Kent Archaeological Society
Founded in 1857 to promote advances in knowledge of Kent’s past by fieldwork, documentary research and publication.
News
The Archaeology Research Group of the Kent Archaeology Society is proud to present its annual fieldwork conference focusing on “Recent archaeological work in the Darent Valley.”
An online discussion with Dr Simon Elliott FSA about Septimius Severus, the great warrior emperor from North Africa who died in York in AD 211 after spending the last three years of his life trying to conquer the far north of Britain.
A conference run by The Sussex School of Archaeology & History in association with CBA SE.
An online talk by Andrew Mayfield, Community Archaeologist for Kent County Council and the Royal Parks at Greenwich, on the history of the site, the big dig over ten seasons and the work to further research and report on the former home of a Sheriff of Kent.
The latest in a series of online talks hosted by the KAS with Dr Reb Ellis-Haken, Postdoctoral Research Associate with the University of York Department of Archaeology.
A series of exhibitions and events to mark 900 years since the compilation of the most exceptional treasure at Rochester Cathedral.
Visit the museum and explore our new, engaging, interactive family experience interpreting the archaeology of Kent.
The next exhibition in the Templeman Gallery at the University of Kent features a collection of images from the KAS Library.
The latest update by Dr Sheila Sweetinburgh featured on the Center for Kent History blog at the Canterbury Christ Church University website.
We had a spine chilling, spooktacular time hunting down ten of the most haunted locations in Kent for the Halloween season.
The latest update by Dr Sheila Sweetinburgh featured on the Center for Kent History blog at the Canterbury Christ Church University website.
An article by Lady Sondes on Lees Court Estate features in Capturing Inspiring Stories from Changemakers given to delegates and circulated to 193 Member States of the United Nations and select media outlets during the opening of the UN General Assembly in New York.
Halling Historical Society committee is delighted to announce full success in its long-running (three years!) campaign to get Medway Council to properly conserve the 900-year old Halling Bishop's Palace and the adjacent Halling Lime and Brick Works railway embankment.
The latest update by Dr Sheila Sweetinburgh featured on the Center for Kent History blog at the Canterbury Christ Church University website.
Publications
A wide-ranging history of the geography and communities of Kent from the earliest times to the present day. Edited by Stuart Bligh, Elizabeth Edwards and Sheila Sweetinburgh.
Paul Tritton of the Kent Defence Research Group investigates how a Kent market town prepared to confront a Nazi invasion during Britain’s darkest Hour.
Giles Dawkes, 2024, Archaeologia Cantiana, Volume 145. Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
David and Barbara Martin, 2024, Archaeologia Cantiana, Volume 145. Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Gillian Draper, 2024, Archaeologia Cantiana, Volume 145. Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Nicholas J.E. Riall, 2024, Archaeologia Cantiana, Volume 145. Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Richard Taylor, KAS Magazine, Issue 122 (Summer 2024). Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Member Access
Kerry Brown, KAS Magazine, Issue 122 (Summer 2024). Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Member Access
Alexander Read, KAS Magazine, Issue 122 (Summer 2024). Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Member Access
Victor Smith FSA, KAS Magazine, Issue 122 (Summer 2024). Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Member Access
Dr Sam Moorhead FSA (British Museum, 1997-2023), KAS Magazine, Issue 122 (Summer 2024). Maidstone: Kent Archaeological Society.
Member Access
Rochester Cathedral Chapter Library volunteer Beverley Jacobs leafs through the 16th-century Sarum Missal, a remnant from the final days of the Priory Library.
Victor Smith explores Henley’s Second World War Industrial air-raid shelters.
Dr Alexander Thomas introduces the Danelaw; an 11th-century name for the areas of Northern and Eastern England in which the laws of the Danish Viking empire from the late 9th century until the early 11th century.
Dr Christopher Monk explores details about animals and animal products consumed at Rochester Priory emerging from a section in Custumale Roffense concerning the monastery’s lay servants (folios 53r-60v).
Elizabeth Elstob made a facsimile of Textus Roffensis (c.1123), in two parts. Here, Dr Christopher Monk explores her handwritten copies of the three Old English Kentish law codes, unique to Textus, and her copy of the foundation charter of Rochester Cathedral with its marvellous decorated initial.
Dr Christopher Monk explores The Rochester Bible; a richly decorated manuscript produced by the monks of St Andrew’s Priory, Rochester.
Resources
KAS General Manager Richard Taylor features on the 27th July episode of the Fun Kids Science Weekly podcast discussing the prehistoric discoveries at the Lees Court Estate Project.
