletter.

Finally, Council discussed plans for the next AGM. The President, Secretary, both Editors, the Assistant Editor and one ordinary member are standing down, which leaves a large hole in Council. It is customary for the President to invite somebody to take over as his successor, although that post, as well as all the others, is available for anyone who wishes to stand. The greatest problem is losing the editorial team. Jacqui Pearce may stand for one of the Editor’s posts and Council considered that, in the event that nobody offered their services, the other Editor’s post might be filled by co-opting one of the present incumbents for a year. This would have the effect of staggering the terms of office for the Editors, thus avoiding the five-yearly problem of losing both of them at once. It is hoped that the membership are sympathetic towards this plan.

The next meeting of Council is on the 10th February 1999; if there are any matters you wish me to raise, please contact me.

Duncan H Brown, Secretary

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Medieval Ceramics

The proofs for volume 21 of Medieval Ceramics are being finalised at present (it will probably be just over 100 pages), and the editorial team hope the journal will be out by early next year. It is planned that volume 22 will be shorter but will appear in time for the meeting in May next year at Sheffield. There is still time for short contributions to the Compendiario for volume 22.

Mike Hughes, Co-Editor

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Minimum Standards

for the Processing, Analysis, Publication and Archiving of Post-Roman Pottery

As a result of the survey of medieval ceramics (Mellor 1994), the MPRG took on board the need to produce nationally agreed minimum standards for those working with medieval pottery. The other ceramic period groups have all published guideline documents of their own (Fulford & Huddlestone 1991; PCRG 1991; PCRG 1992).

Over the past year an MPRG working party has been working on the production of a draft document. It will include a broad summary, outlining general principles, which it is hoped can be agreed by all three ceramic period groups. The draft document is now ready for circulation among the wider MPRG membership. All regional group organisers have been circulated with a copy. Please contact them if you would like to see one (for the name and address of you regional group organiser, contact Chris Cumberpatch, Regional Groups Officer).

All comments should be sent to me by Christmas, or as soon afterwards as possible, to: Anna Slowikowski, Bedfordshire County Archaeology Service, St Mary’s Church Archaeology Centre, St Mary’s Street, Bedford MK42 0AS, tel 01234 270009.

References

• Fulford, MG and Huddleston, K. 1991, The Current State of Romano-British Pottery Studies, a review for English Heritage. Occasional Paper No. 1.
• Mellor, M. 1994 Medieval Ceramic Studies in England, a review for English Heritage.
• PCRG 1991 The Study of Later Prehistoric Pottery: general policies. Occasional Paper No. 1.
• PCRG 1992 The Study of Later Prehistoric Pottery: guidelines for analysis and publication. Occasional Paper No. 2.

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Regional Group Meetings

SEMPER

The spring 1998 meeting was held at St Albans Museum, on the theme of Hertfordshire Greyware and related types; over 20 people attended! There is no autumn meeting, but a joint session with the East Midlands and Anglia Roman Pottery Research Group is planned for Saturday 6th February 1999, at Aylesbury Museum, to discuss the differences and similarities in our ways of working with ceramics, and the general need for minimum standards. This will also be an opportunity to discuss the draft MPRG standards document, although, as all comments should be in by the New Year, please don’t wait till this meeting if you would like to contribute.

For further details of this meeting, or if you would like to go on the mailing list, please contact Anna Slowikowski (see above, Minimum Standards, for address).

NWMPRG

Unfortunately the planned NWRMPRG meeting for June had to be postponed. It is hoped that a meeting will be held in the New Year. Anyone interested in being placed on the group’s mailing list should contact Julie Edwards, c/o Chester Archaeology, 27 Grosvenor St, Chester CH1 2DD.

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Ceramics and related courses

Handling session: decorated medieval floor tiles

An opportunity to handle medieval floor tiles from Guildford Museum’s collection, including material from Chertsey, Guildford, Merton, Newark and Waverley. The session will be repeated on two days, 13th-14th February 1999, at Salter’s, Guildford Museum’s Annexe, Castle Street, Guildford. Cost is £5, including light refreshments, a glass of wine and a talk. The displays will continue as a public exhibition until 20th February. Applications for tickets should state which day you will attend, and enclose a cheque payable to Guildford Museum. For further details contact Guildford Museum, Castle Arch, Guildford, Surrey, GU1 3SX, tel 01483 444750/444752.

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Meetings and Conferences

British Archaeological Association Meetings 1999

We have been asked to advertise the following series of lectures, which are all held in the rooms of the Society of Antiquaries of London, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London W1V 0HS, with tea from 4.30pm and meeting from 5pm. Non-members welcome, but should contact the Hon Director, Philip Lankester, beforehand (details deleted on request).

• 6 Jan. ‘The grand amorial stove and “Turkish Bath” at the Palace of Whitehall’, David Gaimster.
• 3 Feb. ‘Timber importation to the British Isles and its uses in medieval times’, Gavin Simpson.
• 3 Mar. ‘Louis d’Orleans (1372-1407) and the sculptured images of the Nine Worthies’ Julia Watson.
• 7 April ‘Unspeakable Architecture; or the terminology of Gothic’, Alexandrina Buchanan.
• 5 May ‘Romanesque wall painting in England and Scotland: discoveries and research since 1990’ David Park.

Majolica and glass: from Italy to Antwerp and beyond. The transfer of technology in the 16th-early 17th century.

This conference will be particularly concerned with workshops for the production of luxury tablewares established by Italians in Antwerp, and the diffusion of this technology to other regions in North-Western Europe. The place of majolica and glass within the broader setting of the 16th century economic and social developments and processes will also be considered. Material from excavations in Antwerp will be on display and there will be poster displays and space for material brought by delegates. Papers will be presented in English and French. The conference will take place in Antwerp on 3rd–5th June 1999, and the fee will be approximately 1500 BEF. For further information, or to offer a poster, contact Stad Antwerpen, Archeologie, Godefriduskaai 36, B-2000 Antwerpen, Belgium, tel/fax +32 3 232 9208.

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Experimental Firing in Suffolk

The occasion for this firing was a weekend of archaeology at Priory Farm, Preston St Mary in Suffolk to celebrate the 150th year of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology. On the final day we had invited the public to view our excavation and this seemed as good an excuse as any for a pottery firing. Several years of digging on an adjacent 13th–14th century site had yielded a considerable quantity of pottery, so we had plenty of examples to inspire us when it came to making our pots. Most, but not all, of the pots we put into the kiln were made from clay dug on the farm. It has to be said that the chalky boulder clay subsoil in this part of Suffolk is a potter’s clay of last resort, but I did find an area of brown clay which was free of chalk. This actually threw very well. However, it was rather short and seemed to lack elasticity in drying. This caused jug handles to break or come off. It is interesting that local medieval handles tend to be straight and stay close to the pot. Perhaps they, too, were trying to minimise this problem.

We chose to model our kiln on a late medieval example excavated at Rickinghall in the north of the county (see Medieval Ceramics 20 for report). This unusual kiln had firemouths at each end and a chamber in the middle, and measured 3.5m long and 1m across. We scaled this down to suit our quantity of pots. Gilbert Burroughes, the kiln builder, had to work very fast since we could not start building before Friday morning and it had to be ready to fire at first light on Sunday. For this reason, he supported all of the structure except the dome of the firing chamber with soft red bricks which were then covered with a particularly sticky example of our yellow clay, well stamped up with straw. The pots were then piled in and straw placed over them and the clay dome formed over the top. Four holes were cut for flues and a pyrometer inserted in the side. The kiln with the pots was gently heated late on Saturday evening.

The firing on Sunday went well and a temperature of 980°C was reached around tea-time. This, bearing in mind that the kiln was still fairly wet, was good. The two firemouths worked fine and gave plenty of scope for enthusiastic amateurs to try their hand at stoking. When several days later we opened it up, we were disappointed to find a high proportion of breakages. I think putting the raw pots in a new kiln overnight was probably the reason for our losses. The good news is that all the pots were grey to dark grey and very well fired, even if some suffered fairly drastic warping. In medieval terms they were quite usable, so we can be said to have achieved our aim.

Adrian Thorpe, Priory Farm, Preston St Mary.

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The MPRG website and email

To publicise pottery events on the website, contact Paul Miles, c/o Oxford Archaeological Unit, Janus House, Osney Mead, Oxford OX2 0ES, tel 01865 243888.

Other email addresses can be found on the website.

Other interesting ceramics websites:

• www.ceramique.com: mainly an art site, but with a bookshop which includes some archaeological material. In French, some English.

• www.cma.ab-c.nl: the website for the Corpus Middeleeuws Aardewerk series on ceramics in the Netherlands and Flanders. In English and Dutch.

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New Books

L’Innovation Technique au Moyen-Age

P Beck (ed), Actes du Vie Congrès international d’archéologie médiévale (Dijon 1996), 336 pages, 290F.

