scholarly journals What's Wat's Dyke? Wrexham Comic Heritage Trail

2021 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 183
Author(s):  
Howard Williams ◽  
John Swogger
Keyword(s):  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Western Frontier ◽  
And Control

We hope this comic heritage trail for Wrexham helps introduce you to Britain's third-longest ancient monument.Wat's Dyke was built in the early medieval period (most likely between the late 7th and early 9th centuries AD). Today, it is a fragmentary bank and ditch surviving in varied states of preservation. When newly built, it was most likely designed as a continuous construction by the Anglo-Saxon kingdom of Mercia to dominate and control its western frontier with Welsh rivals. It runs over c. 64km from Basingwerk (Flintshire) to Maesbury (Shropshire).The map shows you where you can visit the monument today, and the comic panels tell the story of Wat's Dyke at each location. And if you'd like to know even more about Wat's dyke and other similar monuments, there are suggestions for further reading as well as online links to recent research at the end of the booklet.

Public Powers, Private Powers, and the Exploitation of Metals for Coinage

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giovanna Bianchi
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Field Research ◽  
Mineral Resources ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Italian Journal ◽  
Open Questions ◽  
And Control ◽  
The Relationship

In 1994, an article appeared in the Italian journal Archeologia Medievale, written by Chris Wickham and Riccardo Francovich, entitled ‘Uno scavo archeologico ed il problema dello sviluppo della signoria territoriale: Rocca San Silvestro e i rapporti di produzione minerari’. It marked a breakthrough in the study of the exploitation of mineral resources (especially silver) in relation to forms of power, and the associated economic structure, and control of production between the twelfth and thirteenth centuries. On the basis of the data available to archeological research at the time, the article ended with a series of open questions, especially relating to the early medieval period. The new campaign of field research, focused on the mining landscape of the Colline Metallifere in southern Tuscany, has made it possible to gather more information. While the data that has now been gathered are not yet sufficient to give definite and complete answers to those questions, they nevertheless allow us to now formulate some hypotheses which may serve as the foundations for broader considerations as regards the relationship between the exploitation of a fundamental resource for the economy of the time, and the main players and agents in that system of exploitation, within a landscape that was undergoing transformation in the period between the early medieval period and the middle centuries of the Middle Ages.

‘Folk’ Cemeteries, Assembly and Territorial Geography in Early Anglo-Saxon England

2019 ◽  
pp. 64-90
Author(s):  
Stuart Brookes
Keyword(s):  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Southern England ◽  
Early Medieval Period

This chapter examines the evidence for open-air assembly places existing at cemeteries of the 5th and 6th centuries in eastern and southern England. Contrasts are drawn between the types of cemetery (i.e. primarily inhumation or cremation), and types of legal assembly taking place at these sites. A small number of associated sites are identified and discussed, but it is argued that in general ‘folk’ cemeteries were not reused by later Anglo-Saxon communities as places of legal assembly. Examination of the available evidence identifies some of the features of palimpsest landscapes and attempts to provide an explanation for their continued significance through the early medieval period. Particular emphasis is given in this discussion to the role of elite power, and its appropriation of the symbolic landscape.

Kingdoms and regiones: The documentary evidence

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Rippon
Keyword(s):  
Archaeological Record ◽  
Documentary Evidence ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
The South ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
East Anglia ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
East Midlands

During the early medieval period eastern England was occupied by two major Anglo-Saxon kingdoms—the East Saxons and East Angles—alongside a region that Bede referred to as ‘Middle Anglia’. There has been a widespread assumption that Essex (‘the East Saxons’) and Suffolk and Norfolk (the ‘South Folk’ and ‘North Folk’ of East Anglia) were direct successors to these Anglo-Saxon kingdoms (e.g. Carver 1989, fig. 10.1; 2005, 498; Yorke 1990, 46, 61; Warner 1996, 4, plate 1; Pestell 2004, 12; Chester-Kadwell 2009, 46; Kemble 2012, 8; Gascoyne and Radford 2013, 176; Reynolds 2013, fig. 4), which would imply a strong degree of territorial continuity from at least the early medieval period through to the present day. There is, however, a recognition in the Regional Research Framework that regional differences within early medieval society across eastern England have seen little investigation (Medlycott 2011b, 58), something that the following chapters hope to address. This chapter will explore the documentary evidence for these early medieval kingdoms and their relationship to later counties, before turning to the archaeological evidence for Anglo- Saxon immigrants and their relationship to the native British population in Chapters 8–10. The clear differences between the Northern Thames Basin, East Anglia, and the South East Midlands that are still evident during the seventh to ninth centuries are outlined in Chapter 11. Finally, Chapter 12 explores the boundaries of the early medieval kingdoms, and in particular the series of dykes constructed in south-eastern Cambridgeshire.Table 7.1 provides a timeline of key historical dates for early medieval England, and key developments within the archaeological record. The earliest list of territorial entities is the Tribal Hidage. The original document has been lost—it only survives in a variety of later forms—but it is thought to have been written between the mid seventh and the ninth centuries (Hart 1970; 1977; Davies and Vierck 1974, 224–7; Yorke 1990, 10; Blair 1991, 8; 1999; Harrington and Welch 2014, 1). The Tribal Hidage lists at least thirteen peoples in and around eastern England, some of whom clearly occupied quite extensive areas, such as the East Angles (assessed as 30,000 hides), East Saxons (7,000 hides), and the Cilternsætna (4,000 hides).

scholarly journals The Six Ages of the World and Biblical Genealogy in Anglo-Saxon Encyclopaedic Notes

