A Saxon Cemetery near the Village of Harwell, Berkshire

By Joan R. Kirk and Kenneth Marshall

Published by Oxoniensa in 1956.  Find the full PDF Article here (14 pages).

During the month of September, [955, an almost complete pot was brought into the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford, by Mr. R. Gregory. The pot, which had a large hole in one side,’ had been discovered by workmen during the excavation of a drainage trench leading to a septic tank in the garden of a bungalow which was being built for Mr. Gregory close to the village of Harwell.

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The site (FIG. 7) is some two hundred yards to the south of the A 417 road (Wantage to Reading) and on the western side of a narrow track known as the Hollow Way which runs south from A 417 on to the downs.

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Mr Gregory donated 12 of these objects to the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford.  Here are links to collection entries

• Sherd
• Small square-headed brooch with cruciform foot and animal ornament
• Spearhead
• Knife
• Applied brooch with a small bossed centre with a ring of raised dots and alternating six heart-shaped motifs (on display, Second floor | Gallery 41 | England 400 – 1600)
• Blackware pot with round body decorated with four bosses
• String of beads
• Small metal buckle
• Disc brooch
• Disc brooch
• Bronze fragment

Here’s the brooch in the display cabinet on the second floor (#16, centre)

(Unrelated, the Ashmolean also has from Harwell a Rubbing of a monumental brass commemorating John Jennes and wife Margaret, presented between 1840 and 1910)