Information from Les Informations de L’Association Bourguignonne de Recherches Céramiques newsletter, which highlights Chapter 5, ‘De l’amélioration du quotidien’, including ‘Tupins et tupiniers, la production potière en Val-de-Saône du Vie au XIIe s.’ by Y Petitdent and E Poil; ‘L’apparition des glaçures plombifères et stannifères: exemplaires français’ by C Hanusse, M Leenhardt, N Meyer-Rodriguès and L Vallauri; ‘Les grès médiévaux: évolution ou révolution?’ by A-M Flambard-Héricher; ‘Tradition et innovation dans la céramique consommée à Tours au Bas-Moyen-Age et à l’époque moderne’ by P Husi. Available from Epona, 7 rue Jean du Bellay, 75004, Paris, tel +(0)1 43 26 40 41.

Les poëles en céramique au Moyen-Age et à l’Epoque moderne

Annick Richard and Jean-Jacques Schwein (eds), Actes du colloque sur la céramique du poële (Montbéliard, 1995), 256 pages, 8 col. plates, many B&W illustrations, c250F. Supplement à la Revue Archéologique de l’Est.

About 15 articles providing a fundamental contribution to the knowledge of this particular type of ceramic, with marked sociological connotations. Available soon from UMR 5594, Faculté des Sciences, 6 bd Gabriel, 21000 Dijon, France. Tel. +(0)3 80 39 57 97.

Newsletter No. 31 – August 1998

Council News

Council met at the British Museum on the 24th June. The president opened the meeting by welcoming new Council members and officers. He also expressed concern at the delays we have suffered in the appearance of Medieval Ceramics and the Guide to the Classification of Medieval Ceramic Forms. All of us on Council are aware of this problem and working hard on behalf of the Group. We will try to improve but in the meantime we hope that the Group’s membership will continue to be patient.

The Secretary reported little other than the usual enquiries. The Treasurer announced that he has found an auditor for the accounts, who was adopted by Council in accordance with the arrangement made at the AGM. The accounts remain healthy.

The report from the Editorial Committee was as full as ever. They have conducted a post-mortem on the ‘Guide’, highlighting the problems encountered in production. One unfortunate effect of these problems has been to force us to raise the price of the ‘Guide’ to cover unexpected outlay. Those of you who saw the pre-publication copy at the London meeting will know that it is worth every penny! Progress on two other occasional papers is slow. English Heritage have asked for more analytical work to be done on Ipswich Ware and Lyn Blackmore has returned to Norway to try and finish off her work on the Trondheim redwares. It is hoped, however, that our Minimum Standards for the Processing and Publication of Medieval Pottery will be available soon for consultation by the membership. The target date for publication of Medieval Ceramics 21 is September. The Committee, and especially the editorial team, have put in a lot of hard work and received deserved thanks from the President.

The report from our new Meetings Secretary concentrated on next year’s conference which will be a two-day meeting with the Prehistoric Ceramics Research Group (see below). The Roman Pottery Research Group have also been invited but had not responded. It was suggested that we rotate between a few fixed venues for future one-day meetings, as attendance at these has been so variable. London, Birmingham and Sheffield were suggested as three easily-accessible places and meetings would be held at each of these in turn, every other year. This would have the advantage of making organisation smoother and allowing the Meetings Secretary to concentrate on the three-day conferences that are held in alternate years. I would be interested to know what the Membership feels about the towns that have been suggested.

Alan Vince reported that the English Heritage Implementation Committee has not met for some time. This was set up to see through the recommendations of the Mellor report but is now at rest. It is perhaps now the responsibility of the Group, particularly through the Regional Groups, to address the remaining recommendations. Chris Cumberpatch, as the new Regional Groups Officer, was given the task of reviewing the recommendations and considering a way forward.

A number of suggestions for the celebration of the Group’s 25th Anniversary, in the year 2000 were put forward from the new working party. These ranged from the production of postcards and a booklet to excavating a pottery kiln. Council considered all these excellent suggestions and is looking forward to working towards a great celebration.

Finally, it was agreed that since Audrey Gahan is no longer a member of MPRG, Claire McCutcheon be invited to act as Irish representative to Council.

The next meeting is on the 21st October, if there are any points any of you want to raise, please write to me.

Duncan H Brown, Secretary

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MPRG Conference 1999

Building bridges: a multidisciplinary approach to ceramic studies

The MPRG annual conference will be held at Sheffield over two days in May 1999.

The aim is to promote collaboration and discussion across regional, chronological and institutional boundaries and stimulate fruitful dialogue. Delegates and speakers will be encouraged from prehistoric, Roman and medieval interest groups.

Lectures will broadly cover processing and interpretation of ceramics from deposition to final publication. Specific areas of discussion will focus on cross-regional fabric studies; fabric archives; minimum standards of processing; methods of interpretation including formation processes and skeuomorphs; and new methods of communication using the internet and virtual reality.

Visits will be arranged to view relevant sites and ceramics.

Anyone wishing to contribute please contact Anne Jenner (or leave a message) on 01207 529553 or 0191 281 6251.

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Medieval Ceramics

All individual members should by now have received a copy of Medieval Ceramics Volume 20. If not, please contact us.

Volume 21 of the Journal is currently undergoing final editing and proofs of part of it have already been printed. It should be out in the near future.

Volume 22 is in preparation and several papers have been submitted. However, the editors would like to hear from anyone who has either a full paper or, particularly, a short paper for inclusion in the Compendiario section, as very few of the latter have been submitted in recent years. Contact the Editors care of the British Museum.

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Regional Group Meetings

NW Region

The NWRMPRG held a meeting last December to discuss recent work in the north-west and to consider holding regular meetings once more. It was a useful day, it was good to see pottery and people from various parts of the region. People had the opportunity to examine Manx granite tempered ware, groups of medieval pottery found in Lancaster and Chester as well as kiln material from Cheshire. A talk was given on the collections held by Liverpool Museum and a progress report on the National Bibliography was also given.

It was decided to hold meetings every six months or so. It is hoped that the next meeting will be in Lancaster this summer. The meeting will provide the opportunity to examine kiln material from Silverdale and Docker as well as to have a closer look at more recently excavated medieval pottery from Lancaster. Unfortunately, this meeting may already have been held by the time you receive this. Ed.

If you would like to be on the Group’s mailing list, please contact Julie Edwards, c/o Chester Archaeology, 27 Grosvenor Street, Chester CH1 2DD.

Regional Groups Liaison

Chris Cumberpatch has recently taken over from Beverley Nenk as Regional Group Liaison Officer. He would like to receive any news about future meetings or activities organised by regional groups. Contact him at 22 Tennyson Road, Lower Walkley, Sheffield S6 2WE, tel/fax 0114 231 0051.

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Meetings and Conferences

European Association of Archaeologists

The 1998 EAA Conference, on 23rd-27th September 1998, will have three main themes, one of which is ‘Archaeology and material culture: interpreting the archaeological record’. This will include sessions on such diverse topics as: Wining and dining; the archaeology and social history of the Table in post-Roman Europe; Urban archaeology; The archaeology of wealth, prestige and value: processes and dynamics; Interpreting cultural identities in the archaeological record; Spatial analysis: landscape and material culture; Landscape and settlement archaeology; and Burial analysis – new approaches. There are several others, so send for details now! The final programme is due at the end of August. Further details from Dept. of Archaeology, Gutteborg University, Box 200, SE-405 30 Gutteborg, Sweden, tel +46 31 773 5181, (fax 5182), email EAA 98, web www.hum.gu.se/~arkeaa.

Finds Research Group AD700-1700

The Autumn meeting of the FRG will be on the theme of ‘Riding into the Past’ and will be spent examining aspects of horse riding and horse equipment. It will be held at the Friends meeting House, Worcester on 26th October 1998. Further details from Derek Hurst, tel 01905 611086.

FRG membership is still only £3 (£5 overseas). Contact Katey Banks, The Potteries Museum, Bethesda Street, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent ST1 3DW, tel 01782 202173, fax 01782 205033.

Majolica and glass: from Italy to Antwerp and beyond. The transfer of technology in the 16th–early 17th century.

This conference will be particularly concerned with workshops for the production of luxury tablewares established by Italians in Antwerp, and the diffusion of this technology to other regions in North-Western Europe. The place of majolica and glass within the broader setting of the 16th century economic and social developments and processes will also be considered. Material from excavations in Antwerp will be on display and there will be poster displays and space for material brought by delegates. Papers will be presented in English and French. The conference will take place in Antwerp on 3rd-5th June 1999, and the fee will be approximately 1500 BEF. For further information, or to offer a poster, contact Stad Antwerpen, Archeologie, Godefriduskaai 36, B-2000 Antwerpen, Belgium, tel/fax +32 3 232 9208.

7th International Conference on Mediterranean Medieval Ceramics

Advance notice for this mid-October 1999 conference, to be held in Thessalonika. There are three main themes: ‘Between East and west: Byzantine ceramics of 5th-15th centuries’, ‘Centres of production and modes of commercialisation’, and ‘Mahgreb between East and West’. General interest papers and posters will also be welcome. For further details, contact AIECM2, 10 rue Mazarine, 13100 Aix-en-Provence, France, tel 04 42 52 43 08, fax 04 42 52 43 78. The email is apparently temporarily unavailable.