Steve Ladner finds out why so many human remains are stored in one place. BBC Radio Kent’s Secret Kent series.
Steve Ladner finds out how disaster unfolded in the River Medway near Hadlow.
Steve Ladner explores the LGBTQ+ history at one of our most famous house and gardens.
The Victorian MP and social reform campaigner is remembered in Folkestone. Jo Burn reports.
It's 1908 and there's a murder, poison pen letters and suicide. Stever Ladner has more.
Chatham's historic dockyard is where Steve Ladner sought out the tale of a famous desk.
Do you know what's just over the hedge as you drive around the county? Steve Ladner stopped and had a look.
As the RNLI marks 200 years of saving lives at sea, Steve Ladner speaks to one of few remaining women on hand to launch the Dungeness lifeboat. Photo Credit: RNLI Dungeness.
We sneak inside Knole Park in Sevenoaks with Steve Ladner.
Have you ever wondered who looks after the windows at the Cathedral? Steve Ladner went to find out. Photo Credit: Getty Images.
The Little Gem in Aylesford, affectionately known as the smallest pub in the county and dating back to the 1100s, was closed and derelict for 10 years.
A man buried in a village churchyard next to the River Medway, played a key role in one of this country's key battles. Steve Ladner went along to find out more.
There are many hidden treasures at Smallhythe Place. Steve Ladner has been for a look.
Steve Ladner is near West Malling and asks 'where's the rest of the castle'?
As the RNLI marks 200 years of saving lives at sea, Steve Ladner hears the story of Dover's cross channel catastrophe. Photo Credit: RNLI.
Straight out of school, John De Rose began his apprenticeship at Chatham Dockyard. Jo Burn went to meet him. Photo Credit: Chatham Historic Dockyard Trust.
It dominates the landscape but is it a castle, a church or something completely different? Steve Ladner finds out.
Step inside the history of Hole Park Gardens with Steve Ladner.
It's Rolvenden Windmill and it only survives because of an awful accident.
'We've known it was there for years but have only just been able to reach it'. Jo Burn hears the stories behind the graffiti door.
A replica cockpit of an Avro Lancaster Bomber has landed in Manston. And the public can take it for a spin. Jo Burn reports.
Steve Ladner takes a wander around the home of Kent Cricket. Photo Credit: Getty Images/Alex Pantling.
It's a century since the coal mine opened and 35 years since it closed for good. Jo Burn has been to meet the miner who turned out the lights on an energy source he still believes could have a future.
A bright, quirky, respectfully irreverent podcast, celebrating the best of Strood, Rochester, Chatham, Gillingham... and not forgetting Rainham. Or come to that the Peninsula.
One of two collections of WW2-period aerial photographs featuring Kent available at the new US National Archives Catalog.
One of two collections of WW2-period aerial photographs featuring Kent available at the new US National Archives Catalog.
The geographic information collated by the Society is made available through ArcGIS.
The Kent LiDAR Portal makes available imagery from various LiDAR datasets from across the county, including the recently obtained high resolution data covering over 190 square km along the Darent Valley and area of the Sevenoaks Commons, at the western end of the Kent Downs AONB.
Kent Maps Online provides a set of themed essays about Kent, a county in South East England, which include interactive maps and images.
The Historic Environment Record is an extensive collection of information relating to Kent’s heritage. The database contains information about 40,000 archaeological discoveries and 18,000 listed buildings, landscapes, excavations and library sources. The HER also contains more than 6,500 archaeological reports as well as aerial photographs and maps.
The Kent Landscape Information Sytstem (KLIS) contains details on countryside access, landscape character, identifies opportunities for habitat creation and landscape restoration, the Kent habitat survey as well as areas designated for their conservation value.
Maps published by Ordnance Survey and related bodies, including the War Office (ca. 1840s-1960s).
Allington Castle is a Grade I listed medieval stone castle in Allington, Kent, just north of Maidstone. The castle is not open to the public, but is used as a wedding venue and has featured in several films and television series.
Read more about the Castle today: allington-castle.com
This complete Anglo-Saxon or Early Medieval pottery vessel is one of 11 intact pots recorded as part of the KAS’ Ozengell collection purchased in December 2022.
A disused 1860s costal defence fort on the south side of the Thames Estuary between Gravesend and Cliffe, Kent, England.
The eastern (chancel) section of the 13th century chapel of the commandery (or preceptory) of the Knights of St John Hospitaller at Sutton-at-Hone, near Dartford.
“The Grange” is an arched garden folly and tunnels located over the footpath on the south west side of the garden of Ingress Abbey, Greenhithe.
A garden bridge located at the north end of Vaughan Country Park, Tiltman Avenue, Greenhithe.
