Queen Mary's Hospital, Charshalton by Andrew Powell

Author:Andrew Powell [Powell, Andrew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781874350941
Publisher: Casemate
Published: 2017-09-15T00:00:00+00:00

Worked Flint

by Phil Harding

An assemblage of 518 pieces was recovered from 182 contexts, and has been quantified by type (Table 3.9). The worked flint is dominated by flakes, which account for 73% of the assemblage, with only 7% blades and bladelets. The flint is a cherty mottled grey/black material, probably sourced from surface nodules from the local Chalk, and flaking quality ranges from relatively good to pieces riven with thermal fractures. There was also some Bullhead flint, a result of the contact between the Chalk and overlying Thanet Sand, which is also of variable quality.

There was a relatively low density of pieces from the excavated features (a mean of 2.8 pieces from all excavated contexts), the largest single group, from Iron Age pit 3223 (Fig. 2.6), comprising 26 pieces. Much of the material is considered likely to be residual, although a small collection of flakes and debitage from Early Iron Age pit 3759 includes two pairs of refitting flakes, suggesting that that these were contemporary with the filling of the pit.

The earliest pieces are two Mesolithic tranchet axe sharpening flakes. There is also the distal end of a notched blade, which may represent failed microburin technique. Mesolithic blades, flakes and cores are believed to have been recovered from the immediate area during previous excavations (Lowther 1944–5) and further material, including occasional microliths, is known from the wider area (Wymer 1977).

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