Windsor Castle, Excavations in the Round Tower (Site 431) 1989-92 and The Upper Ward (Site 485) 1992: A Preliminary Report on the Fish Remains
Author(s): A Locker
This preliminary report concentrates on the fish recovered from selected contexts dated to the 11th to mid 14th centuries from excavations in the Round Tower and Upper Ward at Windsor Castle. Nearly 14,000 bones were identified. The majority were from Kitchen deposits and the Strong Room in the Round Tower, largely of 14th date. An intensive sieving program ensured the smallest bones were retrieved with different mesh sizes demonstrating their effect on recovery. Use of a grid to subdivide the kitchen floor during excavation revealed some depositional differences. The assemblage was largely herring and eel by bone number, small cyprinids were also common, particularly dace and some larger fish, which together with pike and perch, may have come from managed ponds. There is documentary evidence regarding the royal ponds, as well as contemporary records of fish served at table. The major gadid food fishes such as cod, whiting and, less numerous, haddock and ling were all present, as were the common flatfishes plaice and flounder. Evidence of status from individual fish by size or rarity was limited, most of the fish were of species and a size commonplace in occupation deposits.
- Report Number:
- 21/2018
- Series:
- Research Report
- Pages:
- 88
- Keywords:
- Animal Bone Fish Bone Medieval Castle Zooarchaeology
