Exploring Kent's Past

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Monument details

Summary

Three Palaeolithic handaxes from Preston Hall Gravel Pit, Aylesford, held at Maidstone Museum. Two of them collected by flake-tool (or TF) Bunting (in 1925 and 1931) and the other of uncertain origin

Monument Types

• FINDSPOT (Lower Palaeolithic to Middle Palaeolithic - 500000 BC to 40001 BC)

Associated Finds

• HANDAXE (Lower Palaeolithic to Middle Palaeolithic - 500000 BC to 40001 BC)

Full description

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Several Palaeolithic handaxes held at Maidstone Museum came from pits near Preston Hall, Aylesford, on the southwest side of the main Medway river, documented by Roe (1), and then examined in 2005 for the Medway Valley Palaeolithic Project (2). One (a cleaver) is marked as having been found by TF Bunting 28 ft [=8.5m] below the ground surface in August 1931, from "Preston Hall Corporation Gravel Pit". Another (broken butt of well-abraded specimen) was found by flake-tool Bunting in April 1925 in "Preston Hall Gravel Pit", and the third handaxe linked with this pit is a pointed specimen with a squared tip, and appears to be marked on the butt in the handwriting of JPT Burchell (F Wenban-Smith, pers. observation). Cook also pinpoints this site as a source of Palaeolithic flints from Pleist gravels of the 2nd (50ft) terrace (3). This site corresponds with the locality specified as "pit on west side of road opposite British Legion Village" in the Southern Rivers Palaeolithic Project (4, 5), and this latter source specifies that the old pit has housing built in it.

<1> Roe, D.A., 1968, Gazetteer of British Lower and Middle Palaeolithic Sites, p138 (Monograph). SWX6570.

<2> Wenban-Smith F. F., Bates M.R and Marshall G., 2007, Medway Valley Palaeolithic Project Final Report: The Palaeolithic Resource in the Medway Gravels (Kent) (Unpublished document). SKE29351.

<3> Cook W.H, 1923, Excursions [III - Geological Excursion to Lower Greensand Beds and Pleistocene Drifts at Aylesford]. (Article in serial). SKE51481.

<4> Wessex Archaeology, 1993, The Southern Rivers Palaeolithic Project, Report No.2: The South West and South of the Thames [Vol. I - text], M 4.7 (Monograph). SWX6569.

<5> Wessex Archaeology, 1993, The Southern Rivers Palaeolithic Project: maps for Report No. 2, Regions 4 & 1, The South West and South of the Thames [Vol II - maps], M 4.7 (Unpublished document). SKE12023.

Sources and further reading