Glass at Glastonbury

In AD 680 Glastonbury Abbey ran the first glass furnace in Britain

From 1904 to 1974 archaeologist shoveled and sifted tons of earth at Glastonbury in order to uncover the history of the Abbey from the 7^th century and onwards. Unfortunately it was more fun to dig, than to publish. Up until now the archive of the antiquarian excavations has been lying around gathering dust.

Together with the Trustees of Glastonbury Abbey and a team of researchers, professor Roberta Gilchrist from the University of Reading has undertaken the massive work of uncovering the information hidden in the massive reports. The post-excavation work will include the development of a database plus specialist studies of all excavated finds and materials. The aim is to lay the foundation for a new interpretation strategy and to offer a proper context for interpreting Glastonbury’s Arthurian legends.

One of the interesting finds have been the rediscovery of the archaeological excavations of the glass-working structures and the connected debris, which were found in the summers of 1955 -57. Although Donald Harden published the first description of the furnaces and the artefacts in 1960, the current project has already brought many additional finds and records to the fore.

So far the re-examination of the records has shown that the glass furnaces at Glastonbury are similar to the Anglo-Saxon furnaces excavated at Barking. However, the exact Radio-carbon dating indicates that the early furnaces were active already from the 680s. Probably they were set up in connection with a series of building activities instigated by King Ine of Wessex. Further the renewed study of the material has shown that the production centre must have been active over a longer period than has hitherto been thought. This is indicated by the fact that some of the furnaces have been built on top of each other.

The glass material indicates that the source of the glass was reused Roman blue/green cullet. Only afterwards it was decorated with coloured trailing and so-called marvered decoration, possibly using imported ingots or slabs. Since the glass shards found in the cloister walk area were of a more vivid coloured type that the left-overs found near the furnaces, it is believed that the production developed over time and that it was likely glassworkers from Gaul, who worked at the furnaces; as was probably also the case at Yarrow , where extensive collections of glass-fragments have been excavated and reused in the windows of the church from around the same time

The glass slabs and fragments are exhibited during this summer at the Glastonbury Abbey Museum until September 2012. During the exhibition a number of glass workshops will be held.

The full archive of excavations will be brought to publication by Professor Gilchrist, in partnership with the Trustees of Glastonbury Abbey and funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council. The Somerset Archaeology & Natural History Society and the Society for Medieval Archaeology has funded the radiocarbon dating. Dr Hugh Willmott (University of Sheffield) and Dr Kate Welham (University of Bournemouth) have undertaken the specialist analyses of the glass.

Glastonbury Abbey

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