Building Anglo-Saxon England / John Blair.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Blair, John, author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Anglo-Saxons.

Landscape archaeology--England.

Landscape archaeology.

Land settlement--England--History--To 1500.

Land settlement.

Landscapes--England--History--To 1500.

Landscapes.

England--Antiquities.

England.

Great Britain--History--Anglo-Saxon period, 449-1066.

Great Britain.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (103 pages)

Place of Publication:

Princeton, NJ : Princeton University Press, [2018]

Language Note:

In English.

Summary:

A radical rethinking of the Anglo-Saxon world that draws on the latest archaeological discoveriesThis beautifully illustrated book draws on the latest archaeological discoveries to present a radical reappraisal of the Anglo-Saxon built environment and its inhabitants. John Blair, one of the world's leading experts on this transformative era in England's early history, explains the origins of towns, manor houses, and castles in a completely new way, and sheds new light on the important functions of buildings and settlements in shaping people's lives during the age of the Venerable Bede and King Alfred.Building Anglo-Saxon England demonstrates how hundreds of recent excavations enable us to grasp for the first time how regionally diverse the built environment of the Anglo-Saxons truly was. Blair identifies a zone of eastern England with access to the North Sea whose economy, prosperity, and timber buildings had more in common with the Low Countries and Scandinavia than the rest of England. The origins of villages and their field systems emerge with a new clarity, as does the royal administrative organization of the kingdom of Mercia, which dominated central England for two centuries.Featuring a wealth of color illustrations throughout, Building Anglo-Saxon England explores how the natural landscape was modified to accommodate human activity, and how many settlements--secular and religious-were laid out with geometrical precision by specialist surveyors. The book also shows how the Anglo-Saxon love of elegant and intricate decoration is reflected in the construction of the living environment, which in some ways was more sophisticated than it would become after the Norman Conquest.

Contents:

Frontmatter

Contents

Illustrations

Preface and Acknowledgments

Source Citation Conventions

Abbreviations

PART I. Contexts

1. Exploring Anglo- Saxon Landscapes

2. Defining Anglo- Saxon Landscapes

3. Landscapes of the Mind

PART II. The First Transformation, circa 600-700

4. Landscapes of Power and Wealth

5. The Construction of Settlement

PART III. Consolidation, circa 700-920

6. Landscape Organisation and Economy in the Mercian Age

7. Defence, Industry, and Commerce

8. Rural Settlement and the 'Making of the English Village'

PART IV. The Second Transformation, 920-1000

9. Growth and Reconstruction

10. Free Farmers and Emergent Lords

PART V. Beyond Anglo- Saxon Landscapes

11. The Eleventh Century

12. Conclusion

Bibliography

Illustration Sources and Credits

Index

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 08. Jul 2019)

ISBN:

9781400889907

1400889901

OCLC:

1021234899