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Ceramics courses

Early prehistoric pottery

18-25.8.98. Contact: Department of Continuing Education, Rewley House, 1 Wellington Square, Oxford OX1 2JA, tel 01865 270360.

Prehistoric pottery

19-20.9.98. Contact: Centre for Continuing Education, University of Sussex, Educational Development Building, Falmer, Brighton BN1 9RG, tel 01273 678527.

Iron Age and Roman pottery

3.10.98. Contact: Kent Archaeological Field School, School Farm Oast, Graveney Road, Faversham, Kent ME13 8UP, tel 0181 747 3683.

Editor’s note: If you are running a course like these, please let me know so that it can be included for the benefit of less experienced members.

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Exhibitions

European Exhibitions 1998

The newsletter of the Association Bourguignonne de Recherches Ceramiques contains listings of no less than 24 exhibitions with ceramic themes (mostly post-medieval) which are on show in France and Italy this year. Examples include ‘Le pot de chambre en faïence’ at Badonviller; ‘Céramiques architecturales: céramiques dans ma ville,céramiques dans ma vie’ at Dieulefit (until end August); ‘Terres d’industrie’ at Creusot (until October); and ‘Un gout d’Italie: céramiques et céramistes italiens en Provence du Moyen-Age au XXe siecle’ at Fréjus (to 1st October). Those producing published catalogues are also noted, together with costs and contact addresses. The newsletter also lists several recent French and other European publications.

For a copy of the newsletter (No. 20, June 1998), which is sent out three times a year, write to Jean Rosen, ABRC, c/o Musee archaeologique, 5 rue Dr Maret, 21000 Dijon, France, tel/fax 03 80 53 61 71. Subscription costs 130F.

Shoji Hamada: Master Potter

Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, August 1998.

A loan exhibition of the work of this influential Japanese artist (1894-1978). Universally recognised as one of the century’s greatest masters of the craft, he worked with Bernard Leach in establishing the pottery of St Ives in the 1920’s.

Tiles from East and West

Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, November 1998 to January 1999.

This special exhibition is a unique collaboration by the Departments of Eastern Art, Western Art and Antiquities at the Ashmolean Museum. It brings together tile art from 8th century BC Mesopotamia through to 19th century industrial England, touching along the way the Roman Empire, the Islamic world including Spain, Northern French influences on the medieval English paving tile, Renaissance Italy and Dutch tin glaze tiles.

There will be a study day on Tuesday 24th November to explore the cross-cultural splendours of the three collections. A rich programme includes lectures by museum staff and specialists in the morning, and a handling session in the afternoon, looking at Islamic, Renaissance and English Delft tiles, offering participants a chance to follow influences and compare styles and materials. Further details from The Ashmolean Education Service, Beaumont Street, Oxford OX1 2PH. Cost £18. Limited to 36 participants.

Art and Culture of the Carolingian Period

An exhibition will be held in Paderborn, Germany, in 1999 to mark the 1200th anniversary of an alliance between Charlemagne and Pope Leo III which was negotiated in the latter’s palace at Paderborn.

According to the publicity material, this meeting in 799 was a momentous event which changed the spiritual and political landscape of Europe. The international exhibition which will be held to celebrate it, will include aspects of the art, culture and history of the period. It will run from 23rd July to 1st November 1999, and will take place in several museums and galleries across the city. Archaeological material, works of art, jewellery, illuminated manuscripts, historical documents and architectural models will be on display. Themes will include the Saxon Wars and Frankish territorial expansion in the late 8th century, 9th century settlement in Westphalia, the concept of imperial rule, ecclesiastical art and architecture, and art and liturgy in the Carolingian period. Objects and artefacts will be loaned from major collections in Germany, Italy, France, England and the USA. Further information from Ausstellung 799 GbR, Markt 17, D-33098 Paderborn, Germany, tel +49(0)5251 125-400, fax 125-495, email erzb.pb.mus@t-online.de

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The MPRG website and email

The MPRG has a temporary page courtesy of Paul Miles’ website. It contains a copy of the information in the newsletter, information on joining the group and purchasing its publications, and lists of other relevant websites and ceramic groups. You can visit it at www.pmiles.demon.co.uk/mprg/mprg.htm.

The site also lists email addresses for several Council members. Information for the newsletter can now be sent by email (see below for my address), and anything which needs publicising between newsletters can be advertised on the web page.

Contact Paul Miles, c/o Oxford Archaeological Unit, Janus House, Osney Mead, Oxford OX2 0ES, tel 01865 243888.

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A Guide to the Classification of Medieval Ceramic Forms

This first occasional paper has now been published, so pre-publication prices are no longer applicable. New prices and details now online.

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New Books

Les Faïenceries de l’Auxerrois.

Camille Pellet
éditions de l’Armançon, 1998, 128 pages, 130 illustrations, 195F.

The first large study of this material takes a global approach, using archive research, archaeological material, scientific analysis and inventories of public and private collections.

Council News

Council met on the 11th February at the British Museum. The meeting was somewhat disjointed, with the railway ‘network’ conspiring to delay the President for over an hour. Prominence was given to a discussion of the second draft of Minimum Standards for the Processing, Recording, Analysis and Publication of Post-Roman Pottery submitted by our working party. It was time that Council collectively considered the recommendations put forward in this document, as previous consultation had been on an individual basis. The discussion was very interesting and productive as we went through each section of the “Standards”. I don’t want to give anything away, nor run the risk of misrepresenting the finished article, but I am sure that this draft is close becoming a very useful document. You will all have a chance to comment in the near future through the regional groups network.

Much of the remainder of the meeting was taken up with the report from the editorial committee. There have been profound delays with the production of last year’s Medieval Ceramics and also with the Guide to the Classification of Medieval Ceramic Forms. The Editors have been working very hard on both these publications and they reported good progress, but there have been unavoidable problems which have now been resolved. The Editors are reasonably certain that the latest Medieval Ceramics will be out as usual in late Spring. The decision to referee the articles submitted to the journal has had the effect of slowing down production but the system is now in place and hopefully all will run smoothly from now on.

The remainder of the meeting consisted of the usual reports from Officers and arrangements for the AGM, which are included in this mailing. The next Council meeting is set for 24th June; if you have any comments or wish to raise any issues please write to me.

Duncan H Brown, Secretary

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MPRG Annual Conference 1998

Don’t forget! Our annual conference, this year a one-day meeting on the theme Pottery in England 900-1200 AD, will be on Saturday 16th May at the Museum of London Interpretation Unit, London Wall, 9.30am-5.30pm.

Applications should be returned by 30th April. If you can’t find your leaflet, contact Victoria Buteux, Hereford and Worcester County Archaeological Unit, Tolladine Road, Worcester WR4 9NB, tel 01905 458608.

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Regional Group Meeting

SEMPER

The Spring meeting of SEMPER will be held in May/June at Verulamium Museum and will be on the subject of Hertfordshire Greywares, courtesy of Alison Turner-Rugg. For further details (available nearer the time) contact SEMPER coordinator Anna Slowikowski, Bedfordshire Archaeology Service, St Mary’s Archaeological Centre, St Mary’s Street, Bedford MK42 0AS, tel 01234 270009.

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Meetings and Conferences

Society for Post Medieval Archaeology and Northern Ceramic Society Joint Conference

A three day meeting will be held in Stoke-on-Trent on Friday 24th to Sunday 26th April 1998, on the subject of Recent work in ceramic history and archaeology. Cost £55 for members of either society, £65 for non-members, reductions for students, accommodation extra.

Further details from David Barker, Archaeology Section, City Museum and Art Gallery, Hanley, Stoke-on-Trent ST1 3DW, tel 01782 232323.

Finds Research Group AD700-1700

The Spring meeting of the FRG will be on the theme of Religious sites, religious artefacts. It will be hosted by Guildford Museum on 27th April 1998. Finds from Newark Priory and other Surrey religious establishments will be on show, and papers on Flixborough and London will be included in the programme.

Further details: Quita Mould, Christmas Cottage, Choseley, Docking, Kings Lynn, Norfolk PE31 8PQ, tel 01485 512443.

31st International Convention on Ceramics

This Italian conference will be held on 29th-31st May 1998 at Albisola, on the theme of The Iberian Peninsula and Italy: relation-ships and influences in ceramic production from the medieval period to the 17th century. Sessions will include ‘Spanish ceramics in Italy and their influence on local production’, ‘Influence of Ligurian and Italian ceramics on Spanish production’, and ‘Historico-economic problems concerning circulation and trade in Spanish ceramics’.

For further details contact Prof Carlo Varaldo, Centro Ligure per la Storia della Ceramica, Civico Museo Storico Archeologico, Fortezza del Priamàr, C.so Mazzini 1, 17100 Savona, Italy.

