Belt buckles, which were worn by both men and women in Anglo-Saxon England, not only had an obvious practical function, they also had a potent social significance for their wearers. Their archaeological value lies in the fact that, in a period in which coins were scarce, they can be used as dating evidence. This substantial volume explores the social aspects of dress accessories whilst presenting a typology and chronology of finds. Much of the study comprises an illustrated catalogue of over 1,200 examples. Tables and maps also explore the distribution of buckle types and their association with other objects. A useful reference.

The Tribal Hidage, attributed to the 7th century, records the named groups and polities of early Anglo-Saxon England and the taxation tribute due from their lands and surpluses. Whilst providing some indication of relative wealth and its distribution, rather little can be deduced from the Hidage concerning the underlying economic and social realities of the communities documented. Sue Harrington and the late Martin Welch have adopted a new approach to these issues, based on archaeological information from 12,000 burials and 28,000 objects of the period AD 450–650. The nature, distribution and spatial relationships of settlement and burial evidence are examined over time against a background of the productive capabilities of the environment in which they are set, the availability of raw materials, evidence for metalworking and other industrial/craft activities, and communication and trade routes. This has enabled the identification of central areas of wealth that influenced places around them. Key within this period was the influence of the Franks who may have driven economic exploitation by building on the pre-existing Roman infrastructure of the south-east. Frankish material culture was as widespread as that of the Kentish people, whose wealth is evident in many well-furnished graves, but more nuanced approaches to wealth distribution are apparent further to the West, perhaps due to ongoing interaction with communities who maintained an essentially ‘Romano-British’ way of life.

This electronic version has been made available under a Creative Commons (BY) open access license. This book is available as an open access ebook under a CC-BY licence. Early Anglo-Saxon cemeteries are known for their grave goods, but this abundance obscures their interest as the creations of pluralistic, multi-generational communities. This book explores over one hundred early Anglo-Saxon and Merovingian cemeteries, using a multi-dimensional methodology to move beyond artefacts. It offers an alternative way to explore the horizontal organisation of cemeteries from a holistically focused perspective. The physical communication of digging a grave and laying out a body was used to negotiate the arrangement of a cemetery and to construct family and community stories. This approach foregrounds community, because people used and reused cemetery spaces to emphasise different characteristics of the deceased, based on their own attitudes, lifeways and live experiences. This book will appeal to scholars of Anglo-Saxon studies and will be of value to archaeologists interested in mortuary spaces, communities and social archaeology.

Cruciform brooches were large and decorative items of jewellery, frequently used to pin together women's garments in pre-Christian northwest Europe. Characterised by the strange bestial visages that project from the feet of these dress and cloak fasteners, cruciform brooches were especially common in eastern England during the 5th and 6th centuries AD. This book provides a multifaceted, holistic and contextual analysis of more than 2,000 Anglo-Saxon cruciform brooches. It offers a critical examination of identity in Early Medieval society, suggesting that the idea of being Anglian in post-Roman Britain was not a primordial, tribal identity transplanted from northern Germany, but was at least partly forged through the repeated, prevalent use of dress and material culture.

Written by a team of experts and presenting the results of the most up-to-date research, The Handbook of Anglo-Saxon Archaeology will both stimulate and support further investigation into a society poised at the interface between prehistory and history.

Archaeological investigations by MOLA on land adjacent to Upthorpe Road, Stanton (2013-2014), revealed the remains of a prehistoric round barrow and a cemetery containing the remains of 67 inhumations with associated grave goods. This book provides detailed analysis of the archaeological features, skeletal assemblage and other artefacts.

Daily Life in Anglo-Saxon England examines and recreates many of the details of ordinary lives in early medieval England between the 5th and 11th centuries, exploring what we know as well as the surprising gaps in our knowledge. Daily Life in Anglo-Saxon England covers daily life in England from the 5th through the 11th centuries. These six centuries saw significant social, cultural, religious, and ethnic upheavals, including the introduction of Christianity, the creation of towns, the Viking invasions, the invention of "Englishness," and the Norman Conquest. In the last 10 years, there have been significant new archaeological discoveries, major advances in scientific archaeology, and new ways of thinking about the past, meaning it is now possible to say much more about everyday life during this time period than ever before. Drawing on a combination of archaeological and textual evidence, including the latest scientific findings from DNA and stable isotope analysis, this book looks at the life course of the early medieval English from the cradle to the grave, as well as how daily lives changed over these centuries. Topics covered include maintenance activities, education, play, commerce, trade, manufacturing, fashion, travel, migration, warfare, health, and medicine.

The Early Anglo-Saxon Period is characterized archaeologically by the regular deposition of artefacts in human graves in England. The scope for dating these objects and graves has long been studied, but it has typically proved easier to identify and enumerate the chronological problems of the material than to solve them. Prior to the work of the project reported on here, therefore, there was no comprehensive chronological framework for Early Anglo-Saxon Archaeology, and the level of detail and precision in dates that could be suggested was low. The evidence has now been studied afresh using a co-ordinated suite of dating techniques, both traditional and new: a review and revision of artefact-typology; seriation of grave-assemblages using correspondence analysis; high-precision radiocarbon dating of selected bone samples; and Bayesian modelling using the results of all of these. These were focussed primarily on the later part of the Early Anglo-Saxon Period, starting in the 6th century. This research has produced a new chronological framework, consisting of sequences of phases that are separate for male and female burials but nevertheless mutually consistent and coordinated. These will allow archaeologists to assign grave-assemblages and a wide range of individual artefact-types to defined phases that are associated with calendrical date-ranges whose limits are expressed to a specific degree of probability. Important unresolved issues include a precise adjustment for dietary effects on radiocarbon dates from human skeletal material. Nonetheless the results of this project suggest the cessation of regular burial with grave goods in Anglo-Saxon England two decades or even more before the end of the seventh century. That creates a limited but important discrepancy with the current numismatic chronology of early English sceattas. The wider implications of the results for key topics in Anglo-Saxon archaeology and social, economic and religious history are discussed to conclude the report.

Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History is an annual series concerned with the archaeology and history of England and its neighbours during the Anglo-Saxon period. ASSAH offers researchers an opportunity to publish new work in an interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary forum which allows for a diversity of approaches and subject matter. Contributions focus not just on Anglo-Saxon England but also its international context.

Volume 14 of the Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History series is dedicated to the archaeology of early medieval death, burial and commemoration. Incorporating studies focusing upon Anglo-Saxon England as well as research encompassing western Britain, Continental Europe and Scandinavia, this volume originated as the proceedings of a two-day conference held at the University of Exeter in February 2004. It comprises of an Introduction that outlines the key debates and new approaches in early medieval mortuary archaeology followed by eighteen innovative research papers offering new interpretations of the material culture, monuments and landscape context of early medieval mortuary practices. Papers contribute to a variety of ongoing debates including the study of ethnicity, religion, ideology and social memory from burial evidence. The volume also contains two cemetery reports of early Anglo-Saxon cemeteries from Cambridgeshire.