Hostname: page-component-848d4c4894-2xdlg Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-06-17T17:00:20.908Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Prehistoric Boats from North Ferriby, East Yorkshire

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 May 2014

E. V. Wright  and
C. W. Wright
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The discovery of part of a large ‘sewn’ boat on the banks of the Humber at North Ferriby, East Yorkshire, in 1937, was announced just before the late war. Exploration which revealed many of the outstanding details of construction as well as the limits of the find, was carried out during 1938 and 1939, with a view to full excavation and, if possible, salvage in 1940. This prospect naturally disappeared on the outbreak of war, leaving us in some anxiety whether the boat would survive destruction by the waters of the river. The danger induced us to remove at intervals just before and during the war three sections from the lower end which would otherwise have been lost. Of these sections about half the pieces were stored in the Municipal Museum at Hull where they were destroyed when that building was set on fire by incendiary bombs and burnt down in 1942. The rest were kept at North Ferriby and, although shrunken and cracked for want of treatment, at least survive. In spite of our attentions a considerable amount of the remaining part of the boat was carried away.

Type
Research Article
Information
Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society , Volume 13 , 1947 , pp. 114 - 138
Copyright
Copyright © The Prehistoric Society 1947

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

page 114 note 1 Wright, E. V. and , E. V., Antiquity, XIII, 1939, 349 ffGoogle Scholar. A number of our ideas then advanced have since proved to be mistaken.

page 116 note 1 Bisat, E. V., ‘Glacial and Post-glacial sections on the Humber Shore at North Ferriby,’ Trans. Hull Geol. Soc. VII, Pt. 3, 1930–1931Google Scholar; Wright, E. V. and , E. V., ‘Some notes on the Holocene Deposits at North Ferriby,’ Naturalist No. 920, Sept. 1933, 210Google Scholar.

page 116 note 2 Barley, M. W., ‘Lincolnshire Rivers in the Middle Ages,’ Rep. and Papers of the Architectural and Arch. Societies (Lincolnshire) I, Pt. 1, 1936, 2Google Scholar.

page 116 note 3 Corder, E. V. and Davies Pryce, T., Ant. J. XVII, 1938, 262CrossRefGoogle Scholar, seq; ibid. XIX, 1939, 207.; Corder, P. and Wright, C. W. and , E. V., Naturalist, Sept. 1939, 237 fGoogle Scholar.

page 116 note 4 Corder, P. and Richmond, I. A.; ‘Petuaria,’ J.B.A.A. VII, 1942Google Scholar.

page 117 note 1 Phillips, C. W., ‘Present State of Archaeology in Lines.,’ Arch. J. xc, 147–9Google Scholar for description of ancient trackways.

page 117 note 2 Barley, op. cit., 3–4.

page 120 note 1 Notably the Brigg dugout (Atkinson, A., Arch. L, Pt. 2, 1887, 361–70Google Scholar) and the Clifton canoes (Phillips, C. W., Ant.J., XXI, 1941, 133–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar).

page 122 note 1 Single examples of winged adzes occurred in the Shoebury and Swallowcliffe hoards (B.M.). They are small tools and look no more effective than an ordinary winged or socketed axe mounted at right angles to the line of the haft.

page 122 note 2 The following records of iron adzes have been noted:—Glastonbury (7), Hunsbury (4), Ham Hill (3), Hod Hill (2), Bigbury, Hengistbury Head and Wookey Hole (1 each). Several of the same type were found in the Lisnacroghera Crannog, Co. Antrim, of which the well-preserved example in the British Museum would be excellently suited to the purpose of facing planks. Some of these tools may, however, be hoes.

page 122 note 3 Ant.J., VI, 1926, 121 fGoogle Scholar.

page 124 note 1 Engelhardt, C., Nydam Mosefund 1859–63, Copenhagen 1865Google Scholar, and Denmark in the Early Iron Age, London, 1866Google Scholar.

page 125 note 1 Rosenberg, Jessen and Johannessen, , Hjortspringfundet, Nordiske Fortidsminder, Copenhagen, 1937Google Scholar.

page 125 note 2 Shetelig, H., Bergens Museums Aarbog, Bergen 1903Google Scholar.

page 125 note 3 Thropp, J., Rep. and Papers of the Architectural and Arch. Societies XIX, Pt. 1, 1887Google Scholar. Hunt Rev., A.Saga Book of the Viking Club, 1907–1908Google Scholar.