International Medieval Congress 1998

13th-16th July, at the International Medieval Institute, University of Leeds. There will be over 300 sessions on all aspects of the European Middle Ages (c450-1500), as well as events and excursions. Archaeology sessions include several organised by the Society for Medieval Archaeology, the Medieval Settlement Research Group and others, such as ‘Archaeology and urban settlement’, ‘Seasonal settlement’, ‘Peasant houses’, ‘Industry and exchange in the countryside’, ‘Food supply and medieval settlements’, ‘The Great Replanning?: the origins of field systems, villages and towns in Northamptonshire’, ‘Urban elites in Late Medieval York’, ‘Wharram Percy revisited’, ‘Taking goods from Bergen to Berlin: means of transport from an archaeological perspective’, and ‘Urban growth and planning’. Conference fee £89.50 (£99.50 after 15th May), food and accommodation extra. Reduced fee for unwaged etc. £48, and one-day pass £48. Further details from Marianne O’Doherty or Josine Opmeer, International Medieval Congress, Parkinson Building 1.03, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9TJ, tel 0113 233 3614.

7th International Conference on Mediterranean Medieval Ceramics

Advance notice for this mid-October 1999 conference, to be held in Thessalonika. There are three main themes: ‘Between East and west: Byzantine ceramics of 5th-15th centuries’, ‘Centres of production and modes of commercialisation’, and ‘Mahgreb between East and West’. General interest papers and posters will also be welcome. For further details, contact AIECM2, 10 rue Mazarine, 13100 Aix-en-Provence, France. Please note change of telephone number since the last newsletter: tel 04 42 52 43 08, fax 04 42 52 43 78. The email is apparently temporarily unavailable.

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Experimental Firing in Suffolk – call for advice!

The Suffolk Archaeological Field Group will be holding a Medieval Weekend on the 2nd-4th October 1998 at Priory Farm, Preston St. Mary. The activities will include a three-day investigation of a medieval house platform, and an experimental clamp or kiln firing with pots made by local amateur and professional potters in medieval styles. The organisers are interested in hearing from anyone who has experience of clamp firings as we haven’t tried it before! Everyone is welcome to attend the open day on Sunday 4th October from 10am, which will include exhibitions, tour of the excavation and pottery firing. Contact Suffolk CC Archaeological Service for more details nearer the time. The organiser, Adrian Thorpe, would like to hear from anyone who has advice on clamp firing. Contact him at Priory Farm, Preston St Mary, Lavenham, Suffolk, tel 01787 247251.

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International Ceramics Fair and Seminar

The 17th International Ceramics Fair will be held over the long weekend 12th-15th June 1998 at The Park Lane Hotel, Piccadilly, London. Although mainly a venue for ceramics dealers and collectors, there will be several exhibitions including: ‘Contemporary Ceramics from British Collections’. A series of 15 lectures will also be held, including ‘Pots, Prints and Propaganda: German Stoneware in the Renaissance and Reformation’ by David Gaimster (Friday 12th, 5.15-6.15pm), ‘Dutch Majolica and Early Delftware 1570-1670, some problems in attributions’ by JD Van Dam (Saturday 13th, 11.30am-12.30pm), ‘Isleworth pottery and porcelain: the rediscovery of an 18th century London Factory’ by Roger Massey (Saturday 13th, 2.00-3.00pm), and ‘Excavations and resarch into the Donyatt Potteries and the Virginian Connection’ by Richard Coleman-Smith (Monday 15th, 4.00-5.00pm). Cost is £18 for the first lecture attended, £12 for each subsequent lecture. The price includes a Fair ticket and hardback handbook. For further information contact The International Ceramics Fair and Seminar Ltd, 31 Old Burlington Street, London W1X 1LB, tel 0171 734 5491.

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English Heritage Monuments Protection Programme: Clay Industries

I am currently working on the ‘Step One’ report for the clay industries, under the Monument Protection Programme coverage of industrial archaeology topics. My brief is to provide an overview of clay extraction and use over time, including the Roman and medieval periods as well as post-medieval, and to recommend how the issue of statutory protection for relevant sites/structures should be tackled. I am aiming to draw together current thinking on research and site conservation priorities for the different periods and subjects, though the scale of the exercise means that only a ‘broad brush’ approach is possible at this stage.

The database being compiled at King Alfred’s College, Winchester will provide the detailed information for medieval pottery production sites. More problematic is the issue of brick and tile production, particularly the systematic identification of temporary sites, and the issue of how valid criteria for protection can be defined with only limited knowledge of the numbers and character of the potential national population.

My deadline for producing the report is the end of May. If any MPRG member would like to contribute their views about priorities for statutory protection, I would be pleased to receive their comments as soon as possible.

Angela Simco, 13 Green Lane, Clapham, Bedford MK41 6EP, tel 01234 354130.

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New Books

Pots and People that have shaped the Heritage of Medieval and Later England

Maureen Mellor, Ashmolean Museum, 1997, 80 pages, 92 illustrations, paperback, £7.95, ISBN 1854440802

The medieval pottery collections of the Ashmolean Museum shed fascinating light on pottery production, trade and consumption in the uniquely well-documented environs of Oxford. The pots themselves, and what they can tell us about life in Oxford from the 9th to the 19th centuries, make up the first part of this book. Colour photographs of the ceramic groups and descriptions of their typological characteristics make this a useful reference section. The second half of the book explores the extraordinary history of the collection itself with biographies of some of the collectors. Splendidly illustrated, this is an excellent guide to medieval pottery and also an absorbing book. Part of a series commissioned by the Ashmolean on their collections.

Marseille, les ateliers de potiers du XIIIe siecle et le quartier Sainte-Barbe

Henri Marchese, Jacques Thiriot, Lucy Vallauri (eds), DAF 65, 1997, 389 pages, 320 illustrations, paperback, £34, ISBN 2735106217

A report on the excavations of potters’ workshops making unglazed and glazed wares, including tin-glazed bowls, jugs and tiles. Dating from the 13th century, the workshops include a kiln of Islamic tradition showing evidence of the movement of craftsmen and knowledge. Includes numerous drawings of kilns and pottery. An important site providing early evidence of the introduction of majolica in Southern France.

Information from Oxbow Book News 37.

Secretary’s Notes

The group’s AGM and Council meeting were held on 29th June during the three-day conference in Winchester. Reports on the MPRG’s finances indicate they are currently in a healthy state, but that fund raising needs to continue in order to maintain them. Further good news came from the Editorial Committee. Volume 25 of Medieval Ceramics has been published and should have now been received by all subscribers. It was reported that funding for Volume 26 (covering the Dublin Conference papers from 2002) has been located, but not from the Heritage Council. Volume 27 is currently under editorial scrutiny and is just one paper short. The Editorial Committee reported changes for the compilation of the Bibliography. The cost of including this in Medieval Ceramics has proved prohibitive, and its appearance in volume 25 will be the last. However, close liaison with the online Bibliography (previously hosted by Liverpool University, now at the ADS as of 2010) will mean that the information will continue to be updated and available online. Council will be looking to appoint someone to compile and maintain this resource in the near future. The Meetings Secretary revealed details of forthcoming conferences. 2005 will see a one-day event at Oxford’s Ashmolean Museum on the theme of ‘Pottery in Public’, and in 2006 a three-day conference is planned at Chester, with the provisional theme of investigating pottery connected with institutions.

The AGM also voted new Council members into position. Both the AGM and Council extended many thanks to Lorraine Mepham, Victoria Bryant, Jacqueline Pearce, Jennie Stopford and Liz Pieksma who have come to the end of their time on the Council; and also to Duncan Brown for having organised the hugely successful Winchester conference. The newly elected council members are Mark Redknap (Vice President), Stanley Cauvain (Co editor), Chris Jarret (Assistant Editor), Julie Edwards (Ordinary Member) and Anne Boyle (Secretary).

Other issues raised during the AGM included a request for members’ input to the European Production Centres Database. The EAA are developing the idea and a round-table discussion is scheduled for September in Lyons. Lucy Whittingham invited further contributions to Medieval Ceramics honouring the work of John Hurst. Discussions on how John’s memory can further be commemorated are to be discussed by the Council, and ideas such as updating the bibliography of his work were put forward during the AGM.

The next Council meeting is due to be held on Tuesday, 12th October at the Society of Antiquaries. Any comments or issues to be raised at that meeting should be directed to me before then for inclusion on the agenda.

Anne Boyle, Secretary

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President’s Notes

In the Spring, the President gave a research seminar to King Alfred’s College, Winchester about MPRG and its considerable achievements over the past 10 years, areas that still need to be addressed and some new initiatives.

The achievements include the publication of A Guide to the Classification of Medieval Ceramic Forms (1998); the Minimum Standards for the Processing, Recording, Analysis and Publication on Post-Roman Ceramics (2001); the Scientific Analysis of Archaeological Ceramics (2001); the digitisation of the National Bibliography and finally the National Database of Medieval Pottery Production in England: a new gazetteer, available on CD ROM (2003), has attracted considerable interest in other parts of the United Kingdom, Ireland and on the Continent.

The Group’s submission to APPAG (the All Parliamentary Group) in 2001, focussed on the state of ceramic studies of all periods. It was perceived that there was:

1. A need for increased resources for synthesis
2. Increased support for archive and reference collections
3. An increase in teaching of ceramics in universities

In 2004 these issues still need to be addressed, but King Alfred’s, now University College, Winchester were stimulated to consider these issues. University College are now considering introducing a placement in year 2, leading to a dissertation in year 3. Is this something other academic institutions might explore?

