With my rainboots and overalls on, and my trusty wheelbarrow and shovel, I was ready to dig up some natural clay! Having collected clay from my partner’s grandparents’ property before, I already had a good idea of where to start digging.
The ground in this area of the horse’s paddock was very wet, and I could tell from how slippery it was while walking that there was a clay deposit here. We’d have to dig down a bit to access it though. While picking the best spot to start digging, I considered the foliage, and picked a spot with less grass and clovers so there would be less debris to pick out of the clay during later steps. We chose a spot just under the fence, where the horses don’t tend to run, so that the soft spot left behind wouldn’t be a risk for them stepping into it and hurting themselves. I imagine this was a consideration that people had to make in medieval Europe as well, as livestock were valuable and holes from harvesting clay could be dangerous to them.
There were definitely some funny sounds that resulted from pulling up the clay, but as seen in the above video, it only took a quick squish of the mud to feel that it was pure clay. I found it amazing how intrinsic this process was. Before this experience, if someone asked me to describe the different between wet clay and mud, I may have struggled. This process made me realize how much more reliance there is on feeling while working with these natural materials. Looking at the ground wasn’t enough to know what was right, I had to touch it and sense the material with my hands in order to know.
Once I felt that we had collected enough natural clay, I pushed the wheelbarrow back across the field, trying not to slide too much in the very slippery earth. I was grateful for my rainboots to protect me, and I thought about what type of clothing a medieval European may have worn while harvesting clay. What types of footwear might they have had to keep themselves warm and dry?
The clay was very cold straight out of the ground, so we positioned ourselves as close to our bonfire as possible as we prepared for the next step of our pottery-making journey; processing our clay.