West Midlands Regional Research Framework for Archaeology, Seminar 6: Atkin1
Archaeology in Worcestershire 1500 - 1750
Malcolm Atkin
Worcestershire Historic Environment and Archaeology Service
Introduction
In Worcestershire much of the information of this period is still fragmentary and we are still working towards putting individual pieces of information onto a coherent context. Attempts at synthesis are largely confined to illustrating an already well-dated historical framework. As with elsewhere, work is still hampered by a surviving erroneous impression that post-medieval archaeology is less important than earlier periods and in a time of limited resources, not worth the investment Thus, as late as 1996, English Heritage took the decision not to fund work on the post-excavation work of the post-medieval phases of the major urban excavation at Deansway[1]. The potential is, however, enormous. The period gives us as archaeologists the opportunity to work in partnership with documentary historians and buildings specialists - offering an opportunity to provide new insights and also test models of development from earlier periods which rely much more on a single source.
A necessary first step is to improve the baseline of dating evidence. There is a need to develop the local ceramic type fabric series to provide a basis for study – both in terms of establishing a chronology and as a record of the industry in its own right. This is a period in which we see the collapse of what was an extensive local medieval pottery industry (with antecedents in the Roman period), with changing patterns of imported material and finally the swamping of the dying industry by the Staffordshire potteries. In this period of flux it may be that potters were firstly diversifying into the manufacture of tiles and then clay tobacco pipes. Key assemblages are in Worcester at Sidbury, Deansway and a small recent excavation on New Street.
This is a period in which excavated records become secondary to the need to record landscape features from an archaeological perspective. Over 500 new records have been added to the Historic Environment Record in the last two years as a result of the farm consultations undertaken by the Worcestershire Historic Environment Countryside Advisor.
We can also take advantage of the increasing use of GIS to build documentary and cartographic evidence directly into the Historic Environment Record. Locally, we are making a start with digitising late 18th Inclosure and 19th century tithe maps and their ownership, use and land value details onto the Historic Environment Record.[2] We are hoping that by building closer links with our local Record Office we can strengthen the resources available for documentary research. In part this involves encouraging a new emphasis in research amongst the archive community. It is therefore unfortunate that there is a national and regional division of responsibility between Museums, Libraries and Archives agency (MLA) LA and English Heritage. This is not the least because such a division hampers funding possibilities.
The Dissolution of the Monasteries
The period from c.1500 is a period of great and rapid change. One of the defining factors of the post-medieval period is the dissolution of the monasteries and its change in religious and settlement structure. This could create a physical vacuum in town and countryside. In Pershore and Evesham the monasteries were demolished piecemeal and still lie as an empty space within the town. Bordesley Abbey was ‘defaced and plucked down’ within two weeks of dissolution. But there may also be archaeological evidence for the redistribution of land and wealth that the dissolution caused. This is most visible in the new gentry houses that were built. John Packington aquired 30 Worcestershire manors and built ‘a very goodly newe house of bricke’ at Hampton Lovett. His cousin, Humphrey Packington, built Harvington Hall (brick) out of the same proceeds. As a status symbol, these houses are the first large scale use of brick in the county.
Towns
Towns saw dramatic change during this period. A movement of population from the countryside had already begun and this intensified. The population of Worcester rose from 4,250 to 7,000 from 1563 to 1646. We have an historic framework – provided by such works as Dyer's 1981 study of Midlands towns, including Worcester, and the more local work of Pat Hughes reconstructing tenement history of a number of city streets.[3] Work by Pat Hughes on Friar Street, Worcester shows increasing density of housing. The plot occupied by nos17, 19, 21, 23 and 25 Friar Street (on corner with Union Street) contained three houses in 16th century. By 1678, rows of cottages had been built behind 17 and 25 and by 1784 there were 11 dwellings on the site. The increasing pressure on housing is clearly seen in the cartographic evidence with the infilling of open spaces and the development of extensive suburbs. Archaeology can not only test and confirm these sources but also extend the framework provided by historical sources both for urban topography and organisation. There is an under-rated potential in the smaller towns. Based on archaeological evidence and historical geography, the Central Marches Historic Towns Survey (completed 1996) provided models of development for the smaller towns that extend the sequence of development into the post-medieval period and transformed the archaeological planning framework for such places.
