Archaeology of the East Midlands: Class 3. Radcliffe Autumn 2014

An Archaeology of the East Midlands

Class 3: Iron Age to Dark Age, Cultural Transitions in the Archaeological Record.

Tutor: Keith Challis

east-midlands-archaeology.blogspot.co.uk

Recap: Last Week

• The early prehistory of the Midlands

• How far back can we go in the Midlands?• The Bytham River and the colonisation of England• The end of the last glaciation

• Doggerland and the changing face of the land• The Late Upper Palaeolithic of the Midlands

• The Neolithic and Early Bronze Age (transitions)• Settlement• Death and Burial• Ceremonial and Ritual Monuments

• Techniques of Archaeological Research 2: Finding things from the air

Class Summary

• Later Prehistory, Iron Age Landscape and Society

• The Roman Interlude

• Dark Age or Iron Age – A Return

• Coffee Break

• Techniques of Archaeological Research 3: Seeing Beneath the Soil

Learning Outcomes

• Appreciate some of the aspects of late prehistoric society in the Midlands

• Think about the impact of Romanisation and the decline of Rome on the Midlands

• Appreciate the origins of Anglo-Saxon society in England

• Give thought to the cultural, material and social similarities between late prehistoric and dark age Britain

• Know a little about lidar

• Have a broad appreciation of the types and uses of geophysical survey in British archaeology

Section 1: Later Prehistory, Iron Age Landscape and Society

Iron Age Landscape and Society

• When• In Britain c.800BC to AD43• Late IA from 100BC• Adoption of Iron as a

predominant metal, new techniques, smithing not casting

• More complex settlement• Defended sites• Complex social groups (tribes)• Coinage• Urbanism• Druidism• More European contacts

• Landscape and Environment

• Generally continuity from earlier settlements

• Landscape “filled in” suggests growing population and competition for resources

• EG. extensive co-axial field systems of Trent Valley known from cropmarks

• Common settlement for is farmstead within enclosure

• Mixed farming economy, variation in dominance of arable and pastoral depending on location

• Some larger aggregated settlements, eg Naveby, Lincs Gamston, Notts

• Large Defended Sites

• Large defended sites include hillforts, marsh forts and lowland defended enclosures

• Hillforts some record of reuse

• High status finds at Burrow Hill – rare chariot remains

• The End…• Generally continuity of settlement from LIA to Roman• Roman reorganisation of landscape• New rural settlement forms (Villa estates)• Intensification of agriculture• LIA culture was sophisticated

– Included use of money– Some urbanisation– Complex social organisation (adopted by Roam

administration)– Advances metal working and other technologies

• But a tribal society lacking central organisation

Section 2. The Roman Interlude

The Roman Interlude

• The Beginning…• Roman military activity in Midlands

relatively brief (1st century only) • In general not a contested zone, but

marks boundary between civilianised south and militarised north (Trent / Fosse Way boundary)

• Largely within the Civitas Corieltauvorum • Extensive and abundant archaeological

record in East Midlands• Extensive rural settlement hierarchy

building on LIA roots• Systematic organisation of agricultural

landscape evident (Brickwork Plan field System in North Notts/South Yorks)

The Roman Interlude

• Towns and Romanisation

• Two major urban centres Lindum Colonia (Lincoln) founded c AD96 and Ratae Corieltauvorum (Leicester) set up as Civitas capital c AD 96 on IA precursor

• Hierarchy of smaller towns and roadside settlements

• Religious centres eg Red Hill, Ratcliffe on Soar

The Roman Interlude

• Another end…• Roman withdrawal in AD410 isolated Britain from a

centralise European network• Social and economic collapse, but not invasion or

military conquest• Wroxeter Baths Basilica – continuity of occupation,

but on a different social and economic scale• Anglo-Saxon settlers occupy vacuum of Roman

absence?• Problematic areas

– Hiatus in rural settlement– Technological decline– Population– Gross changes in material culture and social

organisation• Dark Age or second Iron Age?

Section 3. Dark Age or Iron Age?

Dark Age or Iron Age

Origins• Post Roman

settlement from Denmark and north Germany

• Co-existence with native Romanised British populations

• Complex social and racial mixing

• Discussion – Anglo Saxon Midlands

Material Culture• Highly distinctive

material culture, largely evidenced in grave goods

• Architectural innovation

• Language

Death and Burial• Large cremation

cemeteries imply substantial immigrant population

• How much is a processes of acculturation of collapsing Romanised British population?

Dark Age or Iron AgeSettlements• Not villages!• Small clusters of simple

dwellings (Hall House/Grubenhaus)

• Local clearance or adoption of existing agricultural lands

• Revealed by later 20th century archaeology (West Stow, Mucking, etc)

Mucking

Catholme• A large settlement of Grubenhauser and

wall-post buildings was occupied from at least the seventh to the ninth centuries.

