Post-Medieval Archaeol 41 (1)

The study of a large hoard of Merida-type ware from Portugal found during excavation in Southampton prompts an examination of Portuguese pottery in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England, its trade, uses and context.

A programme of building recording and excavation at the Waverley Vaults, Edinburgh, examined the development of an urban space from the late-sixteenth century to the end of the twentieth. The sequence of archaeological deposits reflected the transformation of the backlands of an affluent post-medieval burgh house by the construction of New Street, one of the first civic improvements of the Scottish Enlightenment period. Lord Monboddo, a prominent figure in the Enlightenment, lived here in the late-eighteenth century. The site was again transformed in the nineteenth century, when industrial development culminated in the construction of the Waverley Vaults, a major railway monument. Separately authored contributions include

A project carried out in 2001 recorded the most important surviving remains of charcoal-fuelled blast furnaces and forges in Carmarthenshire and Pembrokeshire, and reviewed the documentary evidence relating to them. The earliest sites date to the end of the sixteenth and the early-seventeenth century. The furnaces at Ponthenri (Carmarthenshire) and Blackpool (Pembrokeshire) and the forges at Llandyfan (Carmarthenshire) were surveyed. One furnace site (either Ponthenri or Pontiets) may retain below-ground evidence for experiments in coke smelting by Hugh Grundy in 1620, giving it considerable national importance. The author draws attention to the fact that these monuments are little known, and attention is drawn to their steadily deteriorating condition.