Neophilologus ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Joseph Gallagher
Keyword(s):  
Initial Length ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Depth Analysis ◽  
The World

AbstractIn the early medieval period, history was commonly organised into six epochs lasting roughly one thousand years each, according to certain calculations of the world’s age. The idea of the six ages emerged from and was consolidated by allegorical interpretations of the Hexameron in which the material endurance of the world was thought to mirror the initial length of its Creation. This historical schematisation enjoyed widespread currency in Anglo-Saxon England, even after Bede had proved that the world was not, in fact, approaching 6,000 years. This article analyses how the topos of the six ages is used and adapted within a hitherto understudied group of related encyclopaedic notes in three Anglo-Saxon manuscripts. How these texts relate to and differ from the wider corpus of encyclopaedic texts on this subject is also charted. The following study investigates the ways in which encyclopaedic texts on the six ages were adapted, expanded and transmitted, and the religious and political motivations driving such changes. This article offers the first in-depth analysis of this particular group of texts, foregrounding the sophistication of micro-texts that explain the six ages. Overall, this study emphasises the pedagogical, theological and historiographical applications of this concept in early medieval English thought.

Bede and the Martyrdom of St Oswald

1993 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 57-66
Author(s):  
Victoria A. Gunn
Keyword(s):  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Historia Ecclesiastica

In recent years there has been a definite growth of interest in the royal saints of the early medieval period. Specifically from France, academics such as Robert Folz, and from Britain, historians such as David Rollason and Susan Ridyard, have turned their erudition and their pens to elucidate this topic. The scope of this paper will be to examine one of the saints who has been of interest to these authors: St Oswald of Northumbria. That Oswald was considered a saint from early after his death is not in any doubt: Bede’s Historia ecclesiastica makes this quite clear. Rather, this paper turns its attention to the nature of that sanctity in order to decide whether or not Bede actually perceived Oswald as a martyr. To look at this question this study will firsdy compare Oswald with other Anglo-Saxon martyr-kings. Secondly, it will observe what comments Bede actually makes concerning Oswald’s sanctity. And, finally, it will see how he is categorized and discussed in other contemporary and near-contemporary texts.

Monumentalising the political landscape: a special class of Anglo-Saxon assembly site

2013 ◽  
Vol 93 ◽  
pp. 147-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Baker ◽  
Stuart Brookes
Keyword(s):  
Geographical Distribution ◽  
Special Class ◽  
The Political ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
Assembly Site

This paper outlines the place-name, archaeological and topographical evidence for a special class of Anglo-Saxon open-air assembly site, which we call a ‘hanging promontory’. Discussion of a series of these sites serves to describe the main characteristics of the class as well as their geographical distribution. Consideration is given to the possible functions and dating of the use of hanging promontories. In conclusion, comparisons are drawn with other forms of open-air assembly site to suggest a possible hierarchy of the administrative territories existing in the early medieval period in England.

Horse Burial in First Millennium AD Britain: Issues of Interpretation

2011 ◽  
Vol 14 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 190-209 ◽  
Author(s):  
Pamela J. Cross
Keyword(s):  
Iron Age ◽  
High Status ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Northwest Europe ◽  
First Millennium

Burial of horses and horse-elements occurred throughout Europe during the first millennium AD. These burials are prevalent in northwest Europe and are perhaps more significant in Britain than previously realised. This article explores the position and value of the horse within Britain during this period and why the burials are likely to represent ritual deposition. Both horse and human-horse burials, are linked to non-Christian burial and sacrificial practices of the Iron Age and Early Medieval period and are particularly associated with Anglo- Saxon and Viking Britain. Some of the traditions appear to reflect the culture described in the Icelandic Sagas, Beowulf, and other legends and chronicles. Archaeologically, the human-horse burials are also linked with high status individuals and ‘warrior graves’, while complete-horse and horse-element burials may represent ritual feasting and/or sacrificial rites which are probably linked with fertility, luck, and the ancestors.

scholarly journals A 3D basicranial shape-based assessment of local and continental northwest European ancestry among 5th to 9th century CE Anglo-Saxons

PLoS ONE ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 16 (6) ◽  
pp. e0252477
Author(s):  
Kimberly A. Plomp ◽  
Keith Dobney ◽  
Mark Collard
Keyword(s):  
Great Britain ◽  
Iron Age ◽  
European Ancestry ◽  
Anglo Saxon ◽  
Medieval Period ◽  
Early Medieval ◽  
Early Medieval Period ◽  
Local Ancestry ◽  
Northwest Europe ◽  
3D Shape Analysis

The settlement of Great Britain by Germanic-speaking people from continental northwest Europe in the Early Medieval period (early 5th to mid 11th centuries CE) has long been recognised as an important event, but uncertainty remains about the number of settlers and the nature of their relationship with the preexisting inhabitants of the island. In the study reported here, we sought to shed light on these issues by using 3D shape analysis techniques to compare the cranial bases of Anglo-Saxon skeletons to those of skeletons from Great Britain that pre-date the Early Medieval period and skeletons from Denmark that date to the Iron Age. Analyses that focused on Early Anglo-Saxon skeletons indicated that between two-thirds and three-quarters of Anglo-Saxon individuals were of continental northwest Europe ancestry, while between a quarter and one-third were of local ancestry. In contrast, analyses that focused on Middle Anglo-Saxon skeletons suggested that 50–70% were of local ancestry, while 30–50% were of continental northwest Europe ancestry. Our study suggests, therefore, that ancestry in Early Medieval Britain was similar to what it is today—mixed and mutable.

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