page 125 note 4 op. cit., 96.

page 126 note 1 cf. the rope used to sew up the crack in the floor of the Appleby dugout, p. 127 below.

page 126 note 2 The best descriptions are:—Atkinson, A., Arch. L, Pt. 2, 1887, 361–70Google Scholar, and Rev. Prebendary Cross and Atkinson, , Rep. and Papers of the Architectural and Arch. Societies, XVIII, 1885, 33Google Scholar. Sheppard's review (Trans. E.R. Ant. Soc. XVI, 1910Google Scholar) is also useful.

page 126 note 3 Dudley, H. E., Ant., September, 1943, 156–61.

page 127 note 1 op. cit., 42.

page 127 note 2 Cross and Atkinson, op. cit., 34.

page 127 note 3 Atkinson, op. cit., 364.

page 128 note 1 Phillips, C. W., Ant. J. XXI, 1941, 133–43CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

page 128 note 2 Wylie, W. M., Proc. Soc. Ant. x, 1884, 110 fGoogle Scholar.

page 128 note 3 Meare Heath and Chilton Moor, The Abbot's Way and possibly also below a Roman causeway at Glastonbury, Bulleid, A., Proc. Somerset Arch. Soc., 79, 19Google Scholar; id. XII, I, 67; id. XXVI, 107–16; Trackway, Westhay, Godwin, H., P.P.S. VII, 1946, 9Google Scholar.

page 128 note 4 Naturalist, No. 920, 1933, 210–12.

page 130 note 1 It is just possible to distinguish the Upper Forest Bed in Hunt's photograph (op. cit., pl. facing p. 356).

page 131 note 1 Wylie, op. cit., 115; Atkinson, op. cit., 369.

page 131 note 2 Hawkes, C. F. C., Arch. J. CIII, 1947Google Scholar.

page 131 note 3 Swinnerton, H. H., ‘The Post-glacial Deposits of the Lincolnshire Coast,’ Q.J.G.S. LXXXVII, Pt. 2, 1931Google Scholar.

page 131 note 4 op. cit., 374.

page 131 note 5 Elgee, F., Early Man in N.E.Yorkshire, fig. 30, p. 83Google Scholar. Gloucester, 1930.

page 131 note 6 Hencken, H. O'N., ‘Ballinderry Crannog, No.2,’ Proc. Royal Irish Academy XLVII, Section C, No. 1, 1942, fig. 8, p. 22Google Scholar.

page 131 note 7 Smith, R. A., Arch. LXII, pt. 2 (1911), 593–610Google Scholar.

page 131 note 8 Smith, R. A., Arch. LXXVII (1927), 179–200Google Scholar.

page 131 note 9 Man, 1910, no. 48.

page 132 note 1 For a general review of the material: Elgec, op. cit., 186 seq.; Jacobsthal, P., Ant. J., xxv, 117 fGoogle Scholar. and Hawkes, C. F. C., Ant. J., XXVI, 187 f.Google Scholar, throw new and interesting light on chronology.

page 132 note 2 The name reaches us from Ptolemy, Geogr. II, iii, 10.

page 132 note 3 Greenwell, W., Arch. LIV 1894Google Scholar.

page 132 note 4 Elgee, op. cit., 171–2, who notices only two of the Hallstatt type out of a total of twelve bronze swords from Yorkshire and S. Durham and both of these from the immediate area of Scarborough.

page 134 note 1 Three are given in Atlas Ethnographique de Finlande, I. Chasse et Pêche, Helsingfors, 1905, nos. II 119–121Google Scholar. An even closer parallel, however, is provided by the pattern illustrated by Sirelius, (Die Volkskulter Finnlands, I. Jagd und Fischerei, Berlin, 1934, S.115Google Scholar and Abb.246), which differs from the hypothetical Ferriby type only in the lighter and slightly simpler construction and the method of anchorage against a boulder.

page 136 note 1 Clark, J. G. D., Ant. J. XVI, 40 and fig. 8Google Scholar.

page 136 note 2 Cf. also a small pot from Beverley, V.C.H. Yorks., 375; figured upper left on plate facing p. 374.

page 137 note 1 op. cit., 84–5.

page 137 note 2 Arch. J. c, pl. II, 5.

page 137 note 3 B.M. Iron Age Guide, fig. 180.

page 137 note 4 Ancient Bronze Implements of Great Britain, 211 f.

page 137 note 5 ibid., fig. 252.