Briquetage

The Purbecks have always attracted people, nowadays for recreation, but in times past the abundance of natural resources made the area an attractive place to live or eek out an industrious  living.  Evidence of one such industry can be found along the Southern edge of Kimmeridge Bay, where a thick midden like deposit of Roman Briquetage can be seen.  Briquetage is the name given to the course ceramic used in the boiling process of salt production; salt has always been a valuable commodity and over the centuries huge fortunes were made. Whilst inspecting the midden I found a tiny shard of oxidized Roman glass, a luxury item of the times, maybe an indication of the wealth generated in the bay or merely evidence of the coastal trade of the period.