Kentish Ragstone from the Maidstone Area
by Deborah Goacher
Earlier this year, Gallagher Aggregates Ltd invited KAS representatives to visit Hermitage Quarry near Maidstone - the only Kentish Ragstone quarry including building stone amongst its current products. Gallagher also supported Maidstone Area Archaeological Group recently regarding excavations at East Farleigh, where Roman buildings constructed of Kentish Ragstone were discovered (see articles by A.J. Daniels in KAS Newsletters 2008-2012, and Kent Archaeological Review, 2012, Nos. 187 & 188).
Interestingly, the Tithe Map of 1842 and accompanying apportionment suggest former quarrying to the north and northwest of the site of these Roman buildings. Parcels of land described as Quarry Bank, Upper Quarry, Quarry Meadows, and Lower Quarry (numbered 352, 353, 354 and 357 respectively) were used in the 1840s for arable, coppice, and pasture. Recent excavations in thisland shown on the Tithe Map: No. 351, ‘Coombs’ (hops); No. 408, The Further Orchard (hops/fruit); and No. 409, Further Hop Ground (hops). Tithe documents similarly provide evidence of contemporary and earlier quarrying in other areas of East Farleigh, near Dean Street and Workhouse Lane. The underlying geology - Hythe Beds of the Lower Greensand - suggests Kentish Ragstone quarrying.
The geological memoir which accompanies the Maidstone geological map (Sheet 288) mentions numerous former quarries in the Maidstone area, many still in use in the mid-twentieth century (Worssam, 1963). Archaeological discoveries are recorded as being made during the nineteenth century at local quarry sites, such as the unusual Romano-British burial found in 1847 in a stone quarry at Allington (KCC’s KHER Monument No. TQ 75 NW 2).
Living in a partially Ragstone-built medieval house in Little Buckland (lying to the northwest of Maidstone), the writer is interested in evidence of local quarries. The report of an archaeological watching brief suggests that the steep bank between the two adjacent roads called Buckland Lane, lying at different levels, represents a quarry face (Ward 2003). Whether medieval (or even earlier) it can only be said that any quarry in this location would have pre-dated a timber-framed medieval house on the south side of the lower Buckland Lane, Little Buckland Cottage, probably built c. 1500.
Medieval quarries were sometimes small, possibly intended to provide building stone solely for individual building projects. Amongst fourteenth- to sixteenth-century examples documented are quarries with dimensions of 20 by 40 feet, and 20, 24, 40 and 100 feet square (Knoop and Jones, 1938).
Besides evidence provided by the nineteenth-century Tithe and Ordnance Survey maps, other documents have revealed earlier quarry sites. The Earl of Aylesford’s estate reports for 1805 and 1825 with accompanying maps (CKS U234 E 21) and 1786 (U234 E20) - maps missing - include farms at Buckland. These contain much information about quarrying, especially by the local Bensted family, and show the location of a wharf on the west bank of the Medway (near the lower end of the present Buckland Hill) possibly serving local quarries (see KHER Monument Records). In a title deed dated 1629 relating to Sir John Astley’s property, a pasture of just over two acres at Little Buckland is named ‘The Quarry’ (Goodsall, 1958, 11).
Documentary references to a medieval Ragstone quarry at Buckland, Maidstone, have also been found in deeds dating to between 1471 and 1534 at The National Archives (TNA) (Goacher, 2009, 396-97). Their online catalogue lists details of that dated 30 July, 15 Henry VII (1500): “Release by Thomas Wells of Maidstone, and Robert Welles of Buckland to William Colepepir esq., of all their rights in all those lands and tenements which they lately held jointly with Henry Fylpott of Maidstone, John Halle of Linton, and Thomas Wotton of Waltham, lately deceased, in the parishes of Maidstone, Aylesford and Linton, and which once belonged to John Wode, and were called ‘Tootes’ and ‘Quarryfeld’.”
Aysheforde, the sons and heirs of Richard Welles late of Maidestone, deceased, to William Lylly the elder of the same, of their right to a quarry, with ‘le voydenge’ at Bokelande in the parish of Maidestone” (TNA: PRO E 326/2553).
