Blair Building Anglo-Saxon England

1. Auflage 2018
ISBN: 978-1-4008-8990-7
Verlag: De Gruyter
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 496 Seiten

No detailed description available for "Building Anglo-Saxon England".

Autoren/Hrsg.

Blair, John

Inhaltsverzeichnis

List of Illustrations xi

Preface and Acknowledgements xvii

Source Citation Conventions xxi

Abbreviations xxiii

Part I: Contexts

Chapter 1: Exploring Anglo-Saxon Landscapes 3

History, Geography, and Place Names 3

The Archaeology of Anglo-Saxon Settlements before the 1990s 12

Gathering Knowledge: Academic Research, Contract Archaeology, and the Present Project 14

Archaeology, History, Ethnography, and Reality 18

The Scope and Themes of the Present Study 20

Chapter 2: Defining Anglo-Saxon Landscapes 22

Geography, Environment, and Older Human Landscapes 22

Regional Diversity in Settlement and Material Culture 24

Looking Westward: British, Irish, and Pictish Contexts for English Building Culture 35

Looking Eastward: Scandinavian, Frisian, and Frankish Contexts for English Building Culture 40

Self-Shaping 46

Visible and Invisible Building Cultures: What Did Houses Really Look Like? 51

In the Glare of the Headlamps: Pottery, Wooden Vessels, and the Distortions of Survival 67

Order in the Built Environment: Monuments, Planning, and Linear Modules 70

A Regional Framework for This Book 71

A Chronological Framework for This Book 73

Chapter 3: Landscapes of the Mind: The Built Environment in the Anglo-Saxon Consciousness 74

Houses for Immortals: Unseen Residents in a Conceptual Landscape 75

Houses for the Living: Life Cycles in Timber and the Transience of Earthly Dwellings 84

Living with the Supernatural: Ritual Space in the Homestead 86

Houses for Eternity: Monumentalising the Sacred in the Landscape 91

A Mediterranean Religion in a Northern World: Two Cultures or One? 94

Earth Moving and Ideology 98

Part II: The First Transformation, circa 600–700

Chapter 4: Landscapes of Power and Wealth 103

Centres and Peripheries: Royal Residence and Recreation 104

The Mobile Environment of Royal Life 108

The Background and Context of Seventh-Century Elite Sites 111

The Great Hall Complexes: A Mode of Ostentatious Display 114

The Great Hall Complexes: Local Territorial Contexts 125

The Monasticisation of Royal Sites and the Era of Monastic Supremacy 131

Retrospect: Gain and Loss in an Age of Transformations 136

Chapter 5: The Construction of Settlement: Rural and Commercial Spaces 139

‘Wandering Settlement’ or ‘Static Development’? Form and Regionality in English Settlements before 650 139

Circular Space: Concentrically Defined Zones and Radial Planning in the Insular Tradition 143

Rectilinear Space: Gromatic Surveying and Grid-Planning 148

The Seventh-Century Settlement Revolution: Organisation and Enclosure 149

Grid-Planning in East Midland Settlements: The Diffusion of a Monastic Mode? 154

Outside the Eastern Zone 156

Urbanism in a Nonurban World: Holy Cities and Commercial Cities 164

The Major Emporia before 700 165

Why Did So Much Change in the Seventh Century? 174

Part III: Consolidation, circa 700–920

Chapter 6: Landscape Organisation and Economy in the Mercian Age 179

Mercian Geopolitics 180

Royal Ambitions and Monastic Assets: Compromise, Reform, and Predation in the Age of King Æthelbald 182

Infrastructure: Linear Earthworks 187

Infrastructure: Bridges 189

Infrastructure: Forts 190

Functional Place Names in -t?n: A World of Central Clusters, Not Complex Centres 193

Mercian Centres and burh-t?nas: Eight Case Studies 201

Mercian Territorial Organisation: Routes, Frontiers, and the Control of Kent 220

Parallel Arrangements in Wessex 222

Parallel Arrangements in Northumbria 226

The Fruits of a Developed Infrastructure: Mercia’s Golden Age, 780–820 228

Trauma and Legacy 230

Chapter 7: Defence, Industry, and Commerce: From Central Clusters to Complex Centres 232

The ‘Burghal’ Problem: The Tyranny of a Construct 232

Reoccupied Iron Age Forts and Roman Towns 236

Minsters as Strongholds 237

Minor Earthwork Enclosures 240

Major Formally Planned Defended Sites 243

Intensification at the Grass Roots: Production, Processing, and Manufacture in the Rural Landscape 246

Varieties of w?c: The Emporia and Beyond 254

Centres and w?c-type Peripheries in Polyfocal Clusters: Two Alternative Outcomes 256

Towards Urban Industries 266

A Precocious Urban Axis: London, Rochester, and Canterbury 269

Regrouping and Concentration, circa 850–920 275

Continuities: Trade, Production, and the Vikings 276

Chapter 8: Rural Settlement and the ‘Making of the English Village’ 282

Continuities and the Later Ninth Century: Rural Settlement Submerged? 283

The Components of Settlement: Buildings, Groups of Buildings, and the

Elusiveness of Great Halls 285

Rural Settlements, circa 700–920: The Evidence 288

Interpreting Semi-Nucleations: Settlement Structure in an ‘Infield-Outfield’ Economy 294

Evolution or Design? Lordly and Spiritual Power within the Village 301

Who Were the People? 302

Spanning the ‘Viking Age’ 305

Part IV: The Second Transformation, 920–1000

Chapter 9: Growth and Reconstruction: The Human Landscape Remodelled 311

Intensification at All Levels: The Mid-Tenth-Century Watershed 311

Gridded and Non-Gridded Settlements in the Eastern Zone and Beyond 317

Spreading Southwestward: The Expanding Zone of Visible Settlement 324

Arable Intensification, Open Fields, and the Shift to Heavier Soils 329

Countryside and Town: A New Dichotomy 337

Major Urban Places: The Formation of Townscapes and the Definition of House Plots 339

Minor Urban Places: The Enduring Substratum of Markets and Minsters 350

Chapter 10: Free Farmers and Emergent Lords: Towards the Manorial Landscape 354

Contexts 354

Differentiation and Complexity in Houses 355

Differentiation and Complexity in Domestic Compounds 362

Coexistent Halls: The Relatives Next Door? 365

Boundaries, Enclosures, and Gates: The ‘Burhgeat’ Problem Revisited 372

Churches 375

Who Was Then the Gentleman? 377

Part V: Beyond Anglo-Saxon Landscapes

Chapter 11: The Eleventh Century: A New Built Environment 383

Communications 384

Towns 385

Earthwork Castles 387

Stone Castles 397

Manors and Manor-Houses 400

Churches and the ‘Romanesque Revolution’ 402

Moving Business Indoors 405

Rural Communities and Settlements 408

Chapter 12: Conclusion 416

Bibliography 421

Illustration Sources and Credits 449

Index 455

Über Autor(innen)

John Blair is Professor of Medieval History and Archaeology at the University of Oxford and Fellow in History at The Queen's College. His books include The Church in Anglo-Saxon Society and The Anglo-Saxon Age: A Very Short Introduction.