The hills around Yetholm are crowded with enigmatic humps and bumps that were once medieval and iron-age structures. The fields around the village, too, are littered with bits and pieces from the past. Who knows, maybe one day something really old and interesting will turn up, though mostly one spots rubbish from the more recent past. The photo above shows three objects picked up in the field by Romany Loch in December. Pipe stems are numerous, but the bowl on the right is relatively unusual - the blackened inner surface from the last time it was smoked gives a kind of intimacy with its last, long-gone owner. There is also a bullet from a muzzle-loading gun. Who knows who fired that - or at what - ? The fragmentary figure in the centre is more unusual. Could it be Roman - one of those pipe-clay figurines of Venus produced in Gaul which turn up all over the Roman Empire? Sadly - no. Although the Romans were briefly present in the area this object also dates from the nineteenth century. Another similar example, from the Portable Antiquities website, can be seen below: The function of these objects is explained in the accompanying notes:
Smooth red hard-fired ceramic doll. It is a human figurine, complete save for the head and lower legs, representing an individual of uncertain gender - neither primary nor secondary sexual characteristics are modelled - though the breadth of hips might hint that a female is intended. The arms are alongside the body, with the hands resting on either side of the pelvis. The surface may be lightly slipped. The size, posture and neutral gender are all features of small dolls more usually modelled in white pipeclay, known as Frozen Charlottes. An example in white pipeclay, and various detached limbs from similar dolls with articulated limbs, are displayed at Scunthorpe Museum among finds from a late Victorian or early Edwardian rubbish dump near Doncaster racecourse. That assemblage is securely dated to the period 1895-1905, and a similar date would seem apt for this piece, although Frozen Charlottes as a whole were popular in both America and Britain from about 1840 to about 1920. The use of red clay may be less common, though the numerous brickworks and tileries in the region would give ample opportunity for casual toy-making by workers. Length: 47.4mm, Width: 22.5mm, Thickness: 15.3mm, Weight: 14.53g. https://finds.org.uk/database/artefacts/record/id/585133 So - not Roman - but a cheap Victorian doll which probably belonged to a little girl in Yetholm in the late nineteenth century. Disappointing in some ways - yet, like the pipe-bowl and the bullet, a tantalising glimpse of life in Yetholm in the not-too-distant past.
0 Comments
|
Archives
April 2024
|