An earlier deed (dated 1449-1450) survives relating to a quarry (plus messuage and garden) in Maydenstone in the ‘burgh’ (or medieval borgh) of Stone: “Grant by John Chapelle of Maydenstone and Thomas Garolde of East Farlegh, to John Sutton and John Maynelle of Maydenstone” (E 326/2565).
An account relating to several of the Archbishop of Canterbury’s medieval Kentish manors, dating to 1496-1497, refers to sales of stone, called ‘Ragge’, apparently from a quarry at the ‘Mote’ which appears to have been associated with the manor of Maidstone (CKS U386 M17).
These documents are interesting in the context both of open-cast Ragstone quarries and underground workings near Mote Park in Maidstone, where no dating evidence has been found (LeGear 2007, 413-419; Worssam, 1963).
References to Maidstone’s medieval masons (as well as quarries) appear in fourteenth- and fifteenth-century deeds and account rolls (Goacher, 2009, 397; Salzman, 1952; HKW, 1963). A mason-contractor, Maurice Young, prominent in the latter part of the reign of Edward III (1327-1377), seems, with the addition of ‘and company of Maidstone’, to have been a quarry owner (HKW, –209, 959).
Documents record supply of stone from Boughton Monchelsea, and Aylesford, as well as Maidstone for medieval royal building projects. Exchequer accounts detail transport of stone from Maidstone (for the Tower of London) between 1338 and 1363, and, even earlier, ‘grey stone of Aylesford’, or Ragstone, in 1278 and 1317. Boughton stone was still being supplied to Westminster as late as 1532 (HKW, 281, 999; Salzman, 121, 128-9).
Besides the River Medway for barge and ship transport, the Len and the Loose, as tributary rivers, would potentially have provided local quarries with additional linking waterways.
A published medieval account, the “Fabric Roll of Rochester Castle”, lists named types of worked stones supplied for specific building applications. Although fragments (possibly medieval) of finished stonework were found in 1859 on re-opening a quarry in Dean Street, East Farleigh, the ‘Farleigh’ stone in the account was considered to relate to Fairlight in Sussex. This account (dating from 1368-69) records carriage of 2289.5 tons of “Bocton and Maydestane stone from Maydestane to the said Castle, at 5d. per ton” (Arch. Cant. Vol. 2, 111-4; 121; HKW, 811).
Finally, it is interesting to note that the place-name ‘Maidstone’ appears to contain an Old English element in its ‘stane’ ending; also that stone contributes an element of the image on the 1567 seal of Maidstone (Maidstone Museum). A young lady stands on a stone, holding a stone in one hand - an obvious visual pun, or rebus, incorporating the two parts of the name, ‘maid’ and ‘stone’.
REFERENCES
“Fabric Roll of Rochester Castle” (by “L.B.L”) in Archaeologia Cantiana Vol. 2, 1859, 111-132
HKW: Brown, R.A., Colvin, H.M., Taylor, A.J., 1963, The History of the King’s Works, Vols. 1 & 2
Goacher, D.J., 2009, “A Documentary Study Relating to Buckland in the Medieval Borough of Weeds in Maidstone” in Arch. Cant. Vol. 129, 394-98
Goodsall, R.H., 1958, “The Astleys of Maidstone” in Arch. Cant. Vol. 72, 1-17; 9-16; original deed CKS U2035 T32
KCC’s Kent Historic Environment Record (KHER): http://www.kent.gov.uk/ExploringKentsPast/
Knoop, D., & Jones G.P., 1938, “The English Medieval Quarry” in Economic History Review, (Nov. 1938) 17-37
LeGear, R., 2007, “Underground Ragstone Quarries in Kent: a brief Overview” in Arch. Cant. Vol. 127, 407-419
Salzman, L.F., 1952, Building in England Down to 1540
TNA: PRO E 326: Exchequer: Augmentation Office: Ancient Deeds, Series B
Ward, A., October 2003, An Archaeological Watching Brief at 5 Hythe Road, Allington (CAT)
Worssam, B.C., 1963, Geology of the Country Around Maidstone