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(6.VI); the remaining sites produced, so far as can be inferred, grey wares
for local markets. The kilns at Springhead (Southfleet) and Swanscombe may
have operated within the Thameside-Cliffe peninsula rural nucleation, at its
western extremity, or as a separate group or succession of sites serving the
small town and religious complex at Vagniacae. The New Ash Green
(Ash-cum-Ridley) kilns lay close to a villa centre, but on high ground some
distance from the River Darent and thus in geographical isolation from the
Thameside potteries. Kiln 1 (Swan's notation, 1984) lay within a possible
field system (cf. Mucking: Jones and Rodwell 1973) and may have fired BB2 as
well as grey wares. Kiln 2 was adjacent to, but antedating the stone phase
of, a villa outbuilding. Neither is thought to post-date the second century.
Richborough has been cited already as the raison d'être for
various potteries known and putative (6.III.2, 6.IV.1). The kiln site at
Preston, it is argued below (6.VIII), existed at least in part to capitalise
on the potential custom of the garrison of the Saxon Shore fort and its vicus.
The enigmatic group of pottery 'kiln waste' (5.IV.2) would seem to
represent a dependent individual workshop within the early military supply
base or perhaps the small town 'port of entry' that succeeded the base.
In view of the strong indigenous potting tradition in east Kent, it is
unlikely that the army or fleet would have taken any direct role in pottery
manufacture, and a civilian concern can be postulated with confidence. The
existence of another individual workshop just across the county boundary,
near Titsey in Surrey, is also worth noting (Swan 1984, 627, Tatsfield).
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V. NUCLEATED WORKSHOPS
1. The Thames-Medway Industry
The model of four elements of this industry - the Thameside and Cliffe
peninsula grey wares, the Hoo flagons, the Rochester mortaria, and the
Medway estuary grey and fine wares - has been introduced above (5.11). It
has been proposed that up to the late Antonine period the first of these
operated as a series of individual workshops in mutual contact but with an
essentially localised custom for a range of forms common to all sites. The
evidence for the Hoo and Rochester potteries rests solely with the vessels
themselves, products of workshops assuredly, but at what level of
organisation? The lack of other evidence for mortarium production in this
part of Kent is suggestive of an individual workshop, though mortaria were
made at Thurrock along with flagons and utility vessels (Drury 1973). The
relationships between Thurrock, Rochester, Canterbury and Colchester in the
second century remain to be explained. Swan (1984, 403) considers that at
Hoo the 'range of vessels may imply production geared mainly to military
markets', a theory favoured also for the possibly contemporary kiln sites
at Otford and Eccles (ibid., 406, 389, respectively). A pre-Flavian
military presence at key points of communication on the rivers of Kent has
yet to be identified, though Eccles may have had military connections
(Detsicas 1976, 162). The military/estate models are examined below.
The fine ware potteries of the Upchurch Marshes may have
nucleated from their earliest years. Their location may have been determined
in no small measure by the development of the villas at Hartlip and Boxted
within the first century A.D. in an area which exhibits signs of
considerable wealth at this time, as is also reflected by the number of rich
early post-Conquest
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