POTSHERD : Atlas of Roman Pottery
potsherd •
Potsherd
+Home
+Atlas
+Publications
+FAQ

Wares
+All wares

Classes
+All classes
+Amphoras
+Coarse wares
+Fine wares
+Mortaria
+Terra Sigillata

Sources
+All sources
+Africa
+Britain
+Gaul
+Germany
+Iberia
+Italy
+Eastern Empire

Databases
+All databases
+Pottery kilns (GB)
+Samian forms
+NRFRC

Bibliographies
+JRPS (GB)
+SFECAG (FR)

Other topics
+Tools
+Sherd scans
+Site albums

Malvernian coarse wares
Class : Coarse wares
Source : Britain
Distribution in Britain
map
  • Click on the image (or here) for larger map.
  • This is a hectad map. More details of the data and mapping are available here.
  • Compare the distribution of this ware with others
Distribution summary
Illustration
National Roman Fabric Reference Collection
(Tomber & Dore 1998)
Cross-reference from this group to fabric descriptions published in The National Roman Fabric Reference Collection (1998):
MAL RE A
Malvernian Group A Reduced ware p.147

Illustrations of these fabrics are available only in the printed catalogue: R. Tomber & J. Dore, The national Roman fabric reference collection. A handbook Museum of London Archaeology Service, London. MOLAS monograph 2. (1998).

Summary
Cooking pots in coarse grey or black wares produced in the Malvern Hills region (Hereford & Worcs/GB) and distibuted in western Britain during the 2nd to 4th centuries AD.
Fabric and technology
Hard, slightly rough fabric; usually black or dark grey (N3) throughout, sometimes with red-orange (7.5YR 6/8) patches or margins; abundant angular fragments of metamorphic rocks, quartz, white and pink feldspar and hornblende (regularly up to 3mm, occasionally 10mm); wiped, burnished or smoothed surfaces. Hand-formed, but see note on wheel-thrown fabrics below. Inclusions are crushed igneous and metamorphic rocks from the Malvern Hills.
Forms
Most frequent form is 'tubby cooking pot' with thickened or beaded rim and vertical burnished streaks on the body; also everted-rim cooking pots and bead-rim dishes, based on BB1 prototypes.
Chronology
Pottery production in the Malvern district is attested since middle Iron Age (Peacock 1969). The hand-made forms described date from 2nd cent. AD. Increasing quantities of wheel-thrown fabrics with similar, but finer, inclusions during 3rd/4th cent. when BB-derived forms become increasingly common. Some overlap between these fabrics and grey Severn Valley wares.
Source
The Malvern region.
Distribution
Principally Herefordshire and Worcestershire, with a scatter to the east, north and (particularly) west, into South Wales.
Aliases
Gloucester fabrics TF18 and TF19B. JRPS bibliography fabric mlv. Sidbury fabrics 3 and 19.
Bibliography
Vince 1977. Discussion of dating in Darlington and Evans 1992, 48-51.
References
Darlington and Evans 1992.
Darlington, J. and Evans, J., 'Roman Sidbury, Worcester excavations 1959-1989', TWorcsAS, 13, (1992), pp. 5-104.
Peacock 1969.
Peacock, D. P. S., 'A petrological study of certain Iron Age pottery from Western England', PPS, 34, (1969), pp. 414-27.
Vince 1977.
Vince, A. G., 'The Medieval and Post-Medieval Ceramic Industry of the Malvern Region: The Study of a Ware and its Distribution' in Pottery and Commerce: Characterisation and Trade in Roman and Later Ceramics., ed. D. P. S. Peacock, Academic Press, London, (1977), pp. 257-305.

  • URL: http://www.potsherd.uklinux.net/atlas/Ware/MALV • Author: • Last updated: 21 July, 2006