• The settlement was set in a framework of enclosures and trackways defined by shallow ditches

• Evidence from excavation, cropmarks and fieldwalking suggests that the excavated features may represent the final phase of a single settlement, located at the Tame/Trent confluence in the mid-Romano-British period, and migrating along the river terrace through the early Saxon period, and into the middle/late Anglo-Saxon period

• The population of Catholme may have been substantially, even wholly, native

Middle Saxon England

Middle Saxon England• By mid 7th century

emergence of larger polities

• Kingdoms documented in Tribal Hidage

• Increasing social complexity

• Towns and trade

Middle Saxon England

Christianity and the State

• Promotion of ideal of kingship

• Innovation in land holding (and influence on organisation of land?)

• Role in cementing emerging polities

Coffee Break

Catch up: Lidar and Archaeology

Finding things from the air

• Lidar – What is it?

• Lidar (Light Detection and Ranging

• Uses a very high frequency pulsing laser to scan ground below a moving aircraft

• Calculations using GPS and INS allow generation of 3D map of ground surface

• Lidar – Seeing Beneath the Trees

Welshbury Hill, Gloucestershire (Deveraux et al, 2005)

• Lidar – Understanding What You See

Elevation (Height)

Hill Shade (Shadows)

• Lidar in the Midlands

Lidar used as a tool to update HER Challis et al 2008

• Lidar in the Midlands

M1 motorway widening scheme

• Lidar in the MidlandsEast Fen, Lincolnshire

•Lidar reveals the slight traces of the complex creeks and inlets of the Bronze Age valley

•Roddons, sandy ridges exposed by desiccating peat

•The drainage network dramatically altered by Roman and later hydraulic engineering

Section 4. Seeing Beneath the Soil

Seeing Beneath the Soil

• What is Geophysical Survey?

• Electrical Techniques

• Magnetic Techniques

• Radar

What is Geophysical Survey?

• Geophysical surveys are techniques used to measure different physical properties of the surface and subsurface. Some of these properties may reflect buried archaeological features and deposits, many others will relate to a range of other factors.

• It is important to remember that these techniques do not detect archaeology – they detect ‘anomalies’ in the subsurface environment.

• Further investigations are usually required to establish whether the results of a geophysical survey definitely reflect archaeological remains.

• First recorded use for archaeology in Britain by Richard Atkinson at Dorchester-on-Thames (1946). Precursor of resistance technique and used to locate moist ditches cut into gravel.

• 1950s – 1970s – technological and methodological innovations but techniques still not widespread.

• Late 1980s onwards (esp 1990s +) get ever increasing use and development:– Technological developments (quicker,

higher resolution…)– Nature of British archaeology changed –

developer-led approach requires rapid evaluation of large areas. Geophysics is ideally suited to this.

• 2000 - 2010 – well established and relatively widely used approach (as reflected in Archaeological Prospection, the Time Team television series amongst others).

• 2010 onwards – automated rapid data acquisition, powered or towed arrays, very high resolution multi sensor techniques which collect huge volumes of data

Types of Geophysical Survey

We can separate geophysical prospection into active and passive techniques

a) Active techniques, which are based on the

injection of signals into the ground (e.g. an electric current or electromagnetic wave) and measurement of the response on the ground surface.

b) Passive techniques, which rely on physical attributes that would exist even in the absence of measuring device (such as the magnetic field of a buried kiln).

Survey Methods

• Resistance survey

• Magnetometer survey

• Ground-penetrating radar

• Magnetic susceptibility

• Electrical Imaging

Magnetic Survey• Magnetic survey equipment measures

distortions in the Earth’s magnetic field.

• These magnetic anomalies can be the result of two main phenomena:

1. Thermoremanence2. Magnetic susceptibility

• In archaeological terms this is likely to relate to: ditches, pits, kilns, hearths, ovens, ferrous debris…

• Data collection is rapid and is therefore the primary technique used in evaluations.

• The surveyor must be completely free of ferrous material – including belt buckles, keys, zips, eyelets on shoes…

Earth Resistance Survey• Resistance survey is an active geophysical

technique, involving the passing of an electrical current into the ground and measuring the resistance to the flow of this current.

• The resistance of a material to an electrical current is mainly influenced by its moisture content and porosity.

• Compact, dry features such as walls or metalled surfaces will provide a relatively high resistance response, whilst silted-up ditches and pits will retain moisture and provide a relatively low resistance response.

• The technique is relatively slow and therefore not usually suited to large area surveys. Can be adapted to provide depth estimations.

Ground-Penetrating Radar (GPR)

• An active geophysical technique that involves passing a pulse of electromagnetic energy into the ground and measuring the response time as it is reflected back to the surface.

• The pulse of energy is emitted from a transmitter antenna, returning echoes from different interfaces.

• The travel times of the echo are recorded by a receiver antenna and converted to depths.

• Some of the energy is reflected back from the interface between contrasting subsurface anomalies. The rest of the energy continues deeper into the ground to be reflected from another interface deeper into the soil profile.

• Unlike many other techniques, radar produces vertical slices through the ground

Laxton Castle, NottsGeophysical Survey Example

Earth Resistance

Gradiometer

Further Study

Assignment

•Viking impact on the East Midlands

•Read Biddle’s account of his seminal excavations at Repton in Antiquity

•What does his excavation tell us about the Vikings in our region and how generally applicable is any insight from this excavation?

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