More information : Two kilns have been found at Silchester to the northeast of the town. They date from the end of the first century and are of small size and typical updraught construction, partly set into the gravel. Each had a roughly circular or oval combustion chamber and a domed oven above, separated by a pierced clay diaphragm or floor supported from below on a pedestal. A short firing-flue, also domed, communicated with the chamber from a stoking-hollow outside. The kiln-structure was of clay reinforced by the addition of wasters and grass.
One kiln was about 32 inches in internal diameter and had walls 5 inches thick. A little of the dome remained in place, enough to show that it was about 40 ins. high. The pierced oven-floor was 6 ins. thick and stood about 16 ins. above the bottom of the combustion-chamber. The stoking-flue was about 30ins. long, 11 ins. wide and up to 15 ins. high. Its walls were only 2 ins. thick, but were buried below the surface. The floor sloped upward from the flue to the far end of the chamber. The other kiln lay quite close and was of similar dimensions. (1)
A considerable quantity of broken pottery was found in and around the kilns, but much was surface stuff such as is found anywhere within a radius of a quarter-mile from the town walls. In one kiln were four wasters and several pieces of dishes and basins; in the other were only a dish of coarse red ware and an ornamented vase, both found in the furnace flue. (2)
Two very small pottery kilns, found a short distance beyond the north gate in 1906. Both measured about 0.80 metres amd 0.60 metres by 0.40 metres and appeared to be in production from the end of the first century (3)
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