For the past two years there has been an initiative at European level, led by Guus Lange of ROB in Holland, for a cyberspace European Reference Collection for all archaeological material culture. Professor Clive Orton (past President) gave a keynote address and Maureen Mellor, as President, was asked to give a paper on ‘Building quality in working collections’ at a workshop in Amerfoort. In order to test these concepts and make the best use of technology, the President carried out a straw-poll, over three days, amongst the curators of the ceramic reference collections in the United Kingdom. A fifty percent response was achieved and a further five responses were received after the workshop. The results of the survey were presented at the conference (see below), in order to stimulate discussion on a joined-up bottom up approach.

Reference collections and type series are vital for research and must be kept up-to-date. Such collections enable us to build quality into our data and the collection of quality data is essential. These resources should be part of the discussion, within the English Heritage led initiative to produce regional research guidelines. Spin-offs include a common terminology which is all the more pressing as we begin to put material on the web. The Group’s online listing on the MPRG website is an extremely useful resource, please look at it and make sure the details of your local and regional type series and reference collections are up-to-date.

Surveys, such as that carried out by Alexandra Gutierrez, of Higher Education research/teaching do much to keep us in touch with the current state of ceramic studies in the United Kingdom and enable Council to try to find remedies, where necessary.

Another new initiative linked to Europe-wide integration is the Group’s promotion of the database and online resource of European Production Centres. This will be discussed and taken further at the forthcoming EAA conference in Lyons (8th-11th September) which will be attended by the President and Assistant Secretary.

Maureen Mellor, President

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National Gazetteer of Medieval Pottery Production Centres

Have you got your copy of the CD yet? For the next 18 months, until March 2006, the database will be maintained by Phil Marter and anyone wanting to update or make corrections to particular entries will be able to do so by passing new information directly to him. In March 2006, the responsibility for the upkeep of the database will pass to the Medieval Pottery Research Group. So if you have not yet got a copy, contact Phil Marter

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News from the Ashmolean

Dr Susan Walker, took up her post as Keeper of the Department of Antiquities at the Ashmolean in April this year. The Ashmolean has recently heard news of the award of £15m lottery funding to start the rebuilding project. Dr Walker writes: we expect building work to start on site in 2006, for completion in 2008 and reinstallation of the displays and reserve collections in 2009. We expect to begin packing and decanting the collections in the coming winter (2004/5). At the time of writing, the post-Roman ceramics collections have a high profile both in cross-cultural displays on the top floor of the new buildings, and in culturally specific displays on the making of the modern world on the first floor.

Ceramic Events in the Ashmolean Museum

An exhibition of 1000 years of Jingdezhen: 22 September- 8 January

Jingdezhen, in Jiangxi province, has had porcelain kilns, burning since the early 11th century. During this remarkably long history of porcelain making, it became the site of the imperial porcelain kilns from the mid-14th century until the foundation of the Republic in the early 20th century. All the pieces on display are from the Museum’s own extensive collection.

Introductory Study Day: ‘Pottery or Porcelain’?: Saturday 25th September 2004, 10.00-4.00. Cost £25GBP (£9GBP full time students)

Day of Special Interest: ‘Collectors and Collecting’: Saturday 27th November 2004, 10.00-4.00. Cost £40GBP (£20GBP full time students). Includes lunch and glass of wine.

For more information or to make a booking please contact the Ashmolean Education team on 01865 278015

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New websites

Announcing TileWeb, a new website at the Ashmolean and collaborative venture between Worcester City Museums and Art Gallery and the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, enabled in part by the Millennium Commission.

Announcing the new website of the Prehistoric Ceramics Research Group.

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Regional Group Reports

Scottish Group

Skinnergate, Perth (© SUAT Ltd)

Skinnergate, Perth

Recent developer funded excavations on the Skinnergate in Perth located up to 14 separate floor levels overlying each other to formation level. The pottery assemblage recovered from these deposits implies that there may be as little as 150 years between the highest and lowest floors, this has interesting implications for the level of renewal of timber buildings in the medieval burgh. This site has also produced yet another fragment of North German stove tile dating to the 15th or 16th centuries.

Redware Sourcing

Historic Scotland have now commissioned this follow on to the redware pilot study of 1997 and the project members are in the process of collecting brick, tile, pottery and clay samples.

Perth High Street Excavation

SUAT Ltd have been commissioned by Historic Scotland to manage the post-excavation programme on the late Nicholas Bogdan’s excavations to completion. As part of this all the imported pottery will be laid out for a specialist seminar in September or October of this year.

Scottish contact

Secretary’s Notes

Council met on 20th January at the Society of Antiquaries in London. Top of the agenda was a forward strategy for the group. As a starting point for discussion, the President circulated an outline document, taking as its starting point Medieval Ceramic Studies in England (1994). On a more specific note, Council discussed ways in which MPRG could have input into the current EH-led initiative to produce regional research guidelines. One region (East Anglia) has already published a research agenda; other regions are in various stages of consultation or resource assessment. It would be desirable to get representation on to the various steering groups if we want direct input into these projects. Access to information is the key – we need to stress that HERs should contain proper records of finds and environmental data, and require indices so that researchers can find key sites, findspots, etc. So much ceramic work is currently published only in grey literature. Digital data is also of increasing importance – in the future, HERs will be attaching site archives (including digital data) to their records.

Volume 25 of Medieval Ceramics will be out shortly. This volume has received over 50% funding through various grants (which will be fully acknowledged in the volume). Volume 26, which will carry papers from the Irish conference in 2002, is also well advanced, and sufficient papers have already been received for Volume 27, which will include the Scottish White Gritty Wares report. The Editorial Committee’s aim to seek a higher level of funding for these and future volumes will enable us to build up reserves which could be used, for example, for digital publishing projects.

The provisional programme and booking form for this year’s annual conference in Winchester are circulated with this newsletter, together with agenda and reports for the AGM which will be held at the conference. We hope to see as many members as possible there, for what promises to be a very stimulating conference. It is hoped that next year’s conference, which will be a one-day event, will be held at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford. Some members may also be planning to attend the EAA conference to be held in Lyons in September, where MPRG will be represented in order to discuss the European Production Centres Project.

The next Council meeting will be held during the Winchester conference.

Lorraine Mepham, Secretary

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Database of European Production Centres

The proposal for a round table at this years EAA conference in Lyons has now been accepted by the scientific committee. With this in mind I have created a group e-mail list in order to keep all interested parties up to speed. If anyone has not registered an interest in this project with me could they please do so.

Derek Hall, Assistant Secretary

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Regional Research Frameworks

The development of regional research frameworks is being encouraged, and in part funded, by English Heritage in an attempt to close the gap between research/academic archaeology and PPG16 led fieldwork. These are local initiatives influenced by local archaeologists and will have an effect on future work. The best way to make sure that a ceramic research agenda is included in the framework for your region is to participate in the meetings. The first stage is the resource assessment (what do we have and what are the problems and potential of the resource) followed by the compilation of the research frameworks. This is the state of play as of February.

1. East Anglia – Published and now undergoing a revision
2. West Midlands – The resource assessment is almost finished with many papers on-line but further meetings will be held in 2005
3. East Midlands – About half way through the resource assessment stage
4. North West – About 9 months into the resource assessment
5. London – Completed
6. Kent – Submitted proposal
7. South West – At project design stage
8. North East – At project design stage

Having been involved in the West Midlands Regional Research Frameworks I would encourage any one who isn’t already to get involved.

Victoria Bryant MA MIFA, Historic Environment Record Manager, Worcestershire County Council Historic Environment and Archaeology Service, Woodbury Hall, University College Worcester, Henwick Grove, Worcester WR2 6AJ, tel 01905 855494

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MPRG Bibliography

Now that the decision has been taken to no longer publish a bibliography in Medieval Ceramics but to concentrate on an online version can I direct members to http://ntserver002.liv.ac.uk/mprg/ where they will find this excellent resource.

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In Memory of John Hurst

The editors would like to invite any member of MPRG to contribute towards compiling a fitting tribute to John in the next journal. This will be published in the spring of 2005. As well as formal obituaries it would be nice to include shorter contributions from anybody who feels they would like to comment on their association with John, either as a work/pottery colleague, travelling companion or simply for his friendship.

Please send any submissions or photographs you may have to; The Editors, MPRG c/o MOLSS Mortimer Wheeler House, London, N1 7ED by 1st September 2004.

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Subscriptions

Can those of you who have not yet paid your subscriptions for 2004 please do so? Any queries please contact Nigel Jeffries

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Historical Archaeology Conference: Continuity and Change

York, 5-10 January 2005

We have a dedicated conference webpage or via University of York webspace.

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Regional Group Reports

Scottish Group

Sourcing Scottish White Gritty Ware

The first draft report on this project has now been submitted to Historic Scotland, with the intention of publication in Medieval Ceramics and SAIR (Scottish Archaeological Internet Reports). As part of this project Dr Richard Jones and his students carried out further geophysical survey of the unscheduled and uncultivated field directly adjacent to the excavated kilns at Colstoun.

