Mary Ellin's request for information on 17th/18th century chamber pots
elicited 21 responses as of this writing. Curious how quickly the
conversation moved away from her initial question to generalities about
hygiene, particularly for the late historic period. Getting back to the
first thread in the fabric...
The Lost Towns of Anne Arundel Project excavated one half of a partial
earthen cellar thought to be a part of Edward Rumney's tavern. The site
dates from c.1690 to 1740 and is situated in the core of the port town
of London, Maryland, just south of Annapolis. We recovered numerous
tablewares (mostly faience) and a few kitchenwares (e.g., North Devon),
numerous wine bottles, some wine glasses, vials, etc. We recovered two
largely mendable chamberpots, one of plain faience, one a highly
decorated Westerwald-like stoneware.
No chamberpots were identified among the 200+ minimum vessels identified
for the Compton (c.1651-1660s) and Patuxent Point (c.1660s-1670s) sites
in southern Maryland (see my The Archaeology of Wealth, Plenum Press,
1996), and they do not appear on the sites of Cushnoc and Pentagoet in
Maine, also 17th century (Cranmer, Leon E. [1990]Cushnoc. Occassional
Publications in Maine Archaeology Number 7, Maine Historic Preservation
Commission, Augusta; and Alaric and Gretchen Faulkner [1987] The French
at Pentagoet. Special Publications of the New Brunswick Museum and
Occassional Papers in Maine Archaeology No. 5). See also Anne Yentsch's
1990 piece in Historical Archaeology 24(3):24-53 and Gibb and Balla's
[1993] Dutch Pots in Maryland Middens in Journal of Middle Atlantic
Archaeology 9:67-86.
Good luck, Jim Gibb
The Lost Towns of Anne Arundel Project
Annapolis, MD USA
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