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The Flint Industries of Bapchild

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 October 2013

H. G. Dines
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Extract

During the autumn of 1927, Mr. S. Williams, of Murston, observed palæolithic implements in a gravelly deposit underlying the brickearth in the pit which lies west of Haywood Farm, Bapchild. He kept a watch on the site, and, shortly after his first finds had been made, a small quarry was sunk in the bottom of the brickpit. This exposed the sub-brickearth deposits in section, and here Mr. Williams, assisted by Mr. T. Revel and other keen workers, carried out excavations, by permission of the owners of the property, Messrs. Smeed, Dean & Co., Ltd. Their labours were rewarded by a haul of more than four hundred artifacts, of Le Moustier type.

The brickearth dug at Bapchild is placed in a wash-mill and converted to slurry, in which state it is pumped to the brickworks. The wash-mill is periodically cleaned out, and from the accumulation of stones that, at such times, is removed from the mill, a number of flakes of post-Le Moustier form have been found. These obviously came from the brickearth, but none had hitherto been found in situ. Towards the end of 1928 Mr. Williams was joined in his work of implement hunting by Mr. E. A. Mount, of Sittingbourne, whom he advised to give special attention to the brickearth in an endeavour to discover the source of the flakes that had been found in the wash-mill.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society of East Anglia , Volume 6 , Issue 1 , 1929 , pp. 12 - 26
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1929

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References

page 12 note 1 Shown as Weston's on the Old Series Map No. 3.

page 12 note 2 Many of these implements, thanks to the generosity of Mr. Williams, are now exhibited in the British Museum, Eastgate House Museum (Rochester), and other local museums.

page 12 note 3 The geological map (Fig 1) is taken from the Old Series Geological Map No. 3, with alterations to the boundaries of the brickearth to conform with present exposures.

page 14 note 1 Smith, R. A., Archaelogia, Vol. lxii, 1911. pp. 515–532CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

page 14 note 2 Spurrell, F. C. J., Journ. of Anth. Inst., Vol. xiii, p. 109Google Scholar.

page 14 note 3 Cook, W. H. and Killick, J. R., Proc. Prehist. Soc. East Anglia, Vol. iv., pp. 133–140Google Scholar, also Smith, R. A., Brit. Mus. Stone Age Guide, 1926, p. 41Google Scholar.

page 15 note 1 Smith, R.A., Archaeologia, Vol. lxii, 1911, p. 524Google Scholar.

page 15 note 2 Now at the British Museum.

page 15 note 3 Now at the British Museum.

page 16 note 1 Les Hommes Contemporains du Renne,” Amiens, 1913, pp. 329–361Google Scholar.

page 16 note 2 i.e., the industry of the Coombe Deposit at Bapchild.

page 17 note 1 “The Stone Age in Egypt”. Ancient Egypt, Part III, 1915, p. 126Google ScholarPubMed.

page 18 note 1 Smith, R. A., Stone Age Guide, 1926, p. 41Google ScholarPubMed.

page 18 note 2 The conditions at the Luton site are not unlike those at Bapchild. The gravelly “clay-with-flints” beneath the brickearth may be a hill wash or sludge of Coombe Deposit age. See Turner, J. Prehist. Soc. East Anglia, Vol V, pp. 299–305Google Scholar.

page 18 note 3 See Smith, R.A., op. cıt.