Proposed Seminar

The Scottish Group is holding a seminar on 30th April in Customs House, Leith with the main focus of discussion being the continuing plough damage at the Colstoun production centre. Progress on the New Review of pottery imported into Medieval Scotland will also be discussed. There are still spaces available for this please contact me if you are interested in attending.

Malagan Lustreware from Horsecross, Perth

Excavations at Horsecross, Perth

The initial spot dating of the large assemblage from the Horsecross excavation has just been completed. It contains the first examples of an 11th/12th century fabric which is also found in Lincolnshire (pers comm A Vince) and some rare examples of late medieval imported wares from Iberia and Green Glazed stonewares from Siegburg in Germany. D Hall can also confirm that it has also produced several pieces of kiln furniture, the potters are out here somewhere on the northern limits of Perth!

Scottish contact

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Computer Based Methodologies for Pottery Analysis

English Heritage is funding the development of a flexible database system for the cataloguing, dissemination and archiving of archaeological data. On completion of the project, it is intended that the system will be made freely available to other archaeologists. The pilot scheme at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, Cambridge, is being implemented by Phil Mills through a study the Romano-British pottery assemblage from Hayton, East Yorkshire, under the direction of Prof Martin Millett and Dr Jerry Evans. It is intended that the database will be developed to become as useful for ceramics of any period, for small finds and even animal bones.

The development team are well aware that to make the most of the technology it is important that implement strategies are discussed among likely users. They duly organised a one-day conference to explain and demonstrate how the system is being developed and requesting and encouraging feedback from delegates in order to improve the database. On Saturday 24th April 2004, Anna Slowikowski and I were among twenty delegates at the meeting held.at the McDonald Institute.

The title, ‘Digital archiving for the pottery specialist made easy’ held a clue to the hidden agenda, the wish that users would in the fullness of time, deposit their archives with the Archaeology Data Service (ADS), and in the morning, as well as useful introductions by Millett, Evans and Mills, we had the sales pitch from the ADS rep. Apart, of course, from lunch and the networking opportunities, the ‘best bit’ was in the afternoon, a 90-minute workshop, a hands-on session playing with the database and offering our criticisms. This was followed by more than enough time in seminar for feed back between the delegates.

The system allows linking to context information, and to in-house and regional or national fabric and form ‘type’ series. It incorporates software for analysis as well as for data entry. It is intended to be used alongside excel and word to produce report ready tables and graphs. It can produce drawing lists. In my opinion, the system is already readily adaptable for use at multi-period sites, and I am joining the queue to get a copy as soon as possible.

Our meetings Secretary is endeavouring to get at least a demonstration of the system at the MPRG annual conference in Winchester in June. A report on the project is to be given at the Roman Pottery Research Group conference on 3rd-5th July 2004.

Katherine Barclay

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An Unusual Medieval Floor Tile From Chester

A somewhat worn medieval floor tile excavated by Chester Archaeology from the nave of Chester Cathedral is on display alongside ancient silks and T’ang ceramics in a major exhibition at the British Library. The tile is one of several hundred exhibits which have been loaned by museums in China, Japan, India, France, Germany and the United Kingdom for ‘The Silk Road: Trade, Travel, War and Faith’. The exhibition explores the history, cultures and everyday life of the ancient route through central Asia. The floor tile was made in Cheshire but the reason for its inclusion in the exhibition is its design of three hares linked by their ears so that whilst only three ears have been drawn each hare has two ears (see Figure).

This motif also appears in wall paintings dating from the seventh century found in the elaborately decorated Caves of a Thousand Buddhas at Dunhuang, north-west China. These caves were used as shrines where merchants would go to pray before setting off on their long journeys. It has been suggested that the motif travelled along the Silk Road eventually appearing in northern Europe in the fourteenth/fifteenth century. The design appears on a relatively small number of tiles found in Chester and there is only one complete example from the city; the same motif but in a different design also appears on a tile from Long Crendon, Oxfordshire. A group of researchers (The Three Hares Project) have been recording objects and buildings where the three hares occur in an effort to prove the origins of the design. The exhibition runs from 7th May to 12th September 2004.

Julie Edwards

Secretary’s Notes

Council met on 15th October at the Society of Antiquaries in London. The Editorial Committee once again reported good progress, both with the publication of forthcoming volumes of Medieval Ceramics and also with the receipt of various grants towards publication, including a grant from the Marc Fitch Fund toward Volume 25. This should be out early in the New Year. The next two volumes will feature, respectively, the papers from the Irish conference in 2002 and, it is hoped, a report on Scottish White Gritty Wares.

The group still holds a substantial quantity of back numbers of MC. In order to shift this stock, and to raise further funds for the Group, Council have decided to offer these to members at reduced prices – details appear elsewhere in this Newsletter.

Discussions continue over the Bibliography. Although only one response was received following the note in the last newsletter asking for members’ views, it was decided that we will no longer produce a published version of the Bibliography, but we will still support the collection of data for the on-line version.

Alongside as our immediate concerns, the President directed our thoughts towards future strategy. There is currently an EH-led initiative to produce regional guidelines in an attempt to put research back into developer-funded fieldwork. We feel that MPRG should be involved in such a process. However, if we are to produce anything, it must be something short, snappy and focused that curators can use easily. Starting points could be Maureen Mellor’s 1994 Survey, our submission to APPAG, and Alejandra Gutierrez’s recent questionnaire on teaching and research in higher education. We could, for example, push for decent indices of ceramic work to be incorporated into revamped SMRs/HERs, as there is now government money available for upgrading these.

Council again discussed ways of commemorating John Hurst through the work of the Group. A few replies were received after the invitation for suggestions in the last newsletter – a travel fund and a research fund for students were suggested. Council thought a memorial lecture was the easiest option, and that a ‘general research fund’ in John’s memory could cover several options.

In February 2003, MPRG was approached by a Hungarian archaeologist mooting the idea of European project on production centres. This was followed up at a round table discussion at EAA conference in St Petersburg, attended byDerek Hall and Maureen Mellor. It was suggested that MPRG might like to promote such a project, involving setting up a database for European production centres. Preliminary discussions have already been held with King Alfred’s College, who currently hold the database of production centres in England, and with EH. Part of the project would be to put the resulting database on-line. Derek Hall gives further details of this project below.

You will receive with this newsletter the preliminary publicity for next year’s annual conference – a three day event in Winchester on the subject of Transformation. Further details and booking forms will be available with the next Newsletter in April.

The next Council meeting will be held on Tuesday 20th January.

Lorraine Mepham, Secretary

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Back Copies of Medieval Ceramics

Ever felt that there was something missing from your bookshelf? Why not remedy this straight away by looking at what copies of Medieval Ceramics are still available at £5 each – or why not buy 10 and get one free?

As you can see there are complete runs from Volume 11, and earlier numbers might be able to be scanned at extra cost. All requests for back numbers should initially be sent to Nigel Jeffries, Membership Secretary.

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Database of medieval pottery production centres in England: a new resource for archaeology

Among the principal recommendations arising from the English Heritage review Medieval Ceramic Studies in England was the need for ‘an initiative to establish a national list of production centres, recording the whereabouts of the finds, references to publication, or the current state of work’ (Mellor 1994, 32). Behind this recommendation lay widely-expressed concerns within the profession about the disappointing rate of publication of excavated production sites and the desire to improve identification and common nomenclatures for medieval pottery in order to avoid inconsistencies in reporting. It was felt a new national database could help to address these concerns and provide a basis for further technical studies of kilns, as well as informing cost-effective research and raising awareness of the importance of production centres generally.

Between May 1997 and June 2000 a project was established at King Alfred’s College, Winchester which was designed to address these issues. The project was designed and managed by Chris Gerrard, undertaken by Phil Marter and funded by English Heritage. The procedure was simple. Information held on medieval pottery production sites (defined here as c850-1600 AD) in England was obtained from the National Monument Record Long-listings and Excavation Index and from county Sites and Monuments Records, 70% of whom responded to requests for information. To these two sources were added data collated by the Medieval Ceramics Survey and that stored with the National Reference Collection of Medieval Ceramics at the British Museum. Major published national and regional data sets such as McCarthy and Brooks (1991), Musty (1969), Vince (1984), Victoria County Histories and published documentary sources (Lay Subsidy ‘potting-related’ names, for example) were also input, as well as information from local and national journals such as Medieval Archaeology and Medieval Ceramics. An advance digital copy of the thin-sections database allowed descriptions of thin-sections from pottery fragments found at kiln sites to be linked in. About half of the forty-five county museums targeted responded to a request for accession numbers for their holdings. These sources, nearly 1500 in all, were then cross-checked against the National Medieval Ceramics bibliography to verify a master database of some 4500 entries which was circulated to regional secretaries of the Medieval Pottery Research Group for further checking.

