The Iron Age material culture of South East Scotland, or rather the ‘Tyne-Forth’ province is often viewed as being impoverished and having an absence of clearly diagnostic types (Harding 2017). Assessing the finds from the Traprain Law Environs Project (TLEP) project, Hunter stated, ‘…the specialist reports have discussed the material in detail, with largely prosaic finds dominating the picture… typically, the activities represented are everyday tasks such as preparing, storing and consuming food, or preparing hides; other, equally everyday tasks such as textile manufacture or making stone tools are only intermittently represented, emphasising the partial nature of our assemblages’ (2009).
It is undoubtedly true that, with a few exceptions, for example Traprain Law and Broxmouth, the material culture from the majority of South East Scotland Iron Age and Roman Iron Age sites is generally modest in quantity. However, Hunter has shown that the material culture is rich in interpretive value and the occurrence of decorative metalwork from hoards in the area should warn us that ‘poverty’ is a misleading impression (2009). Hunter contextualised the TLEP material culture by reviewing all lowland Iron Age site, (defined as the Tyne Forth, Solway Clyde and North East provinces, published in PSAS in the period 1945 to 2006, along with a selection of monographs (2009). This work will be the basis for all future discussions of material culture in the area and is the basis for the following summary, with a focus on material from the South East and wider a focus on East Lothian that has seen the most excavated sites and with accompanying scientific analysis and radiocarbon dating.
South East Scottish assemblages include coarse pottery, stone tools, glass and metal artefacts, and Roman imports. The assemblages also attest to a range of craft activities. In one sense, this broad range is very typical of broader Iron Age assemblages. The most substantial finds come from Traprain Law, with these assemblages long dominating discussions.
In the 1980s attention moved to the assemblages from developer-led archaeology, particularly from Dryburn Bridge and Broxmouth with Cool (1982) discussing the possibilities from the emerging artefact record and stratigraphic associations. Many of the finds from Cool’s ‘Middle’ (400 BC to 200 BC) and ‘Late’ (250BC to AD100) assemblages had been found previously at various sites but it was not possible until the Broxmouth excavations to place them in a broad, chronological sequence. Further, the Broxmouth artefact-rich middens and the preservation of bone and antler, provided new insight into a range of materials, particularly bone.
Cool’s Middle Iron Age assemblages consisted of Type 1 pottery, bone yoke neck pins, stone balls and ‘knobbly pottery’ and the Late Iron Age assemblages consisted of Type 2 pottery, bone pins, domes and handles, antler combs and stone whorls. Although not on the scale of Hunter (2009) Cool also demonstrated that other South East Scottish Iron Age sites. for example Kaimes Hill, Braidwood, Castlelaw, Craigs Quarry (Direlton), Traprain Law and others, also had Type 1 and 2 pottery and stone balls, suggesting a shared use of material culture across the region. The ‘Early’ Iron Age assemblages (pre-400BC) differed in several aspects from the Middle and Late assemblages, which also included a whole range of shale, worked stone, bone points, handles, the main finds being saddle-querns, pebble rubbers and a variety of miscellaneous stone objects. Aside from a shale bracelet few other finds can be assigned to the Early phase; no pottery is associated with this Early phase.
The full publication of Broxmouth (Armit & McKenzie 2013) demonstrated the range of objects in use at Broxmouth, and perhaps parts of southern Scotland, during the first millennium BC. The assemblage is the second largest assemblage in South East Scotland behind the exceptional assemblage from Traprain Law. The publication of Broxmouth was only a few years after the publication of other sites, particularly the Traprain Law Environs Project (TLEP) (Haselgrove 2009) and the A1 Haddington to Dunbar Bypass (LeLong & MacGregor 2007). Combined, these artefact assemblages demonstrate that agricultural and craft activities were at the centre of everyday life in South East Iron Age Scotland. The evidence has, as always, been expertly reviewed and interpreted by Hunter (2009; 2013). The following discussion focuses on these most recent publications in East Lothian, particularly at Broxmouth (Armit & McKenzie 2013; Hunter 2013; Cool 2013 and Bruhn 2013) but particularly the wider analysis of East Lothian by Hunter (2009; 2013).
Regarding the latter, Hunter’s study shows that of 35 examined sites, 34 produced artefact assemblages; 30 from excavation or recovery from erosion surfaces, four from stray finds or metal- detecting. Hunter examined 29 sites first hand, including the key assemblages of Broxmouth and Traprain Law, giving us unparalleled insight into East Lothian, and presumably wider South Eastern Scotland. Only Traprain Law, Broxmouth and Dryburn Bridge have more than 50 small finds, excluding pottery, and almost half the sites have fewer than 10 small finds.