Far Blacklands is one of the larger iron-smelting sites in the Wealden iron industry, located on the High Weald near Great Cansiron Farm in the parish of Hartfield, East Sussex. The site operated during the Roman period, with activity broadly attributable to the later 1st and 2nd centuries AD, the peak phase of Wealden iron production. It was a working bloomery industrial site rather than a settlement of any pretension, producing wrought iron blooms from local Wadhurst Clay siderite ores using charcoal from the surrounding woodland.
Source: Pleiades — A Community-Built Gazetteer and Graph of Ancient Places. View the Pleiades record →
Far Blacklands lies within the eastern (or "northern") group of Wealden bloomeries, which is generally regarded as having been civilian-operated, in contrast to the apparently Classis Britannica-controlled coastal sites further south and east. Together with the nearby Great Cansiron bloomery, it contributed to one of the most productive iron-producing regions in the north-western Roman provinces, supplying iron to markets including London via the road that ran through this part of the Weald.
The site is known principally from substantial deposits of slag and bloomery debris identified through fieldwork by the Wealden Iron Research Group, with surface finds including tap slag, furnace lining and Romano-British pottery indicating the date range. No large-scale modern excavation has been published for this specific site, and detailed structural evid
Far Blacklands is one of the larger iron-smelting sites in the Wealden iron industry, located on the High Weald near Great Cansiron Farm in the parish of Hartfield, East Sussex. It is recorded in the Pleiades gazetteer of ancient places as a site site from the Roman period in Britain.
Far Blacklands Romano-British Iron Bloomery, 580m NNW of Great Cansiron Farm is classified as a Roman site — a civilian site in the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer. Roman Britain's archaeology encompasses thousands of sites ranging from legionary fortresses and marching camps to villas, temples and towns.
Several Roman sites lie within a short distance, including Section of Roman road 270yds (250m) in length SE of Holtye Common (1.5 km), Hillfort, Roman villa and iron works on Garden Hill (6.3 km), Romano-British bloomery in Pippingford Park, 775m north-east of Pippingford House (7 km). Aubrey Research maps over 2,200 Roman sites across Britain, drawn from the Pleiades ancient world gazetteer.
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Research the area around Far Blacklands Romano-British Iron Bloomery, 580m NNW of Great Cansiron Farm