WD's mudlarking

[Winddancer]

What is mudlarking you say? Well the short answer is digging up old trash in the mud of the Thames :P However we are talking about very old trash. The Thames is the river that runs through London and it has a tide. Twice a day the tide goes out and leaves several foreshores that can be accessed via stairs and ladders. You can then, with a valid permit, head down onto this forshore and dig/rifle through the mud and look for old interesting things. Clay pipes, coins, pottery sherds, heck even whole bottles are but a few things that can be found, so come digging with me!

One of the stairs that leads down to the foreshore, as you can see the tide can get high..

[Raisins]

Ohhh I saw people doing this when I was in London years ago I thought it was terribly interesting I wish the person I'd been staying with had of been a bigger nerd and into that sort of thing I might have gotten to do more fun history things. I can't wait to see what other treasures you post.

[Winddancer]

Shame! It is soo fascinating and addictive! :D

It speaks to me..

[Afird Splitax]

Oh, how interesting! I use to take my son to the local dump (when it was free to enter) and spend time looking around.
Cool, Windy!

[Marceline]

Wow this is a high tide line!

And of course you would find a WD item whilst mudlarking

Yay, please share more - the pics I've seen on your IG are incredible!

[Taethowen]

So mudlarking is basically just a treasure hunt? Sounds fantastic! Can't wait to see what other finds you share here!

That tide line is very impressive, but I'm also in a land-locked state so I have very little experience with tides. The only time the rivers go up here are when we have a lot of rain or when they let water out of the dams.

[Winddancer]

@Drifa here in the UK there are such things as victorian bottledumps! Basically a trash site that has been covered over, but you can find a lot of (whole!) bottles from the 1800's. I would loove to go dig out one of those :D

@Tarawen What I thought too! Naith was like "I am surprised you didnt take it home with you" :P

@Taethowen Yep, that's basically what it is :D

Now my all time favourite is and always will be finding clay pipes. They can be anywhere from 100-440 years old. Maybe it is just because they are so easily identifiable, but I love them all the same <3 As you can see I also collect the broken ones and the pieces and stems :P


The blackened one is about 1610-1640


This is about mid 1800's


Likely mid 1800's


This is about 1680-1710

[Nia]

I can't help but see the clay pipes as like the 17th century equivalent of cigarette butts on the pavement (although an infinitely nicer and not at all gross equivalent!!). But this is all pretty awesome, Windy. I have often spotted mud-larkers on the banks of the Thames in central London when I wander along southbank (which I haven't really done much this year) and always wondered what sort of things they were finding - now I know!

[Marceline]

Whaaat, you didn’t keep it? I’m surprised too!

[Winddancer]

@Nia Well I am about as anti smoking as they come and I LOOOVE them! Tbh there is a bit more to it, it's also knowing that 440 or so years (440!!) ago, some woman or man sat at their bench and pressed a lump of clay into a pipe and then someone smoked it. It makes me wonder what they did to afford it (as it was expensive back then) and for how long they used it and what the person was like. Makes me feel like I got a lil bit of history in my home, where normally you would have to go to the museum for something that old :P

@Skwovet don't make me feel worse about it! I have regretted it since! :P

Now while the intricate ones are less old, it is still awesome to find the more detailed ones like this dog on a pipe stem

[Nia]

No, I am 100% with you on that!! So I used to (well, on three occasions) do archaeological digs at a site called Silchester, helping out the uni students. And the most exciting thing I would ever find were just hobnails. But I LOVED it. I just thought it was so awesome that at some point that thing was holding someone's shoe together, and that they were walking around and talking and living their life back in the Roman times, and then BOOM, 1,500 years later there I am holding that same hobnail. And I feel like that's the same when you find any old thing from a bygone era. Kinda makes me wonder what we'll all leave behind.

[Winddancer]

I know right! The closest thing to archaeology I will likely get :P Oh and they will be finding stuff like this :

[Raisins]

that last one is quite the amazing pipe. The dog pipe is amazing lookingand the older the mostly complete? one above it is very interesting piece to me.

What do you do with these pieces after you find them?

