Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Swalecliffe foreshore, Late Prehistoric flint artefact and pottery finds, and ambiguous Prehistoric flint artefact finds

Monument Types

• FINDSPOT (Prehistoric - 500000 BC to 42 AD)
• LITHIC WORKING SITE (Early Neolithic to Early Bronze Age - 4000 BC to 2200 BC)

Associated Finds

• DEBITAGE (Prehistoric - 500000 BC to 42 AD)
• AXEHEAD (Mesolithic - 10000 BC to 4001 BC)
• SHERD (Neolithic - 4000 BC to 2351 BC)

Full description

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[TR 13106745] Neolithic pottery found [NAT] [Published on the information supplied by L.R.A. grove quoting Authority 3, but sited incorrectly.] (1)(2) [TR 13326747, TR 13386750, TR 13446753] Early Neolithic flint working floors, about 15 ft. across and 1.5 - 4.5 ft. below the surface, were revealed 345, 425 and 485 yds. eastwards along the cliff edge from the boundary stone at Swalecliffe. [Shown on Worsfold's map at TR 13016737]. A few pieces of crude pottery and worked bone were found and older intrusive tools included late Acheulian axes, Aurignacian planes and a Magdalenian blade. Some had been reworked in later times. Three Thames Picks were found within 50 yds. of the last site, on which sufficient evidence was found to show that it was an actual working site for this type of implement (3). Mr. Harvey holds a large number of flint implements which he collected from the sites about 1925 when they were exposed as a result of cliff falls. They include 10 'Thames picks', several ovate hand axes, scrapers, flakes, and Acheulian hand-axes and 4 polished axes (including 2 of slate). The Town Council have in store a considerable number of implements from the same area and a selection of these will be exhibited in a museum shortly to be erected in Whitstable (a). Further implements on exhibition in Maidstone Museum include 3 Me. flint knives, some small Me. flint flakes and a fragment of a rim of Ne. `B' (Peterborough) ware (Worsfold Collection) (b). The find areas now fall below high water mark, but can be accurately sited (from Worsfold's description, H.W.Ms. on contemporary plans, and identification of the boundary stone) to TR 1331567487, TR 1338067519 and TR 1342867546 respectively (the first coincides with the findspot of an LBA cremation - see TR 66 NW (4). Additional references (5-8) and for context with other Mesolithic finds see (9). Site photographs (10-11).


Swalecliffe foreshore, Late Prehistoric flint artefact and pottery finds, and ambiguous Prehistoric flint artefact finds. Abundant material found on numerous occasions since later 19th C (1-13). Likely that almost all of it, including most of that recovered by Worsfold (3, 13), (apart from a few distinctive Palaeolithic handaxes, recorded as separate HERs) is post-Palaeolithic.

<1> OS 1/1250 1957 (OS Card Reference). SKE48116.

<2> OS 6" 1962 (OS Card Reference). SKE48371.

<3> Worsfold, F. H., 1926, Observations on the provenance of the Thames Valley Pick, Swalecliffe, Kent (Article in serial). SWX6578.

<4> Inf Mr Wallace C Harvey (councillor and local historian) 53 Oxford St Whitstable (OS Card Reference). SKE44356.

<5> Maidstone Mus Arch Gaz (in progress) Anon Undated (OS Card Reference). SKE46300.

<6> F1 ASP 29.11.63 (OS Card Reference). SKE42341.

<7> Field report for monument TR 16 NW 2 - November, 1963 (Bibliographic reference). SKE5531.

<8> Canterbury Archaeological Trust, Canterbury Sites and Monuments Record, 2 (Index). SWX11836.

<9> Department of Archaeology, University of Reading, 1994, Inter-tidal archaeology in Kent (Unpublished document). SWX9353.

<10> 1982, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX11613.

<11> 1982, Photograph (Photograph (Print)). SWX11612.

<12> Evans, J., 1897, The Ancient Stone Implements, Weapons and Ornaments of Great Britain, p. 617 (Monograph). SWX6573.

<13> Worsfold, F.H., 1926a, An examination of the contents of the brickearths and gravels of Tankerton Bay, Swalecliffe, Kent (Article in serial). SKE29740.

Sources and further reading