Archaeology of the East Midland Class 4: Radcliffe Autumn 2014

An Archaeology of the
East Midlands
Class 4: A Disputed Land: Angles, Saxon and
Vikings in the East Midlands.
Tutor: Keith Challis
east-midlands-archaeology.blogspot.co.uk

Recap: Last Week
• Later Prehistory, Iron Age Landscape and
Society
• The Roman Interlude
• Dark Age or Iron Age – A Return

Class Summary
• Viking Origins
• Scandinavian Settlement in the East Midlands
• Discussion – Repton and the Vikings
• Coffee Break
• Techniques of Archaeological Research 3:
Seeing Beneath the Soil

Learning Outcomes
• Know a little about the origins and impact of the Viking
incursions into and settlement of England.
• Understand the importance of Repton and Ingleby for
our appreciation of Viking activity in all its variety.
• Have an appreciation of the main geophysical survey
techniques used in British archaeology.

Viking Origins
This year came dreadful fore-warnings
over the land of the
Northumbrians, terrifying the people
most woefully: these were immense
sheets of light rushing through the
air, and whirlwinds, and fiery,
dragons flying across the firmament.
These tremendous tokens were soon
followed by a great famine: and not
long after, on the sixth day before the
ides of January in the same year, the
harrowing inroads of heathen men
made lamentable havoc in the
church of God in Holy-island, by
rapine and slaughter.
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle AD. 793.
The 9th-century grave marker
found at Lindisfarne known as the
Viking Domesday stone

Viking Origins
June 793, Letter of Alcuin Archbishop of
York to Ethelred King of Northumbria

Viking Origins
• Where and How?
• Old Norse víkingr – “to go on an
expedition overseas”
• Norse raiders, settlers and traders
active from 8th to 11th centuries
• Advanced seafaring skills and
technology – longships –
• Raids on coastal sites from late 8th
century
• Revenge – opportunity – European
weakness and lack of naval force
The Oseberg ship, a well-preserved 9th century
Viking ship discovered in 1904 in a large burial
mound at the Oseberg farm near Tønsberg in
Vestfold county, Norway.

Viking Origins
• Vikings Campaigns
• Raids in northern England and Scotland from
late 8th century.
• Many monastic houses destroyed or
abandoned and with them written records of
raids
• From the 850s Viking armies begin to
overwinter in England. Bigger armies suggest
campaigns of conquest
• 866 Capture York, 867 southern Northumbria,
873/4 annex Mercia
• 876 division of Northumbria lands (settlement)
• 878 subjugation of Wessex
• 886 establishment of Danelaw treaty of Alfred
and Guthrum

Viking Origins
• Where did they
end up…
• By late 9th century large parts of Britain
settled and ruled by Scandinavians
• In early 11th century kingdoms of
Denmark and England united under
one king (Cnut)
• Ultimately two Scandinavian houses
vie for the English throne in 1066
• Scandinavia (Viking) raiding and
settlement widespread throughout
north-west Europe, the Mediterranean
and inland in north central Europe
• Scandinavia trade links extend into the
Middle East and Asia

Viking Origins
• Archaeological Evidence
• Churchyard burials with grave
goods
• Monuments and decorative
sculpture (hogbacks)
• Hoards (local response)
• Distinctive buildings types in north
and west (longhouses)
• The great trading sites (York,
Dublin)

Section 2: Scandinavian
Settlement in the East
Midlands

Scandinavian Settlement
• The Archaeological
Record
• In EM earliest documented Viking raids
on Lindsey on (841) and Nottingham
(867)
• Vikings in archaeological record hard to
spot
• Churchyard burial/finds
• Hogbacks
• Settlement form and agricultural practice
arbitrarily attributed to Vikings, but no
sound basis of evidence

• Placename
Evidence
• –by (Village) eg Ingleby: village
of the English
• – thorpe (secondary settlement)
eg Gunthorpe: Gunnas
settlement
• - thwaite (clearing of meadow)
• “Grimston Hybrids” ON personal
name with OE Tun –
appropriation of an existing
settlement?
• Language and naming elements
eg Kirk, Beck, Gate, etc
www.britishmuseum.org/whats_on/past_exhibitions/2014/vikings/vikings_live/old_norse_origins.aspx

• Warriors or Settlers?
• Initial raiding gave way
to conquest and
settlement
• A strong trading instinct
based on seafaring –
but building on existing
Anglo-Saxon networks
and places

• Viking Trade
• Classic site Jorvik (York)
evidence for industry and
extensive pan-European trade
post 866 capture of York
• But extensive pre-Viking trading
evidence at York and elsewhere
– AS Emporia (York, London,
Ipswich, Southampton)
• Increasing recognition of
“productive sites” ad hoc and
seasonal trading places

Section 3: Repton and the
Vikings

Repton and the Vikings
This year went the army from Lindsey to Repton,
and there took up their winter-quarters,drove the
king, Burhred, over sea, when he had reigned
about two and twenty winters, and subdued all
that land. He then went to Rome, and there
remained to the end of his life…. And the same
year they gave Ceolwulf, an unwise king's thane,
the Mercian kingdom to hold; and he swore
oaths to them, and gave hostages, that it should
be ready for them on whatever day they would
have it; and he would be ready with himself, and
with all those that would remain with him, at the
service of the army.
Anglo-Saxon Chronicle 874

• Discussion

St Wystan’s Mausoleum (850s)

Grave 511 The warrior

• The Mass Grave
• A reused AS mortuary
chapel
• Discovered and looted
in 1686 – “a humane
body 9ft long”
• Surrounded by a
charnel deposit
• Closely dated by coin
finds to 873/4

• Heath Wood Ingelby
• 59 barrows in four
groups
• Associated with in-situ
cremation with grave
goods
• Within site of Repton
• The pagan part of the
Great Army?

• Typical barrow
• Ring-ditch and
cleared land surface
• Sand layer (ritual)
• Cremation pyre with
grave goods (some
removed?)
Mound 50

• .
Cremated
Grave Goods
•Ritually
broken swords
•Personal
items
•Nails (ship
boards)

Torksey
Dirhams were minted in the Middle East and
carried to Torksey by the Great Army
• It’s More Complex than you
Think…
• Another Great Army Winter Camp (872/3)
• University of York Investigations
• Viking items and evidence of trade/travel
• An existing Anglo-Saxon “productive site”
• Relationship with Littleborough? on
opposite bank of Trent

• Coffee Break

Section 5. 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. Thermoremanence
2. 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, Notts
Geophysical Survey Example

Earth Resistance
Gradiometer

Radar

Further Study
• Suggested Reading
• Self Study Themes

Archaeology of the East Midland Class 4: Radcliffe Autumn 2014

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Archaeology of the East Midland Class 4: Radcliffe Autumn 2014