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Hartley (1968, 174) has shown that the mortaria of the latter industry
encroached upon the Kent products' markets share at Richborough in the
second century, and were even able to compete in Canterbury itself with the
indigenous pottery (Hartley 1963; 1973a, fig. 7) during the Antonine period.
Colchester mortaria of this date have also been recorded at Dover (Hartley
1981) and Highstead (Hartley forthcoming). The most common coarse ware in
use at Dover in Periods II and III (c. A.D. 155-180 and 190-210)
would appear to have been BB2, and grey sandy ware roll-rim necked jars
(e.g. Willson 1981, 222-9 and 235-41). The latter could
conceivably be of Canterbury origin, but the lack of other characteristic
Canterbury grey wares here makes this improbable. The roll-rim necked jar
was a ubiquitous product of the later second and third centuries (e.g. in
the lower Thames industries, such as Mucking - Jones and Rodwell 1973,
Type J - and Higham - Pollard 1983b, Gross Form XVI; and at Colchester
- Hull 1963, Form 268), and the possibilities of importation of these
vessels from the Thames estuary or local production at Dover cannot be
disregarded. A Colchester source is unlikely, as the Dover pottery does not
exhibit the shoulder groove(s) characteristic of that industry.
BB2 pie- and dog-dishes were in widespread use in east Kent
prior to the collapse of the Canterbury grey ware industry. Unfortunately, a
lack of independent dating evidence and well-stratified groups have
frustrated attempts to assess the rate and periods of introduction of the
ware to most sites in the east. There is no certain evidence of BB2 at
Canterbury antedating the Hadrianic period: the vessel cited by Williams
(1977, 207) from one of Jenkins' sites (1950, fig. 11, no. 28) came from a
late first-century pit cut by third-century pits, and no well-sealed
examples have come to light during the recent campaign of excavations
undertaken by the Canterbury Archaeological Trust (Macpherson-Grant 1982;
Pollard forthcoming, d). It is probable that BB2 first occurred in east Kent
in the
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Hadrianic period: several pits with fills of Flavian-early Hadrianic date
(Bushe-Fox 1932, Pit 34, no. 339) or late first to mid second (Bushe-Fox
1949, Pit 182: unpublished jar of Gillam 1970, Type 139; Cunliffe 1968, Pit
255: unpublished bead-rim jar of Gillam and Mann 1970, fig. 2, no. 14, and
dog-dish of Gillam 1970, Type 328) contain BB2, but only a single
first-century pit (Bushe-Fox 1949, Pit 76, pre-Flavian) held a BB2 vessel (a
pie-dish with stubby triangular rim and lattice, unpublished), possibly to
be interpreted as intrusive. The earliest BB2 in east Kent may have come
from more than one source: Williams suggested a Colchester origin for a
pie-dish from a late first- to early second-century deposit at Canterbury
(Williams 1977, 208), but postulated a Kentish source for a group of six
vessels from Richborough including lattice decorated pie-dishes and a
decorated dog-dish from late first to early second century contexts (ibid.,
207: Group XVII). That this source continued to supply Richborough in
the late second to mid third century is implied by the inclusion of a plain
pie-dish (datable by typology to c. A.D. 180-250) in this group. A
third source, perhaps in the vicinity of Canterbury, is represented by a
series of coarse-grained, soft, semi-matt BB2 lattice-decorated pie-dishes
from Canterbury occurring in early to late second-century contexts (e.g.
Pollard forthcoming, e, no. 7); the fabric is easily distinguished from the
finer-grained, hard, glossy vessels from the Richborough groups, bearing a
closer resemblance to the Greenhithe BB2 copies (see above).
These Canterbury vessels, and the finer BB2 dishes that are
found alongside them, formed only a small proportion of the city's pottery
in the first half of the second century in comparison with the much greater
numbers of vessels recovered from contexts of c. A.D. 150-220. 17
per cent of the pottery from a well filled in this period (Macpherson-Grant
1982, Well 101; quantification by the present author) comprised BB2, all of
it of plain dish forms, suggesting a
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