[Winddancer]

This is my main display, it is a coffee table with a glass lid. I do have lots of other bits all over the place, much to my partners dismay :P I am trying to find a way to display the pipes and pipe bowls in a better way, got a boxed frame I am hoping will look good :)

[Yávië]

Aaaaah, this is SO COOL, Windy! That is by far and away the best coffee table I have ever seen. Well, now I have something new to add to my bucket list -- mudlarking in the Thames! *is quite jealous*

[Winddancer]

I watched several video's on youtube and was like I need to do this! Luckily I live only about 1½ to 2 hours away :P

This is a tiny vid of some visitor's I had while larking a while back, just to see if I can post it.

https://imgur.com/f3KbNAB

[Marceline]

Wait, what - this table is amazing! Is it a custom piece?

[Winddancer]

Wait, what - this table is amazing! Is it a custom piece?

Nope! Got it on FB marketplace for a tenner, partner paid! :P Think it was sold in like Ikea or something. I have seen something similar in Ikea now https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/images/produ ... 032_S5.JPG

[Marceline]

Whoa - what a deal! And such a perfect way to display your finds.

[Winddancer]

Yep, love it! Though it needs a lick of paint :P

[Winddancer]

Several post medieval roof tiles. Can't help but think of the great London fire when I see these, but there are SO many of them. (The crossed out ones turned out to be spacers in construction work ) They are the ones with holes in them, the holes are for the pegs that would hold them.

[Lailyn]

Wow! This is so cool! I had no idea people could do this, I'm so glad they give permits out. I look at these items and I also imagine the people who made the clay pipes, used them, what were they like and where did they live I wonder? Its like holding a piece of someone's life in your hands.

I'm really impressed with your coffee table - it is so professional and unique! How do you know how old some of these are? Is it based on material, style, etc.? What is the oldest thing you ever found (even if just a rough estimate)?

[Winddancer]

Probably anything roman, is the oldest. I mean apart from the fossils of course lol. The sherd above is likely from a roman mortarium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mortarium I got a few other roman pottery sherds as well. After that it is likely those roof tiles as they are about 500 years old, then the oldest clay pipes and some of the other pottery.

[Moriel]

Windy this is so awesome!! The historian in me is squealing with delight. If I had known it was a thing I would have been mudlarking all the time when I was living over there. I especially love all the different pipes, and Nia's comment about them being like cigarette buts

[Winddancer]

I know right! How could I not have known this all the times I went on vacation in London??

[Raisins]

I love the coffee table its a brilliant way of displaying all those pieces! Also I think the roofing tile pieces are really neat looking, especially with the history around the London fire, curious if the ones that are darker are flame damaged (maybe not necessarily THE London Fire but a fire) Or is it river dirt?

[Winddancer]

Nope all those have been cleaned, it is black like that, so of course can't help but think it was in a fire :P But stopped collecting them as there are so many and already have a bowl full lol. But keeping my eye out for one with an animal imprint on it!

[Pele Alarion]

That definitely looks like a cool adventurous thing to do, @Winddancer. Though... have you ever thought of what'd you do if you collected so many items that you ran out of space where to keep them?

[Winddancer]

Ahem.. we are way beyond that.. So had to bring 2 bagfulls of sherds back..

[Nessa Saelind]

There's always the option of looking for extra storage space although not sure how much storage around London costs these days... An arm and a leg?

[Winddancer]

More likely a whole body.. Partner keeps whining about how much I still have, but tough! I am more picky with what I take home now though, but still bring more than he would care for, cause he sees it as trash :P

[Taethowen]

I love that dog pipe! And that coffee table is *amazing* no matter what you're displaying in it, and dang I kind of want something like that now! The roof tiles are so interesting too. It's amazing the kind of artifacts that literally pile up when a place has been densely populated for as long as England (and London, really) has. Can't wait to see more treasures you've collected when I'm back from my hiatus!

[Baphởmet]

I've seen the term mudlarking here and there but never actually stopped to figure out what the heck it actually meant. From the looks of things though, I have been missing out! I took an anthropology class in college and we did something vaguely similar but mudlarking looking like much more fun that combing a random bit of land in New Mexico for arrowheads several times in a single year. You've found some fascinating bits of treasure. I love all the pipes! It baffles the mind that so many of them can be found in the Thames. I have so many questions!

[Winddancer]

I looove this table! It's my best find ever. Would like to get a printing box or whatever they are called for the wall as well to display even more :D And yes there is a ton of stuff still in the Thames, it still brings in treasures. I havent been lucky enough to find bullets, medallions, rings and coins. But I am hoping!

