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Beyond the Burghal Hidage

Workway Drove to Pewsey Down with Adam's Grave long barrow (top left). Image courtesy of Graham Bathe

Landscapes of Defence in the Viking Age

'Beyond the Burghal Hidage: Anglo-Saxon Civil Defence in the Viking Age' was a three-year project funded by the Leverhulme Trust from 2005–8.

It aimed to provide the first systematic study of Anglo-Saxon military organisation and its landscape context for the period c.850-1066, drawing on the whole range of sources available including archaeology, place-names, landscape and documents.

At a national scale the ASCD project team brought together and assessed all evidence from excavated major fortifications and related sites, ‘military’ place-name elements, and other evidence from documentary sources.

This survey was complemented by detailed regional analyses of the local landscape context of civil defence networks, and their relationship to settlement, local topography, land-ownership and administration over time.

The research has generated scholarly publications, two major monographs, and a database to be archived with the Archaeology Data Service.

Related outputs

  • A series of articles in relevant, peer-reviewed journals including:

    • Baker, J. (in press). Warriors and watchmen: place-names and Anglo-Saxon civil defence. Medieval Archaeology 55
    • Baker, J. and Brookes, S.J. (in press). Overseeing the sea: some West Saxon responses to waterborne threats in the South-East. Proceedings of the ISAS Conference 2009
    • Baker, J. and Brookes, S.J. (in press). From frontier to border: the evolution of northern West Saxon territorial delineation in the ninth and tenth centuries. Anglo-Saxon Studies in Archaeology and History 16
  • An ADS special collection database that provides for non-specialist access to the project’s results, but also specialist access to the ASCDV dataset.
  • A monograph outlining the results of the project has been prepared, entitled Beyond the Burghal Hidage: Anglo-Saxon civil defence in the Viking Age. It is currently being reviewed by Brill.
  • The proceedings of the conference Landscapes of Defence in the Viking Age: Anglo-Saxon England and Comparative Perspectives is in press as a separate edited volume published by Brepols in the Studies in the Early Middle Ages 28.

Funding

Leverhulme Trust logo

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