The key to the success of the project has been to design and manage a series of linked tables within a Microsoft Access database. This allows the researcher easily to interrogate the information held within the database. The database contains records of archaeological investigations or events (eg excavations), kilns, components (eg waster dumps), pottery fabrics, forms (standardised using the Classification of Medieval Pottery Forms; MPRG 1998) and sources (eg article reference). The relational structure of the database allows the researcher to interrogate the data in various ways such as looking for pottery kilns by county, by date, and so on. There are 738 kilns recorded on the database, 97 waster pits, 80 buildings interpreted as potters’ workshops or living accommodation, as well as a wide range of associated features such as clay pits, puddling floors, fuel dumps, fences, drains and boundary ditches. Unsurprisingly, there has been strong bias in favour of recording kilns, which comprise 60% of all the recorded elements from medieval pottery production centres in England. Neither is the work evenly spread, some counties like Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Yorkshire having strong track records of excavation and wider synthetic research, others such as Cheshire, Cambridgeshire, Durham, Lancashire and Warwickshire being far less well represented. The bibliography confirms that much of the recent work has been undertaken by a small pool of active researchers, with a notable lack of recent academic research into medieval pottery production being undertaken through universities and MPhil and PhD levels. Very few recent theses were identified in the course of this project, the weight of publication strongly favouring short descriptive articles rather than broader scale analysis of results. It is a sign of the times that the basis of modern research into kiln classification remains Musty (1974) and that, with some notable exceptions (Le Patourel 1968; Moorhouse 1983), documentary evidence for the medieval pottery industry remains untapped.

Between November 2002 and March 2003 the format of the database was finalised and is now equipped with an ‘easy-to-use’ front end complete with a selection of regularly used data queries and a help file. The data will be made available free of charge on CD to all those who originally supplied information to the project. For anyone else who would like a copy, the database is available at cost on CD and in hard copy (price per page), plus postage and packing from Phil Marter, King Alfred’s College, Winchester SO22 4NR. For anyone wanting more information, a website explaining the project and giving examples of the data available can be found online. For the next three years, until March 2006, the database will be maintained by Phil Marter and anyone willing to update or make corrections to particular entries will be able to do so by passing new information directly to him. In March 2006 the responsibility for the upkeep of the database will pass to the Medieval Pottery Research Group.

Le Patourel, J, 1968. Documentary evidence and the medieval pottery industry, Medieval Archaeol 12, 101-126

MPRG (Medieval Pottery Research Group) 1998. A Guide to the classification of medieval ceramic forms. MPRG Occasional Paper 1. London; Medieval Pottery Research Group

Mellor, M, 1994. Medieval Ceramic Studies in England. A review for English Heritage. London; English Heritage

Moorhouse, S, 1983. Documentary evidence and its potential for understanding the inland movement of medieval pottery, Medieval Ceramics 7, 45-87

Musty, J, 1974. Medieval pottery kilns, in VI Evison, H Hodges and JG Hurst (eds), Medieval pottery from excavations: studies presented to Gerald Clough Dunning, with a bibliography of his works, 41-67. London: J Baker

C Gerrard and P Marter

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Database of European Production Centres

Following a round table session at last years EAA conference in St Petersburg it was decided to take forward Zsolt Vagner’s suggestion of a European database along similar lines to the one described by Chris Gerrard and Phil Marter above. For this to work successfully we need several European partners with a view to submitting a bid to Culture 2000 later this year. It is our intention to have a day session on this subject at this year’s EAA conference in Lyons in September. I would like to ask anybody who might be interested in becoming part of this potentially exciting project to contact me in the first place so that I can register their interest.

Derek Hall, Assistant Secretary

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Regional Group Reports

Scottish Group

Stove Tile from St Giles Cathedral, Edinburgh (© SUAT Ltd)

Stove Tiles

Fragments from these high status central heating systems were very rare finds in Scotland until recently when several have been recovered from excavations in Edinburgh, St Andrews and Perth. The example from St Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh appears to be from a chained unicorn, the jury is still out as to whether this might be a fragment from the Scottish Royal Coat of Arms.

Scottish Redware Sourcing

It is hoped to start this ICPS project in the new financial year and as part of it the participants would like to include samples from redware brick and tile works. If anyone has or knows of a collection of named Scottish bricks could they contact either Derek Hall or George Haggarty.

Can I ask for more regional group reports from people please? I know that we are busy little bees up here but I am sure that some of you are as well.

Scottish contact

Secretary’s Notes

Council met on 17th June at the Society of Antiquaries in Piccadilly. Much of the meeting was taken up with editorial business and our recent fund-raising efforts. We also discussed the Bibliography.

Volume 25 of Medieval Ceramics will now appear in the autumn, delayed for John Hurst’s obituary. Volume 26, containing the papers from the Dublin conference, is in preparation, in the capable hands of Clare McCutcheon, and some papers have already been received for Volume 27.

Peter Davey attended the Council meeting to discuss the Bibliography. The online version is curated (at no cost to MPRG) at Liverpool University, and is updated from the Annual Bibliography (about 350 entries every year). The online version also contains a large amount of backlog material (not published in Medieval Ceramics), resulting from volunteers covering whole back-runs of journals, but geographical coverage is uneven. Following the departure of Liz Pieksma, the Annual Bibliography now lacks a co-ordinator. Despite problems, pointed out by Peter Davey, of inconsistent nomenclature, which make it impossible to index the Bibliography satisfactorily for research purposes, all were agreed that the Bibliography is potentially an immensely useful tool. This subject is addressed later on in this newsletter.

The annual meeting on Nottingham in June, organised by Duncan Brown, was very successful – speakers presented a range of stimulating papers on the subject of technology, and the event attracted a number of non-members. Next year’s annual conference will be a three-day event in Winchester on the subject of Change – preliminary details appear elsewhere in this Newsletter.

The Membership Secretary and Treasurer have continued to chase up subscriptions, and are now targeting institutional members. Overseas members are reminded that MPRG now has both euro and dollar accounts, enabling easier payment.

Enclosed with this newsletter is a copy of our very attractive new publicity leaflet. If you can, please display it in a prominent place. This is part of our drive to attract new members.

Our recent problems with our website host have happily now been resolved, thanks to Sue Anderson, and we are now back on-line. Both Sue and Council are looking at ways to improve the website, and would welcome any suggestions (more links to related websites, etc) – please pass on any ideas in the first instance to Victoria Bryant.

The next Council meeting will be held on 15th October; if you have any comments or wish to raise any issues, please contact me before then.

Lorraine Mepham, Secretary

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Dear Members

Your views are sought on two important subjects currently under discussion by Council. Please think about these and pass on any thoughts to Derek Hall.

John Hurst

Council decided at their last meeting that they would like to ask the views of the membership on the best way of commemorating the life and work of John Hurst. One way might be to have a memorial lecture at the MPRG conference in a similar fashion to the current Gerald Dunning lecture. Maybe we could alternate between a Gerald Dunning lecture and a John Hurst one? Several members have suggested setting up a travel fund in John’s name to allow people to travel abroad to conferences or to search for parallel material. Could I ask members to let me know what they would prefer?

MPRG Bibliography

As mentioned earlier on in the Secretary’s notes the time has come for the membership to decide how they would like the Bibliography to proceed. If we were no longer to publish it in Medieval Ceramics but to rely on it as an online internet resource would people miss it? In short is there any need to publish both in print and online? Can I ask for your views on this please.

Derek Hall, Assistant Secretary

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MPRG Annual Conference 2004

Call for Papers

The theme of the conference is ‘Looking at Change’ – we’ll be considering how we identify and interpret changes in the ways pottery was produced, supplied and used, and indeed examining how medieval pottery developed. We’ll also look at how our methods for studying the ceramic record have progressed; and of course, we will be discussing what all those changes might mean.

Any offers of papers should be sent, with their name, contact details, and a draft title with brief description, to: Duncan H Brown, 7 Donnington Grove, Southampton, SO14 1RW.

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Conference

A ‘beautiful and ingenious’ art: a one-day conference on Spanish and Italian lustreware

11th March 2004, The Wallace Collection, Hertford House, Manchester Square, London W1U 3BN

This fascinating conference will address some of the most intriguing aspects of lustreware, from the challenge of producing it to questions of attribution and inspiration. From the Renaissance and the Renaissance Revival to the experience of potters working with lustre today, this conference will provide participants with the opportunity to find out about recent research from experts in the field and to enjoy a visual feast of lustrewares both on screen and in the galleries of the Wallace Collection.

Speakers will include Giulio Busti (Director of the Museo Regionale della Ceramica, Deruta), Alan Caiger-Smith (practising potter), John Mallet (formerly of the Victoria & Albert Museum), Anthony Ray (publications include Spanish Pottery 1248-1898), Dora Thornton (British Museum), Jeremy Warren (Wallace Collection), Steve Wharton (completing a doctoral thesis) and Timothy Wilson (Ashmolean Museum).

Conference fee £35 per person; concessions £25. Advance booking is essential. Payment is by cheque only. Contact Hayley Kruger, The Wallace Collection, tel 020 7563 9551.

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Regional Group Reports

Scottish Group

2003 survey of Colstoun production centre (© University of Glasgow)

Plough damage at Colstoun

A recent geophysical survey at Colstoun as part of the Sourcing Scottish White Gritty Ware project suggests that there has been considerable damage to the site since the last survey of 1999. It is intended to submit a bid to the Historic Scotland archaeology programme to assess how bad this damage is and decide what form of mitigation should be adopted.