When you come and visit, I will take you mudlarking then! ;D
And yes there is a ton of pipes as they would throw them away sometimes after one use or when they were done with them, like cigarette butts.
And ask away, Frost! :D

As for what I have a lot of it would be pottery sherds. I display those in glass vases and bowls. They too have a lot of history as they are all 100-500 years old, some older if you find the roman sherds. Have a few of those <3

[Lirimaer]

Never heard of this. Looks like mucky fun. Expensive mucky fun. Which upsets your other half ... I knew you liked to live dangerously!

[Winddancer]

If I lived in London, the only expense would be the permit, which lasts for 3 years. But yes, driving 2 hours to do it costs me about 20 quid each time I go :( But then again, what hobby is completely free? :P

[Raisins]

HOLY POTTERY SHARDS BATMAN. I love all the little blue painted shards those are always weirdly my favourite sort of bits to find anywhere I was such a goblin as a child I am so glad mudlarking doesn't exist where I am.

So the question is if you have randos *cough*me*cough* coming from across the pond to visit is there some sort of touristy permit that allows them to do this as well or just the 3 year permit? Because Honestly the more I see of England/Europe the more I want to make the trip again once I can post covid.

[Winddancer]

They used to have day ones, looks like the only other one is a monthly one. That sucks.. https://www.pla.co.uk/Environment/Thame ... re-permits Though things might change again, you never know.

Btw the lil blue ones, most of those are transferware, some are chinese porcelain :)

[Nia]

The blue and white ones are awesome. Also yeah that's a great coffee table. I saw a similar table once in a shop somewhere (though it wasn't for sale) which someone had used to display coins from all over the world (and probably from lots of different times too). Such a practical way of displaying cool things.

[Winddancer]

It is! Love it, though like I said it really needs a lick of paint :P

Ok as for the oldest things, obviously that would be fossils :P

Cidarid echinoid/urchin. A single plate with a central spine boss (area where spine joins the urchin test/skeleton)


Micraster - heart urchin


Some kind of coral


Some kind of sponge

[Nia]

In an abstract sort of way, Windy, the third one kind of reminds me of just a depiction of a shed-load of coronaviruses. That or dandelion puffs. They're great though. Do you know how old any of those fossils are?

[Winddancer]

Lets go with dandilion puffs! :O They would be millions of years old as fossils, I forgot what they were, so am asking in the fb group again. Seems I forgot to add the names to their pics when I found them :P Silly me..

[Winddancer]

Editing the names of them in as I get them :)

[Marceline]

Whoa, fossils! The child in me who wanted to be a paleontologist is truly in awe. How often do you find fossils while mudlarking??

[Lailyn]

Omg fossils!!! Ok when I asked about the oldest, I was thinking oldest man-made (which wow the Roman stuff is super cool by the way!) but those fossils are so gorgeous! They are way nicer than anything I ever found in my geology classes at uni. So cool. Will definitely also be adding mudlarking to my if-I-ever-visit-London to-do list.

Are there other places you know of where you can legally do this or is the Thames a very special case?

[Winddancer]

I know you meant man made ;P Couldnt help myself But yes, loads of fossils, especially corals and echinoids :D

I think you can "mudlark" on any river (better if they have ebb and flow) or beach. As far as I know, Thames is the only place you need a permit (to ensure treasures arent lost, but people take them and dont report it anyways :( ) So anywhere with a river and a record of old towns/cities, should produce stuff, cause basically the Thames was once a garbage bin. You can also find porcelain and some pipes in fields. And you can research where the Vicorian dumps were and dig those up for bottles/pipes (would love to do this too). Anywhere else you just need permission, if it is private land.

[Lailyn]

I should've seen that coming. I can't lie I'm a little jealous of the fossil collection I'm now imaging you must have and I wish I knew more about them. Looking forward to seeing more!

I'm surprised you don't need a permit elsewhere but I feel like the U.S. has a lot of rules about collecting stuff though I think a lot might depend on land ownership and such. So neat there is so much history and artifacts just waiting to be found!

[Winddancer]

Yea me too, though a lot of rivers are on private land, so that might be why :P

[KingODuckingham]

Okay honestly I had a hard time looking through this thread because I am so stinking jealous. There's some cool stuff around my area, but absolutely nothing like this. Maybe we could just, like, trade spots for a few days or something? You can go mountain-climbing and I can go mudlarking?

[Winddancer]

Deal! Though I wouldn't get very far lol. I loove mountains though, miss them like crazy!