Transcription of Custumale Roffense 4r-5r by Jacob Scott (reviewed by Dr Christopher Monk). Translation and commentary by Dr Christopher Monk.
Monumental Inscriptions with concise wills of the mural monuments of All Saints Church, Maidstone. Transcribed by D.E. Williams 2022-2023.
Dr Alexander Thomas introduces The Peace of Edward and Guthrum forgery, Textus Roffensis, folios 40r-41v.
Be wifmannes beweddung (‘Concerning a woman’s betrothal’) (early-11th-century). Translation from Old English of Textus Roffensis folios 94v-95r by Dr Christopher Monk.
Monumental Inscriptions on the ledgerstones inside the church with related, concise wills. Compiled and wills transcribed by D. E. Williams.
The latest in the series on online talks hosted by the KAS, featuring KAS Curator Andy Ward discussing the Anglo-Saxon Ozengell Collection.
Archaeology in action! The ankle breaker was a nasty feature of Roman defences designed to snap the ankles of anyone attacking their strongholds! An ongoing excavation at Lympne with @kentarchaeologicalsociety_kas may have unearthed the remains of one such defence, outside of a Roman fort that overlooked the English Channel. Featuring Dr Simon Elliott.
Richard Taylor shows off a Iron Age coin discovered at Lympne in southeast Kent, not far from the Channel. It reveals how people have been living and trading (with coinage) in this part of Britain since Iron Age times, before the Romans.
Sorting through Roman Ceramic Building Material from Lympne!
An online talk by Philip Smither on the reinvestigation of Roman Richborough.
An online talk by Thomas Booth, Senior Laboratory Research Scientist at Skoglund Lab Ancient Genomics Laboratory, on ancient DNA and what we have learned about Britain 15,000-2000 years ago.
About the Society
The Society’s interests include all aspects of the human past in the historic County of Kent, including the the Boroughs of Bexley, Bromley, Greenwich and Lewisham lost to London since the Society's founding.
The Society encourages local groups to remain active in fieldwork as well as historical and desk-based research, and makes grants, organises events, publications, lectures and training excavations. The Society also promotes education and the study of history and archaeology in schools and encourages people of all ages to take an interest in the subject. The Society also administers, funds and distributes grants, bursaries and prizes in support of initiatives and projects which meet our core value of bringing the past to the present for everyone.
In soaring language typical of the period, the introduction to the first volume of the Society journal Archaeologia Cantiana, published in 1858, provides insight into the activities and aspirations of those that founded and established the Society in the mid-nineteenth century.
A report on the Society’s first Annual General Meeting was also featured in the first volume of Archaeologia Cantiana. Amongst other items, resolutions called for the establishment of a Society Library, which eventually took shape within the rooms at Maidstone Museum.
Frank W. Jessup writing in 1956 on the origin and first century of the Kent Archaeological Society, featured in Archaeologia Cantiana, volume 70.
The first issue of the KAS Newsletter was published in 1982. It has since featured over a thousand articles on Kent archaeology and history, being rebranded and expanded as the KAS Magazine in 2020.
A fire in the west wing resulted in a refurbishment of Maidstone Museum and the establishing of the Society Library as we find it today.
In recent decades, generous benefactors have left legacies with the Society and several dedicated research, publication and education grants are made each year.
The KAS Website at www.kentarchaeology.org.uk was a coming together of several online projects in the late 1990s.
The Society became a UK Registered Charity in 2018, with a formal Constitution of the Society's charitable purposes. Branding and the new Society logo are also designed around this time.
An exhibition at Maidstone Museum in 2023 and early 2024 exploring the origins and development of the Kent Archaeological Society Collections.
The latest in the series on online talks hosted by the KAS, featuring KAS Curator Andy Ward discussing the Anglo-Saxon Ozengell Collection.
Its #MuseumMonday! On Friday 13th our curator Andy organised a research visit with Professor John Hines, Emeritus Professor at Cardiff University.
It's #FindsFriday! Our student placement Holly has been hard at work illustrating more of our Ozengell Early-Medieval collection.
For a late #fossilfriday we have this amazing fossilised Oyster shell from the Lympne excavation last year!
It's #FindsFriday! Our curator has been busy cataloguing more of the Lympne excavation archive from last year, and today's find shows the importance of a secondary sort off site.
Yesterday society Curator Andy and #Lithics volunteer Angela headed back to Lees Court Estate to undertake the process of sorting out the flint assemblage so that they can be sent off for specialist analysis.
Promotes research, preservation and enjoyment of local history in the ancient County of Kent.
