The early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of southern Britain, AD 450-650 : beneath the Tribal Hidage /
Sue Harrington and Martin Welch.
- Oxford ; Philadelphia : Oxbow Books, (c)2014.
- 1 online resource
Includes bibliographies and index.
The Early Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms of Southern Britain: evidence and questions -- Introduction -- The kingdoms in the written sources (text by Martin Welch, edited by Barbara Yorke) -- Research questions -- What are the data? -- What is the landscape context of that data? -- Why is the data located within this context -- what were the criteria behind site location selection? -- How can this evidence be explained and interpreted -- is this evidence of wealth creation and state formation? -- Methodology -- Overview of the contents of this volume -- The Early Anglo-Saxon Census -- Southern Britain south of the Thames and the archaeological data -- The database -- Data-quality assessment -- The dating framework -- The sites -- Populating the landscape -- These individuals and their graves -- Phasing the burials -- The artefacts -- Type -- Provenance -- Regional -- Kentish; Saxon; Anglian; Wessex -- Romano-British -- British West -- Curated/Roman; Curated/Jutlandic -- Kentish/ -- Imported -- Imported/ -- Position in grave -- Material component -- Object weights -- Findspots and their contents -- Other datasets used -- Late Roman sites -- Place-name evidence -- Concluding remarks -- The Environmental Context of Southern Britain -- Introduction -- Mapping the evidence -- The geology of southern Britain -- Definitions of landscape units -- Soil types and fertility: the mapping of land use potential -- A new definition of landscape units in southern Britain -- Climate -- Rivers and floodplains -- Palaeo-environmental evidence -- Woodland -- Travelling and Using the Land- and Sea-Scapes -- Coastal erosion and tide patterns -- Changes to the southern coast of Britain -- Roads, droveways and trackways south of the Thames -- Agricultural practices -- Pastoral practices -- The environmental evidence from selected excavation reports for southern Britain -- The Upper Thames Valley and chalklands to the south -- Central chalk lands to the south coast -- The eastern area of the Thames, the Weald and the coast -- The western area -- Conclusions -- Sites, Locations and Soils -- Introduction -- Theories of site location -- Settlement and wealth in the three kingdoms -- Kent -- Wessex -- Sussex -- What was the spatial relationship between early cemeteries and their parent settlements? -- Case study: The Lower Ouse Valley, East Sussex -- Where were the sites with the earliest artefactual evidence? -- What are the spatial relationships of the cemeteries and settlements to routeways and other topographical features? -- What kinds of soils do the cemetery/settlement communities occupy for their resource base and how does this compare with those occupied by the Later Roman sites? Were there spatial and temporal variations in site selection criteria? -- Roman sites -- Early Anglo-Saxon complexes -- What relationships can be determined between the place-name data and the phase A and early phase B sites (AD 450 -- 600)? -- Conclusions -- Surrey: A Case Study -- Surrey in the documentary sources -- The archaeological evidence -- Conclusions -- A Common Wealth in Iron? -- Introduction -- Sources of iron ore -- The regional settlement pattern and proximity to iron ore deposits -- The processes of iron working -- Iron working in Roman Britain -- Iron working in the Western Roman Empire -- Iron working in the northern European Barbaricum in the study period (AD 450 -- 650) -- Iron working in southern Britain AD 450 -- 650 and later -- Discussion -- Community Wealth in Iron Compared -- Iron case study 1: shield bosses (AD 450 -- 700) -- Iron case study 2: swords (AD 450 -- 700) -- Iron case study 3: knives (AD 450 -- 700) -- The iron-wealth over time and space (AD 450 -- 700) -- Phase A comparative study -- Phase B comparative study -- Phase C comparative study -- Conclusions on the value of iron in the study region and period -- A Restricted Wealth in Copper Alloys? -- European copper alloy production -- Copper alloy production in Britain -- Weights of copper alloy artefacts -- Community access to copper alloy material over time and space -- Phase A comparative study -- Phase B comparative study -- Phase C comparative study -- Copper alloy case study 1: buckle loops and plates -- Copper alloy case study 2: bowls and escutcheons -- Phase A distribution of copper alloy bowls -- Phase B distribution of copper alloy bowls -- Phase C distribution of copper alloy bowls -- Sheet vessel fragments -- Escutcheons -- Conclusions on copper alloy bowl distributions -- Esoteric Materials: Amber, Amethyst, Gold and Silver -- Case study: amber beads -- Case study: amethyst beads -- Conclusions concerning amber and amethyst bead usage and distribution -- The role of precious metals: gold and silver -- Gold -- Phase A gold distribution -- Phases B and C gold distribution -- Silver -- Phase A silver distributions -- Phase B silver distributions -- Phase C silver distributions -- Conclusions -- External Forces? A Review of the Frankish Influence within Southern Britain -- The Frankish Data Examined -- Research questions -- Phase A Frankish data -- Frankish artefacts in Kent and Surrey -- Isle of Wight -- Westwards from the East Sussex coast -- Central Wiltshire and the Salisbury Plain -- Upper Thames Valley -- Conclusions relating to Phase A -- Phase B Frankish data -- Phase C Frankish data -- Frankish weapon burials -- Conclusions -- Synthesis: Beneath the Tribal Hidage.