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Collection Item: Ryther Hoard

Basic info

Collection
Archaeology
Title
Ryther Hoard
Object name
Jug
Object category
Medieval
Description
Unglazed jug with single handle. Contained the Ryther hoard. Jennings, S. 1995 (report on Rther Hoard): This nearly complete small jug is a typical example of one of the best known products of the Humber ware industry. Humber wares were made in a number of places in the Humber basin - at Cowick, Kelk, Holme on Spalding Moor and possibly in York - and the products of all the known production centres are visually extremely similar. Small unglazed jugs, such as this one, were usually very crudely made, untrimmed and unfinished and almost never glazed. Any glaze that is found on them tends to be accidental and to have come from other vessels in the kiln. Because of their size these jugs are usually called 'drinking jugs', but scientific analysis, as well as manuscript illustrations, clearly show that they were also commonly used as male urinals. The frequency with which these 'drinking jugs' are found both in excavations and as casual finds suggests that they were cheap even by the standards of low-priced medieval pottery, and may well have been regarded as disposable items. Drinking jugs of this type were made in the second half of the fourteenth century and were common in the fifteenth century. This example is likely to be contemporary with the date of the hoard rather than an old pot that was available to hand. Their popularity declined with the importation of the vastly superior German stonewares in the late fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, and to date there is little evidence of the manufacture of these small jugs after the beginning of the sixteenth century.
Production date start
1480
Period
Medieval

More info

Identification

Object number
YORYM : 1994.151.1
Number of objects
1
ID
12632

Physical Characteristics

Materials
Ceramic (Whole)
Dimensions
Whole height 23.0 cm
Whole diameter 8.2 cm

Find spot

Method
Metal detector find
Place
Ryther