Grass-Marked Pottery

Pottery either marked or tempered with grass. In western Britain, there are examples of pottery covered with 'grass' impressions from Ulster, the Hebrides, and Cornwall, especially around the 5th-6th centuries AD. The term also refers to crude handmade ware made in various parts of Frisia in the Migration Period and in certain parts of southern England in the Early Saxon period in which ferns and other organic material was used as tempering.

Most of the pottery of the Dark Age period in western Britain is characteristically covered with ‘grass’ impressions. ‘Grass-marked’ pottery occurs in Ulster, the Hebrides and in Cornwall, and it has often been argued that it owes its widescale use to 5th- or 6th-century migrations between these regions. The pottery is crude, and the impressions indicate limited seasonal production which was terminated once wheel-thrown wares were produced during the Saxo-Norman period in Cornwall and Ulster.