Excavation of individual blocks of properties should allow us to move from generalities into the particular. There may be evidence for infilling into yards, the subdivision of the ground plan of existing properties and the insertion of upper stories. This evidence may not be present in the surviving sample of buildings of the period – in itself a diminished resource (demolition of buildings in the Lychgate in the 1960s). The physical evidence may lie in blocked doorways and post-holes along the walls to create mezzanine floors and therefore depends on excavation being undertaken on sufficient a scale to be able to place such ephemeral features into a proper context and also to compare neighbouring properties. The structural evidence can be very vulnerable to later rebuilding and may be present largely through the distribution of pits and other dug features. Fortunately, some of the most significant features of the change in building design come from substantial features that may well survive i.e. fireplaces or cess pits.
A series of fires that swept many towns in the early 16th century encouraged a wave of improvements in building construction. Archaeology can illustrate and provide technical details of documented ordnances for improvement. There should be evidence for the use of tiled roofs on a widespread scale (with a consequent increase in demand from that industry). We might also expect open hearths to be similarly replaced by brick fireplaces and chimneys. Documentary evidence also points to a greater effort to improve sanitation – by the regular clearance of rubbish – which ultimately leads to that great archaeological source of information – the rubbish pit. We should perhaps also look for evidence of the activities of the saltpetre men – given widespread powers to enter buildings – domestic, agricultural and even churches to excavate for saltpetre. They were accused of not back-filling their excavations and this may provide one explanation of the shallow scrapes and removal of floor levels often seen in buildings. Churches, far from being exempt through any sign of respect were a favoured target – as the congregation of the time had a habit of relieving themselves in their pews. Within the broad pattern of development, the destruction caused by the Civil War may provide a stratigraphic benchmark for such developments (i.e. in the clearance of suburbs of stripping of deposits within a town for defence works). This is, however difficult to identify in practice (see paper by author on the Archaeology of the Civil War in this series).
Any identified changes need to be placed within a social context. For Worcester there is a good surviving series of 16th century probate inventories for the wealthier properties. 200 are currently being placed on a database. We should be looking to excavate a documented household so that this can serve as a benchmark for understanding other house of that class and also of poorer quality house. Such work will also enable comparisons to be made with other less well-documented centres.
I have been essentially talking about a continuity of development in an established town but the period also saw extraordinary bursts of growth in some towns. Bewdley developed as a major inland port with riverside development. At the end of the period (1635), Kidderminster began its rapid growth as a mill town making carpets. In 1753 Lord Foley built 200 new houses and laid out new streets. But we have only isolated fragments of features of this period.
Industry
Some industries continued from medieval period. The medieval timber-lined ‘great brine pit’ in Droitwich continued in use until the 18th century, with new pumps installed by the 16th century. New brick salt furnaces were also constructed. There was a new intensity of the development of industry in North Worcestershire. Coal mining began in West Worcestershire in the late 13th century, based on village centres such as Mamble, Bayton and Pensax. The coal was used for household fuel and brick making. The high sulphur content also made it useful for preserving hops. These early mines were typically bell-pits and remains can still be seen in the fields around Mamble in the form of a raised spoil heap with a circular hollow in the middle. We might also expect to find the settings for windasses, horse gins or haul roads – but there has yet to be a survey to establish the presence of such remains. Pensax was an important centre of the industry. The Lords of the manor, the Dean and Chapter leased the mining rights to the City of Worcester and the first barge load to Worcester was brought down the Severn to the city in 1570. In 1610 Pensax supplied coal to Droitwich for salt-boiling.
The 16th century saw the landscape of north Worcestershire being transformed by the development of the coal and iron working industries. Forests were being ruthlessly exploited, coal mining increased in scale. Every stream that could be used drove the water wheels, and dams were made across villages to create pools to form a 'head of water'. 16th century saw a great expansion in the use of water power for a variety of industries. From the late 16th century in the region, blast furnaces began to replace the smaller-scale smelting processes, supplying cast iron and pig iron to specialist smiths. Waterways were improved and used to transport the products. In 1620 Dud Dudley estimated that 20,000 smiths were at work within 20 miles of Dudley. By 1636 on the Stour, Richard Foley controlled five furnaces, nine forges forges, three slitting mills (to cut bar iron into rods) and docks, warehouses – all served by a complex transport network. In 1665 Andrew Yarranton claimed to have made the River Stour navigable from Stourport to Stourbridge in order to serve the industry. The Foley works on the Stour in the late 17th century were the heart of a regional enterprise which was in turn the largest producers of metal in England. As a consequence, this area is of great importance for understanding the broader development of the iron working industry. In 1619 Dud Dudley perfected the use of pit coal to make iron in a modified furnace and acquired a royal patent. He claimed this would save 30,000 loads of wood p.a. But coal was only widely used outside Shropshire from the mid-18th century.. Unfortunately, we have the historical context for such developments but as yet have only isolated archaeological finds that can merely illustrate these known facts. Further survey work and an excavation of one of these works is needed.