Kinlochbervie shipwreck

Members of the group were given the opportunity, by Duncan Brown and Celia Curnow, to view the most recent group of ceramics from this shipwreck. A much larger group of oil jars and tiles was recovered than from the previous season as well as a smaller group of Maoilica.

New Review of imported ceramics

It is planned that Volume 1 of this review will be published by the City of Edinburgh Council early in 2004. This will focus on a catalogue and review of imported wares from France, Spain and Italy.

EAA conference, St Petersburg, Russia

Derek Hall attended this conference and gave a paper on the Scottish Medieval Pottery Industry to a mixed audience of Dutch, French, Russian. Macedonian and English delegates! One potentially important thing to come out of the ceramic session is the plan to create a database of European Ceramic Production Centres. This idea has been given EAA backing and will be discussed at the next MPRG council meeting.

Scottish contact

Secretary’s Notes

Council met on 21st January at the Society of Antiquaries. Once again this was a very full and productive meeting. The President began by congratulating all concerned on the appearance of Volume 24 of Medieval Ceramics (distributed early in January), and reported initial good feedback on the volume. Fundraising had drawn in sufficient money to cover the cost of producing Volume 24 and to make the production of Volume 25 viable. All being well, the latter should be ready in time for the June conference. The Editorial Committee are still actively seeking grants and sponsorship towards producing Medieval Ceramics, and are pursuing mutually beneficial advertising offers. With the emphasis of fundraising focused on the journal, production of our new publicity leaflet has stalled – preliminary efforts to attract sponsorship were unsuccessful, but we shall be returning to this at a later date.

MPRG was represented at the APPAG (All Party Parliamentary Archaeology Group) meeting in December. APPAG’s report has now been published. APPAG is concentrating its attention on SMRs, with a view to improving relevant legislation, but outside the meeting the lack of provision for synthetic projects was the subject of some dismay. This point is raised in the APPAG report, along with concern over the dwindling number of specialists, and a general lack of interest in artefacts. On a similar subject, an umbrella organisation (Heritage Link) has just been formed, to raise the profile of the Heritage sector with government, and Council felt that MPRG should become involved if at all practicable. We are also considering closer links with other societies, such as the Societies for Medieval Archaeology and Post-Medieval Archaeology, and the Finds Research Group. We should be making our voice heard.

From the Treasurer, the news that the Group is solvent was thankfully received. Thanks to our Membership Secretary’s work on the membership list, subscriptions have been successfully chased, although we still have a problem with institutional members whose annual payments are more difficult to track. Gift Aid also seems to have been causing some confusion – the Treasurer has received contradictory responses from the Inland Revenue on the subject, and is still not sure what is correct. Despite this uncertainty, we are re-circulating the Gift Aid forms with this newsletter – please take a moment to fill one in and return it, unless you have already done so, or think that your tax definitely cannot be claimed back.

Our Bibliography co-ordinator, Liz Pieksma, sadly announced her resignation at the meeting due to other commitments. Council decided that this would be a good time to consider what we really need from the Bibliography, and how it should be structured. Meanwhile we thank Liz for all her hard work on the Bibliography so far.

The next MPRG annual meeting is in Nottingham on 14th June, with the theme of Technology – advance publicity has already been circulated and a number of bookings made. Fuller details and booking forms are enclosed with this newsletter – we hope to see as many members as possible there for what promises to be a stimulating conference. Our AGM will also be held at the conference, and an agenda with accompanying minutes, etc. is also enclosed here.

On a sad note, the recent death was announced of Peter Farmer, whom some of us met last year in Dublin, a conference which he made the effort to attend after an absence from active participation in the Group of many years. An obituary will appear in the next volume of Medieval Ceramics.

The next Council meeting will be held in the third week in June; if you have any comments or wish to raise any issues, please contact me before then.

Lorraine Mepham, Secretary

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John Hurst

All of us involved with archaeological ceramic studies were shocked to hear of the violent death of John Hurst in Stamford. Struck down with him was his lifetime store of knowledge and experience, much of it irreplaceable. Our thoughts are with his family at this difficult time. A full obituary will appear in Medieval Ceramics.

Maureen Mellor, President

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Bird Pots – Appeal for Information

MPRG has received the following appeal for information regarding bird pots:

I am currently at UCL researching the instance of Bird pots/bottles/jars (also referred to as nesting pots or sparrow pots or starling pots) in the archaeological record.

Type 2 above, Type 1 below

These red or grey earthenware vessels have a date range of c1500 to c1850 and are usually locally made, but occasionally seem to be Dutch imports. The fifty or so I know of, from the London area, are of two types. The majority are Type 1 (see photos – a cutaway base with a keyhole attachment, plus nib or handle with a hole for a perch) with only two Type 2s (see photos – square cutaway in the base and a separate hole for attachment to the wall of a building). A number of other types are known from Dutch paintings. If you have, or know of, any complete pots or sherds, I would be very grateful if you could fill in the information requested below and return it to Mr ATD Cooper, 59 Potters Road, Barnet, Hertfordshire EN5 5HS.

1. Site address; date excavated; type of structure excavated
2. Context; description; spotdate of context; earliest date; latest date
3. Bird pot type if known; description of sherds or complete pot
4. Dimensions if possible (mm); base diam; rim diam; height; colour; fabric
5. Estimated number of vessels; current location; publication reference
6. Any other known literary reference
7. What is believed to be the function of these pots?
8. Other comments; Museum Accession Number

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Undelivered Medieval Ceramics

Two journals of Vol 24 (surname A-N) were delivered back to MoLSS with address labels missing so we have no way of knowing who didn’t receive their journal. These people need to contact Nigel Jeffries at MoLSS.

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Worcestershire Online Ceramic Fabric and Form Type-Series

The Worcestershire online fabric and form type-series is the first part of Pottery in Perspective, an innovative project to provide information on the pottery used in Worcestershire from prehistory to cAD1900.

The county fabric series currently contains 250 pottery types dating from the Neolithic to the 19th century and includes types which are of national and international interest. Extensive analysis of ceramic production and consumer sites has resulted in a substantial corpus of illustrated vessel forms. These resources, along with the results of 30 years research and synthesis, are essential to researchers studying material culture in the Worcestershire region, but are not generally easily accessible.

The online fabric and form type-series brings this data together into one accessible research resource. For each type of pottery the database contains information on:

• Fabric
• Manufacture
• Forms
• Source
• Distribution
• Date

In addition there are magnified images of pottery sections to aid identification, together with bibiographical references for each fabric including cross references to other fabric series. The search engine facilitates general and detailed searches.

The database you can see now is just a small part of the whole project and will develop over the next two years. At the moment it only contains information on medieval fabrics but, when complete, it will include:

• Prehistoric, Roman and post-medieval fabrics (Roman fabrics by June 2003, prehistoric fabrics by December 2003, post-medieval fabrics by June 2004)
• Overviews of the ceramic history of the county
• A form type-series for each fabric with descriptions, images, dates and bibliographies
• Information on kiln sites, including text, dates, maps and bibliographies
• Descriptions and images of thin sections
• Photographs of typical sherds as well as sections
• Database of all the pottery assemblages in the county linked to the Historic Environment Record GIS

This digital resource will help researchers address the complex economic and social questions generated by the material, and has regional and national applications. At present this is a specialist database, but it is being developed for use in schools as well as in the wider community.

We are hoping that the project provides a model for the dissemination of resources using the web. The wider adoption of this model for regional or national fabric and form type-series would provide a resource flexible enough to cope with regional traditions but consistent enough to facilitate the study of widely distributed pottery types.

The fabric and form series was developed by the Archaeology Service of Worcestershire County Council. Its development as an online resource is being undertaken with the Ceramic Research Centre (a partnership between Worcester Archaeology Service and University College Worcester). The software was developed by OxfordArchDigital. It is a research resource which will support the Historic Environment Record for Worcestershire. For more information on the HER please visit our website.

Fig 2. Example of the form series

Fig 1. Example of general information in the fabric series.

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Regional Group Reports

Scottish Group

Ring vase

Ongoing excavations by SUAT Ltd at Horsecross in Perth have recovered a fragment of a glazed ceramic ring vase (see picture). This is the first such Scottish example known to the author and appears to be directly associated with the site of the medieval chapel of St. Laurence which stood on part of the site until the 16th century.

Minimum Standards

A recent seminar at Historic Scotland addressed several worrying trends identified by members of the Scottish Group during the fieldwork elements of the important review. This includes excavated ceramics not being marked prior to study and a general sloppiness in the naming of fabrics and their dating. The seminar was very successful and several suggestions at the best way forward are in the process of being addressed by the group.

C14 dates from shelly ware at Perth High Street

Derek Hall has now received all the dates from the sherds of carbonised shelly ware from this excavation. All of them fall consistently between the 9th and 11th centuries AD and would seem to indicate that the early phases of activity on this site are pre-burgal. The identification of these fabrics as being London-type shelly wares would now seem unlikely given such early dates, further research will be required.

Scottish contact