Norwich Knapped Flint

Meet the Flint Stones.

Knapped flint stone artfully integrated with brick and sandstone in a Norwich house. Note the different styles the mason used to show off his skill.

As we wandered from the Norwich train station to our AirBnB on our first day here we kept running into a black stone on the walls of older buildings. Sometimes it was polished and sharp-looking, almost like glass, and at other times it was indistinguishable from rounded river stones. What were we looking at?

Throughout history people have used the material closest to them for constructing their houses and outbuildings. In Norwich, they used flint, an abundant mineral found near the Norfolk shoreline. It is hard but easy to chip and shape, and has a lovely appearance.

Masons learned to knap or chisel the stone into various shapes to suit the needs and pocketbooks of their customers. In the States we think of flint knapping as a skill associated with American Indians. Indeed, Penny found a flint shard on the ground that could have been used as a hide scraper.

Flint shard found lying on the ground around a construction site.

Flint was so abundant that we discovered old monastery walls at Norwich cathedral, broken down over time, exposing the flint that masons had used as filler between the more desirable cut sandstone used to finish the walls. We also came across flint shards inserted into the gaps in walls that utilized rougher flint stones, either as a filler or as a design element, or perhaps as a reminder to “waste not, want not.”

When pressed into cement to fill the gaps between larger stones in a wall, flint shards create a more integrated appearance.

But the highest form of the mason’s art are the shaped cubes of flint in some of the buildings in downtown Norwich.

Detail of a cubed flint wall. The work is so fine that you can’t see the mortar holding the stones together. Note on the top row that the mason had to shape the stone in the center to fit into the row below.

An example of cubed flint combined with shaped sandstone.

Flint integrated with brick, perhaps as a design element or to strengthen a wall, or as a cost-saving measure.

Another example of flint and brick integrated together.