These moves towards a more industrialised society did not occur in isolation but developed out of an agricultural framework. Some industries relied on seasonal labour whilst, before the widespread use of coal, all relied on fuel that was essentially an agricultural crop. The important nail and scythe industries were often combined with farming.
A new industry in England from the late 16th century was that of making clay tobacco pipes. Pottery workers may have capitalised on the moves in the early 16th century to extend the use of tiled roofs and moved into this industry. In the late 16th century did the same people diversify into clay pipes – possibly as a part-time or seasonal occupation as they saw increasing competition from Staffordshire? Both archaeological and documentary work needs to be undertaken to establish if this was an urban or rural occupation. Two kilns are documented (but not discovered) in St Nicholas’s parish, Worcester in 1690s. More work on the documentary evidence is required but archaeology is likely to provide the most significant advances through the excavation of kiln sites.
Important as these industries were, we have to recognise that our appreciation of them is founded on the fact that they leave physical traces and we can therefore get a distorted view of the local economy. The most widespread industry in the county during the period, textile manufacturing, has left little physical trace. This is despite the assertion that there were 2,000 ‘capmen’ making monmouth caps in the 17th century in Bewdley. There may be evidence of loom rooms in upper floors, wash houses, dyeing vats or in the long thin tenement boundaries of tenteryards.
New patterns of landholding and agriculture
There has been increasing building recording on farms and barns over the past five years. Much of this is at the level of simple photographic surveys but in all 153 recording conditions were applied under PPG15 and PPG16 in 2002 (as opposed to 95 below ground archaeological investigations). But we are not yet at a stage at which synthesis has been undertaken. The surveying and excavation of houses needs to be up into the context of its farming landscape. The period sees changes from arable to pastoral with continued desertion of villages, movement of populations to the construction of new farms on larger, centralised holdings and the enclosure of fields. This occurred in piecemeal fashion from 1664 with Malvern Chase and then occurred on a larger and more systematic scale with the Parliamentary enclosures of second half of the 18th century). This was all designed to meet increasing demand for grain and meat – especially in the towns. By1794 the county could be described as ‘in general inclosed’.
One significant feature was the improvement of lowland pasture by creation of water meadows. In the 1690s, Thomas Foley invested £500 in new water works at Chaddesley Corbett. Work has recently begun on a survey and assessment of water meadows. The typology is being developed although most systems are of a simple nature in the county. This is a prelude to providing greater protection and also opportunities for restoration grants. For example, there is a documentary reference to a recently discovered 16th century watermeadow complex at Shelsley Beauchamp, Worcs. A deed of 1579 refers to:
”All and as much of the arable and meadow lying in the ‘Nether Field’ of William Pirry, Husbandman, which a stank or pool-head lately erected by John Nott, stands on, and as much of the Nether Field as may be drowned or covered with water by reason of the said stank”.
The system survives intact with sluices, carrier channels and drains and will hopefully be taken into Countryside Stewardship.
The exploitation of Woodland is also poorly understood. This has become a symbol of an ‘ancient’ landscape but in reality was a crop where the extent of woodland frequently changed in extent.
Social and political change
One of the most dramatic events of the period is the English Civil War of 1642 - 1651. This will be considered in more detail elsewhere in this seminar. Here I will confine myself to some particular Worcestershire aspects.
A great deal of historical research on the period has been undertaken in the county.[4] The archaeological evidence remains limited and is mainly concerned with identifying defences. At Worcester we can see evidence for the refurbishment of medieval defences. Evidence of newly-constructed defences at Evesham have recently been discovered. Surprisingly, little evidence has been found for the wholesale clearance of the suburbs or the clearance of land within the town to build defences. As far as the latter is concerned the evidence mainly lies in the absence of layers relating to the period. Bridges were regular targets of both sides. Pershore bridge was part demolished in 1644 and was repaired after Civil War. There has not been an opportunity for the detailed finds recording needed to advance the study of battlefield archaeology (as at Naseby and Marston Moor) as might be applied at the still largely intact battlefield site of Ripple or the 1651 camp site at Spetchley. One of the consequences of the war was a deterioration of the transport system.. But although the Dean and Chapter complained that the destruction in the Worcester suburbs had been so complete that they could no longer identify their property boundaries, the county quickly recovered.