Reviews

REVIEWS Collectanea Historica: Essays in Memory of Stuart Rigold. Edited by Alec Detsicas. 27.5 x 22 cm. Pp. xx.xii + 315 + 64 pls. and 65 figs. in the text. Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society, 1981. £20.00. This handsome volume, in a generous format and attractively bound in the familiar blue cloth of the Kent Archaeological Society, is a worthy memorial to that distinguished antiqu􀁯ry, the late Stuart Rigold, and reflects the greatest credit on the three dozen contributors for the speed with which they submitted their offerings and on the editor for placing it before the archaeological world only two years after Riggy's death. It is only right, nevertheless, to point out that this commendable celerity has led to blemishes - mis-spellings, errors of punctuation, infelicities of language, and violence to illustrations - which a more deliberate approach might have avoided. But if would be tedious to enumerate them and the duty of this review should be to assess the quality of the tributes to Riggy's memory. He and I first met in 1949, as I remember, when we were two of Bryan O'Neil's recruits to the old Ministry of Works in Lambeth Bridge House. Riggy was a year ahead of me and quickly impressed me with his learning. We were both bachelors and I recall an evening in his bed-sitter, in Battersea I think, when I was regaled with an unadorned lamb chop and the typescript of 'The Trail of the Easterlings', published that year, to my awe, in BNJ. This was one of his earliest published works and the forerunner of that notable output so ably listed by David Sherlock at the beginning of this volume. The numismatic element of that output is perhaps not fairly reflected in the book, being confined to John Kent's characteristically concise and elegant note 'A new type of George noble of Henry VIII'. But Riggy's other great interests, medieval buildings and vernacular architecture, are amply and ably represented. One could in fact select an ideal paper: it should discuss an aspect of medieval architecture, it should have a Kentish background or origin, and it should relate to a wider English or European context. Others will no doubt choose differently but to me R. Gilyard-Beer's 263 REVIEWS 'Boxley Abbey and the pulpitum collationis' neatly satisfies these various criteria in a rewarding way (apart from dispelling my own ignorance of the etymology of the word 'collation' in the sense of a light meal). But there are many other good things in the book: Brian Philp has some stimulating things to say about Richborough, Reculver and Lympne and is sceptical about Cunliffe's recently published rectangular plan for the last; there are useful castle studies by Derek Renn on gatehouses and Beric Morley on fourteenth-century design (though the latter's dictum th·at planning and defensibility are the arbiters of form (pp. 104 ff.) should perhaps be modified in the light of M.W. Thompson's view that the great tower at Tattershall served primarily as a symbolic display of authority by Cromwell (p. 158) - what one might call 'conspicuous construction'); while John Blair discusses English monumental brasses before the Black Death, skilfully using the evidence of indents and the typology of inscription alphabets. The mention of just a few of the many contributions might give a misleading impression; the sheer variety of subject and locale and the consistently high standard achieved by the authors make this a book which would have delighted the honorand, himself an antiquary in the best sense of the word. One can only hope that in Elysium, surely a blend of Kentish Weald and downland, dotted with castles, granges and timber-framed yeomen's houses, Riggy's pipe is drawing smoothly and he is reading these essays with quiet satisfaction. F.H. THOMPSON Boughton Pottery. By L.G. Welland. 25.5 x 20 cm. Pp. iv + 32. 7 line drawings, I map. Faversham Papers, no. 18,. 1982. 60p (90p post paid). The Inns and Taverns of Faversham. By Frank Haley. 25.5 x 20 cm. Pp. viii + 86. Faversharn Papers, no. 19, 1982 95p (£1.35 post paid). Both published by the Faversham Society and obtainable from the Fleur de Lis Heritage Centre, Faversham. Once again the Faversham Society is to be congratulated on its publications (Arch. Cant., xcv (1979), 315). The Society was founded as recently as 1962 and, besides keeping a protecting eye on local historic buildings, it will soon be publishing its twentieth paper. Which other similar Kent society has such a fine record? The author of paper 18 is both a local historian and a potter. He is also his own illustrator. The genesis of the present work may be 264 REVIEWS seen in a short note published by him in The Journal of Kent Local History in 1976. However, Mr. Welland has gone far beyond this with his researches and also gives valuable asides on the Courtenay Riots of 1838, on the High Halden potteries (so beloved by the late Dr. Gordon Ward) and on making pots and tiles. He has one general chapter on the other village potteries of Kent. It runs to two pages and by its