The Fieldwork Committee considers applications for grants for fieldwork/research in Kent.
Provides authors of successfully completed doctoral theses on the archaeology or history of Kent with grants towards the cost of publishing it in book format.
Bursary open to teachers in both primary and secondary schools to develop classroom resources based on Kent’s local history and/or archaeology.
Awarded to a dissertation judged to be a major contribution to the history or archaeology of Kent.
The KAS has been directly involved in conducting fieldwork in Kent since 1860. Future fieldwork undertaken by the Society will be overseen by the Archaeology Research Group (formerly the KAS Fieldwork Committee).
The group takes an interest in standing buildings from dwellings to cathedrals, arranging events and conferences, sharing resources, and encouraging publication. The group incorporates the areas of interest of the former Churches Committee.
Works with the Society Librarian to care and collate the Society's library collections and faciliate access for researchers.
Researches the county’s defences of all types and periods through the study of records, maps, aerial photographs, ground investigation and by other means.
The study of place names, or toponymy, includes an interest in their origins, meanings, usage and types. The group arranges events and conferences, shares resources and encourages publication.
The Maritime Kent Special Interest Group has been set up as a focal point to support and to disseminate research and information relating to Kent’s rich maritime heritage.
The Library is currently involved in a project to digitise the estate plans held within the Gordon Ward archives.
Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder was born c.1503 and died 1542. The son of Sir Henry Wyatt, he became a Sheriff of Kent in 1522, and by 1524 held positions at court, including that of Privy Councillor. He undertook foreign diplomatic missions from 1526, becoming High Marshal in Calais from 1528 – 30, achieving a knighthood in 1535.
The KAS collection includes a number of Twysden/Twisden family portraits that are currently housed at Bradbourne House. When, in November 1937 Sir John Ramskill Twisden died leaving no heir these portraits were bequeathed mainly to the Kent Archaeological Society, with others going to the National Portrait Gallery.
Membership
Latest issues of the Society’s annual journal Archaeologia Cantiana, KAS Magazine and the E-Newsletter. Publications and events at discounted rates. Use of the Society’s Library and advice from the Society’s network of experts.
Free membership is available to registered students aged 18+ studying any subject at any institution worldwide, entitling them to full member benefits although with PDF copies of Archaeologia Cantiana and the KAS Magazine.
Two adults residing in the same household will receive between them one copy of the publications issued free to members.
Groups carrying out similar work to the Society receive a copy of the member publications, can send a voting member to general meetings, make use of the Society's survey equipment including GNSS and magnetometer, and their members can usually receive the same discounts.
Institutional subscribers receive a copy of Archaeologia Cantiana anywhere around the world.
Students
Starting in 2024, our fund will be available to all full-time student members to help cover expenses and costs during your study period. Contact our Student Ambassadors Alex Read at the University of Kent and Grace Conium at Canterbury Christ Church University to learn more about how the Student Fund can support your academic journey.
The Society provides a unique opportunity for volunteers to help conserve, curate, and digitise valuable documents and artefacts from all over Kent. With your help, we can ensure that these treasures are protected for future generations. We would love to hear from you if you're interested in getting involved in an ongoing project or developing your dissertation project.
Patrons
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Jools Holland
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The Viscount De L’Isle
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Professor David Killingray
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Mr A. I. Moffat
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The Countess Sondes
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Dr J. Whyman
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Professor Sir Robert Worcester
Management Team
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Dr Richard Taylor
GENERAL MANAGER
Responsible for the overall management of the Society’s daily operations, point of contact for the Board of Trustees and all key partnerships with external bodies, including fundraisers and grant-giving bodies.
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Rebecca Fletcher
DEPUTY MANAGER
Responsible for financial operations, the VeryConnect Management system, and Line Manager to the Management Team.
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Ann Watson
ADMINISTRATION MANAGER
Responsible for membership administration, conference and events planning and external enquiries.
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Craig Campbell
SOCIETY ARCHIVIST
Responsible for the care, management and interpretation of the Society’s document collections and Society Library.
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Jason Mazzocchi
ARCHAEOLOGIA CANTIANA EDITOR
Responsible for the annual production of Archaeologia Cantiana.
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Jacob Scott
DIGITAL MANAGER
Responsible for the development and production of the Society website.
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Brie Thomas
FINANCE MANAGER
Responsible for the daily management of the Society’s finances.
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Andy Ward
SOCIETY CURATOR
Responsible for the care, management and interpretation of the Society’s object collections.
The Kent Shipbuilding conference organised jointly by KAS (Maritime Kent Research Group) and Chatham Historic Dockyard.