Ceramics home: Neolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age.

Neolithic, Bronze Age and Iron Age

In Britain, pottery emerges 'fully formed' in the centuries after 4000 BC. The Museum's collection is small but reasonably representative of the range of ceramics circulating in the Thames valley between this time and the eve of the Roman conquest. Much of it was casually recovered during river dredging or gravel digging operations.

Most vessels are hand-made, bonfire-fired and likely to be of local manufacture. Forms encompass Neolithic round-based open bowls used for storage or cooking, flat-based beakers and larger Early and Middle Bronze Age urns placed with (or containing the ashes of) the dead, and later Bronze Age and Iron Age jars, cups and bowls used to prepare and serve food and drink.

A range of materials were employed to 'open' or temper the clays, including crushed burnt flint, fired clay ('grog') pellets and quartz sand. Many of the vessels also bear impressed or incised decoration using finger-tips, finger-nails, bird-bones, toothed combs and twisted cord or string.

Featured types

Peterborough ware (-3400 - -2500)

Late Neolithic & Early Bronze Age Beakers (-2400 - -1800)

Collared urns (-2200 - -1400)

Deverel-Rimbury (-1600 - -1000)

Post Deverel-Rimbury (-1000 - -700)

Iron Age (-700 - 50)

Related objects

There are 77 related objects.

pages: 1 2 3 4   Next >

12775 vase; miniature vase.	C934 weight; loomweight. Late Bronze Age	P6 cup. Late Bronze Age	P5 cup. Late Bronze Age
A20939 cup. Late Bronze Age	18363 jar.	49.107/940 jar. Bronze Age	49.107/933 jar. Bronze Age
P18 jar. Bronze Age	P7 jar. Late Bronze Age	P28 cup. Bronze Age	P23 cup. Bronze Age
P12 cup. Late Bronze Age	A13677 bowl. Late Bronze Age	A10681 food vessel. Early Bronze Age	A1714 flagon. Prehistoric?
52.136 pot. Neolithic	49.87/35 bowl. Neolithic	49.87/4 bowl. Neolithic	49.87/2 bowl. Neolithic
33.301 bowl. Bronze Age	NN20997 pot. unknown	NN20996 bowl; replica bowl.	A13693 bowl. Neolithic

pages: 1 2 3 4   Next >