short length is a fitting commentary on the lack of work which has been done on them and their products. Mr. A.J.B. Kiddell has dealt faithfully with Wrotham and its slipware. Miss Suzanne George (in an unpublished thesis) and Mr. Welland himself have done the like for High Balden. But who has bothered with such sites as the potteries of Aylesford, Benenden, Deal, Deptford, Greenwich, Maidstone, Pembury, Reginald Wells' establishment at Coldrum Farm and Upchurch? However, Boughton Pottery is now on the map and well documented, from its High Balden connections with the Marsh family and from its beginnings, probably about the middle of the nineteenth century according to Mr. Welland. But Gordon Ward has the last words - 'these potteries are known to have been working as far back as 1800 but the Marsh family has been there only since 1850' (pottery lecture notes). If one of the beer cognoscenti were asked what attracts him or her to Faversham the answer would doubtless refer to the products of the breweries of Shepherd Neame and Whitbread Fremlin. Frank Haley, a canny Geordie and retired pharmacist, also has -affinities with those institutions and relates them to some of the thirty-seven licensed premises he describes. He has an appendix of another fifty or so pbsolete and defunct inns and taverns. The paper is written in a racy style, and its author wisely adorns his anecdotes with the architectural opinions of the Department of the Environment and of architect Anthony Swaine. Some of the names of the houses described are intriguing, for instance The Cat and Trencher, Queen of Hearts, Swan and Harlequin, Recreation Tavern, The Royal William (with the delightfully named Miss Mafeking Wash as a fairly recent hostess), The Coal Exchange, The Willow Tap and The Chimney Boy which has a ghost and which at one point of its history was a convent. '.fhis is a happy book and easy to read but the author should have been warned about the ship's timber heresy even though Faversham is a port. ALLEN GROVE 265 REVIEWS A Village School 1850-1970 - Boughton Monchelsea. By Denis Tye. 21.5 x 14 cm. Pp. 140 with numerous illustrations. Village schools are an endangered species. Educational reorganisation and other forms of social change are rapidly removing one of the formerly most important institutions of our rural communities. This must account for the recent crop of short works devoted to the history of the school in particular villages - works which often reveal strongly nostalgic sentiment. Mr. Denis Tye has been headmaster of Boughton Monchelsea School since 1955 and a great deal of what he has written concerns developments in comparatively recent times. He writes with insight and as one who has obvious affection for his subject. One is cheered by the reflection that this school in the Kentish Weald is still performing such worthy service and adapting so successfully to changing circumstances. By use of the school log-books since 1862, together with other sources including the personal recollection of past pupils, the author has reconstructed the activities of pupils and teachers over a century past. There is gratification that changes in curriculum and more humane teaching methods have brought about. improvement in the standard of education. When the school opened in 1850, it was a church-like building with eighteen-inch-thick ragstone walls and windows so high that the children could not look out of them. Now it has its own swimming pool and adventure playground. This is a well written review of the history and educational development of a village school, and at the same time constitutes an epitome of the progress made in the education of younger children generally in the last hundred and twenty years, as well as giving enjoyment to the general reader. Copies are obtainable from Boughton Monchelsea C.P. School, price £3.50, postage 32p. extra. P.J. TESTER The Parish Church of All Saints, Woodchurch. By M.H. Mansell. 21 Y 14 cm. Pp. 32 with 11 photographs, a plan and 3 other illustrations. Second edition, 1982. Seldom does one find a church guide-book in which there are not obvious errors of fact or interpretation, but this well produced booklet is of an exceptionally high standard. Some credit for this must be attributed to the fact that our President, Canon Ingram 266 REVIEWS Hill, Mr. L.R.A. Grove and several other distinguished K.A.S. members are acknowledged as giving help and information, while an extensive bibliography reveals thorough research among reliable sources. The architectural descriptions are clear and authentic, and the accompanying plan by Mr. C.P. Griggs, A.R.I.B.A., shows everything except the number of lights in the larger windows. Woodchurch is famous among students of brasses for its little priest of c. 1333 - Nicholas de Gore - a precious survival among a limited number of brasses originating from before the Black Death. He appears here on page 14, though rather more reduced than he deserves. Two family · names are constantly repeated - the Harlakendens and the Schreibers who are