A Roman oven at Mumrills, Falkirk

With Appendix: Slag from a Roman Oven on the site of the Fort at Mumrills, Falkirk

Abstract

The oven was fully exposed and recorded in 1941. Analysis of the clay indicated that it had not been subjected to a very high temperature, comparable, for example, with that required for smelting iron or firing bricks. The oven could only have been used for baking. A piece of slag-like material found in a layer of burned clay inside the oven was identified as furnace-clinker formed by the burning of coal indicative of a fairly high temperature though not so high as in a smelting furnace. This does not prove that coal was used at Mumrills; all the evidence points to the use of wood as fuel. In its general plan and in the way in which it was worked, the Mumrills\r\noven resembled the circular baking-ovens commonly used in Roman forts.