| Reculver | |
|---|---|
 The twin towers of St. Mary's Church | |
  Reculver Location within Kent | |
| Population | 135 [1] |
| OS grid reference | TR224693 |
| District | |
| Shire county | |
| Region | |
| Country | England |
| Sovereign state | United Kingdom |
| Post town | CANTERBURY |
| Postcode district | CT6 |
| Dialling code | 01227 |
| Police | Kent |
| Fire | Kent |
| Ambulance | South East Coast |
| UK Parliament | |
Reculver is a hamlet and coastal resort situated about 3 miles (5 km) east of Herne Bay in southeast England. It is a ward of the City of Canterbury district in the county of Kent. Reculver once occupied a strategic location at the western end of the Wantsum Channel, between the Isle of Thanet and the Kent mainland. This led the Romans to build a small fort, probably at the time of their conquest of Britain in 43 AD, and, starting late in the 2nd century, they built a "castrum" called Regulbium, which later was part of the chain of Saxon Shore forts. The military connection continued in World War II, when Barnes Wallis' "bouncing bombs" were tested in the sea off Reculver.
Reculver retained its importance after the Romans left, as an Anglo-Saxon palace may have been built in the ruins of the Roman fort before a "preaching cross" and monastery were built there. During the Middle Ages the twin spires of the church became a landmark for mariners known as the "Twin Sisters", supposedly after daughters of Geoffrey St Clare. The facade of St John's Cathedral in Parramatta, Australia, is a copy of that at Reculver.
Reculver declined in importance as the Wantsum Channel silted up and coastal erosion claimed many buildings constructed on the soft sandy cliffs. The village was largely abandoned in the late 18th century, and most of the church was demolished. Protecting the ruins and the rest of Reculver from erosion is an ongoing challenge.
The 1930s saw a revival as a tourism industry developed and there are now three caravan parks. Reculver Country Park is a Special Protection Area and Site of Special Scientific Interest; it has rare clifftop meadows and is important for migrating birds. 135 people were recorded by the 2001 census, nearly a quarter of whom were in caravans.
Geography
edit
Reculver once occupied a strategic location on routes between continental Europe and the east coast of England, but sedimentation and coastal erosion have obscured its importance. In ancient times it lay on a promontory at the western entrance to the Wantsum Channel, a sea lane between the Isle of Thanet and the Kent mainland, that silted up during the Middle Ages. The Roman fort and medieval church stand on the remains of the promontory, now "a small knoll which, rising to a maximum height of 50 feet, is the last seaward extension of the Blean Hills."[2] Place-name authorities state that the name "Regulbium" was Celtic in origin, meaning "at the promontory", or "great headland", and that, in Old English, this became corrupted to "Raculf", sometimes given as "Raculfceastre", giving rise to the modern "Reculver".[3]
Sediments laid down around 55 million years ago are particularly well displayed in the cliffs at Reculver.[4] Nearby Herne Bay is the type location for the Thanet Sand Formation, a fine-grained sand that can be clayey and glauconitic and is of Thanetian (late Paleocene) age.[5] It rests unconformably on the Chalk Group,[5] and forms the base of the cliffs in the Reculver and Herne Bay area.[6] Above the Thanet Sand are the Upnor Formation, a medium sandstone,[7] and the sandy clays of the Harwich Formation at the Paleocene/Eocene boundary.[8] The highest cliffs, rising to a maximum height of about 115 feet (35 m) to the west of Reculver,[9] have a cap[6] of London Clay, a fine silty clay of Eocene age.[10]
These rocks are easily washed away by the sea,[11] and the cliffs are eroding at a rate of approximately 5 feet (2 m) a year. It has been estimated that the Romans built their fort about 1 mile (1.6 km) from the sea.[12] A plan is in place to manage this erosion whereby some parts of the coastline like the country park will be allowed to continue eroding, and others – including the site of the Roman fort and St Mary's Church – will be protected from further erosion.[13]
History
editPre-historic and Roman
editWhile Stone Age flint tools have been washed out from the cliffs to the west of Reculver, a Mesolithic tranchet axe was found at Reculver in 1960, but is "likely to have been a casual loss".[14] Evidence for human settlement at Reculver itself begins with late Bronze Age ditches, followed by an early Iron Age farmstead slightly to the west of the church ruins, a Roman "fortlet" probably dating to their conquest of Britain, which began in 43 AD, and a well known Roman fort, or "castrum", which was probably started late in the 2nd century. This date is derived in part from a re-construction of a uniquely detailed plaque, fragments of which were found by archaeologists in the 1960s.[15]
References
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- ^ Census 2001. (2001). Office for National Statistics. Retrieved 7 September 2010.
- ^ Jessup, R.F., "Reculver", in Antiquity 10(38), 1936, pp. 179 (note), 188.
- ^ Ekwall, E., The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Place-Names (4th edition), OUP, 1960, p. 383 (Reculver) and Hill, A.D., A Dictionary of English Place-Names (2nd edition), OUP, 1998, p. 285 (Reculver). See also Glover, J., The Place Names of Kent, Batsford, 1976, "Reculver" and Jessup, op. cit., p. 190. Ekwall, op. cit., says that "Many more [Old English] forms are on record."
- ^ "The Geology of Kent" (PDF). Kent Wildlife Trust. Retrieved 17 September 2010.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ a b British Geological Survey (2010). "The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details Thanet Sand Formation". NERC. Retrieved 17 September 2010.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ a b Ward, D.J. (1978), The lower London Tertiary (Palaeocene) succession of Herne Bay, Kent, H.M.S.O, ISBN 9780118840521
- ^ British Geological Survey (2010). "The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details Upnor Formation". NERC. Retrieved 17 September 2010.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ British Geological Survey (2010). "The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details Harwich Formation". NERC. Retrieved 17 September 2010.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ Reculver Masterplan Report Volume 1, Section 4.1 "Topography, Landscape and Sea" (2008). Canterbury City Council Online. Retrieved 17 July 2010.
- ^ British Geological Survey (2010). "The BGS Lexicon of Named Rock Units — Result Details London Clay Formation". NERC. Retrieved 17 September 2010.
{{cite web}}: Check date values in:|accessdate=(help) - ^ Reculver Country Park Geology Resource Pack. (not dated). Kent Wildlife Trust. Retrieved 12 September 2010.
- ^ Jessup (1936), pp. 186-8.
- ^ Reculver Masterplan Report Volume 1, Section 3.8 "Coastal Protection". (2008).
- ^ Philp, B., The Excavation of the Roman Fort at Reculver, Kent, Kent Archaeological Rescue Unit, 2005, p. 192.
- ^ Philp, op. cit., pp. 206-18. See also Regulbium. (2007). English Heritage PastScape. Retrieved 8 December 2010. Philp, B., "The Roman Fort at Reculver Excavations 1968 – Interim Report", Kent Archaeological Review 15, 1969, and "The Reculver Inscription", Kent Archaeological Review 17, 1969. Council for Kentish Archaeology. Retrieved 12 July 2010.