THE INTELLECTUAL OBSERVES. 



OCTOBER, 1865. 



ROMAN POTTEKY— THE UPCHURCH WARE. 



BY THOMAS WEIGHT, E.S.A. 

 {With a Coloured Plate.) 



The class of Roman pottery I now proceed to describe involves 

 a rather curious geological question, as well as an archaeological 

 fact. Below Chatham,, the River Medway expands into a 

 succession of reaches, which become wider and wider until it 

 unites with the Thames at Sheerness. Erom Rainham, about 

 three miles below Chatham, to the Swale, which separates the 

 main land from the Isle of Sheppey, the land on the south 

 side of the Medway, which here runs nearly from west to 

 east, is low and marshy for some distance from the shore. 

 This low ground is cut, by the encroachments of the river, 

 into numerous creeks, which will be best understood by a 

 glance at the map given in our cut. The bottom of these 

 creeks is formed of a soft, but very tenacious, clay, which may 

 probably be two or three feet deep, and this is covered by an 

 accumulation of from two to three feet of soil. In the clay 

 we find at a slight depth a continuous deposit of Roman 

 pottery, almost all either broken or defective, mixed with the 

 remains of burnt fuel from the kilns, and attended with other 

 circumstances, which leaves no room for doubt of their being 

 the refuse of extensive Roman potteries. We may judge, 

 indeed, of their extent from the fact that they reach along the 

 river from Rainham to the Swale, between five and six miles, 

 and inward, on an average, from a mile to a mile and a-half. 

 The greater portion of this low ground is divided into the 

 Upchurch Marshes and the Halstow Marshes, named from the 

 two parishes over which they extend. This bed of pottery is 

 nowhere seen to more advantage than in Otterham Creek, in the 

 former parish, which winds up to near Upchurch church. To 

 VOL. VIII. — NO. III. " M 



