Who's up for an Inkwell thread??
Well you're getting one anyway...
As everyone knows thousands of years of inkwell usage was wiped away in a [pen]stroke with the advent of the C20th fountain pen...😔:
Base of a C20th stoneware inkwell, c.AD1900-1960
NLM-E6C367 - Lincs
There's actually just 2 inkwells on the @findsorguk Db dating to the Roman period:
This ceramic fragment of a South Gaulish samian ware inkwell retains some of the opening from the top of the well & part of the lid to the wall (c.AD50-200)
LON-63AA5D - Thames, City of London
Copper-alloy inkwells are relatively rare finds across the Empire with only 6 sites in Roman Britain producing examples.
This fragment of inkwell lid dates to c.AD100-300, from the River Tees at Piercebridge Roman Fort
BM-DD417A (comperanda illustration from Asciburgium)
Early medieval inkwells are even more rare!
Just 1 tentative example on the DB: the base of a glass vessel, possibly an Anglo-Saxon inkwell (c.AD710-850)
LIN-AE2BB1 - Lincs
Of course, there many more medieval examples...well 7 anyway on the Db, including LIN-98F38A (sure it's not an ampulla...?) & NLM-E9A3F0, both lead & both, again, from [literate] Lincs (c.AD1400-1600)
unsurprisingly, most on the DB date from the post-medieval period, with more recognisable ceramic and lead forms:
SF-585B53 - 1500-1700 Suffolk
IOW-5559F8 - [stamped!] 1680 - Worcs
LANCUM-9347A7 - 1600-1800 - Cumbria
NLM-832DD5 - 1800-1900 - Lincs (doh...)
And lastly, the Classic Brown Stoneware inkwell
Oft excavated from many overburden layers across the UK:
"The demand for ink would have exploded after the introduction of compulsory education for children by the Education Act of 1870"
NLM-C37CF1 - 1870-1900 - [has to be...]Lincs
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