commemorated in the church by brasses, windows and other memorials. William Harlakenden was buried here in 1481, and members of the Schreiber family gave the front cover, and also the church clock in 1867, aptly described as enabling people to see the time from all points of the compass. A photograph of the east end of the chancel, as restored in 1966, shows it pleasantly furnished, but uncluttered compared with what obtains at the focal point of many churches. The list of rectors from c. 1200 to 1975, based on the researches of the Rev. T.S. Frampton, is given in full with short biographical notes on some of them. Edward Boughan was the subject of complaint in 1640-41 for railing-in the Communion Table and for walkiqg round the parish at Easter 'in his surplice and hood, reading prayers and psalms at divers crossways, and digging crosses in the earth at divers places of the outbounds of the same' - practices little to the liking of some of his Puritan parishioners, and he was removed from his benefice. Copies of the guide can be obtained from the Gallery Bookshop in Tenterden, price 95p. including postage. P.J. TESTER Medieval Art and Architecture at Canterbury before 1220. By N. Coldstream and P. Draper (Eds.). Pp. 128 + 32 figs. and 107 pls. T􀁱e British Archaeological Association jointly with the Kent Archaeological Society, Leeds, 1982. (£16, cloth-bound; £12 paperbound). Topographical Maps of Canterbyry, second edition. The Canterbury Archaeological Trust, Canterbury 1982. (£2.00). Canterbury has been well served in recent years with two volumes 267 REVIEWS of The Archaeology of Canterbury series, jointly published by the Canterbury Archaeological Trust and . the Kent Archaeological Society, already issued and a third volume due shortly, as well as detailed interim reports on the Trust's excavations appearing annually in Arch. Cant. Two further publications have now joined this impressive list. Medieval Art and Architecture at Canterbury before 1220, Volume V . of the Association's conference transactions, was recently published in conjunction with the Kent Archaeological Society. This volume contains papers read at the Canterbury conference in 1979 on the rebuilding of the eleventh-century Christ Church and St. Augustine's Abbey, the remains of the Lanfranc building, St. Anselm's crypt, the Romanesque vices, the cathedral clerestory, the choir capitals, the decorated stone roundels, Archbishop Walter's tomb, the conventual seals, early Anglo-Norman manuscripts, the Great Hall of the Archbishop's Palace, the Abbey of SS. Peter, Paul and Augustine, and the decoration of the castle keep. This volume is well produced and profusively illustrated; sadly, it lacks a general index, which would have greatly enhanced its value to scholars and general readers alike. However, it is a volume that should greatly appeal to all those who are interested in the early history of Canterbury and its art and architecture. The Canterbury Archaeological Trust have issued a second and completely revised edition of the Topographical Maps of Canterbury in A.D. 400, 1050, 1200, 1500 and 1700 in a f9lder, with an introductory text and suggestion for further reading. This second edition incorporates the results of the Trust's recent work and allows readers to follow the city's development over several centuries; it deserves to be as quickly sold out as its predecessor. The folder is available from the Trust, at 92a Broad Street, Canterbury CTl 2LU, at £2.25, including postage. A.P. DETSICAS Towns in Roman Britain. By Julian Bennett. 21 x 15 cm. Pp. 72 + 19 figs. and 28 pls. Shire Archaeology, Princes Risborough, 1980. (£1.50). Roman Crafts and Industries. By Alan McWhirr. 21 x 15 cm. Pp. 64 + 16 figs. and 34 pls. Shire Archaeology, Princes Risbox:ough, 1982. (£1.95). Romano-British Mosaics. By Peter Johnson. 21 x 15 cm. Pp. 64 + 3 figs. and 44 pls. Shire Archaeology, Princes Risborough, 1982. (£1.95). 268 REVIEWS Shire Archaeology have published in recent years a very useful series of introductory booklets on a large number of aspects of British archaeology intended for schools, the general public and those beginning to take a serious interest in archaeology. The series has recently been joined by the above three titles, each one written by a specialist, which serve well the intentions of the publishers. Each one of these small volumes is well researched and illustrated and contains an index, suggestions for further reading and sites to visit. The whole series, which is well and inexpensively produced, is to be warmly recommended. A.P. DETSICAS Wye Local History, volume II, no. 3. Published by Wye Historical Society. Pp. 16 + 1 fig. Wye, Spring 1982. (40p) The latest issue of Wye Local History contains an appreciation of Canon Stanley Brade-Birks, an article by E.W. Parkin on Coombe Manor, Hastingleigh, a paper by Professor Bryan Keith-Lucas on the Sawbridges and an interview with Phyllis McTierney on Wye Hill Cafe. It can be obtained from the Wye Historical Society, c/o 27 Chequers Park, Wye, Ashford. A.P. DETSICAS 269