The Deserted Medieval Village of Riseholme,near Lincoln

Abstract

Advances in the understanding of the Anglo-Saxon burh in the last 25 years, a reassessment of the date and context of the Burghal Hidage and a recent analysis of comparable archaeological evidence from Cricklade make it necessary to review the archaeological evidence of the defences of the late-Saxon burh at Christchurch. This enables a reconstruction of the urban landscape, which in turn allows a new view of the significance of hidage assessments in the Burghal Hidage for all the burhs in the system it describes. It also places the development of Christchurch in the context of that of other burhs in Wessex and southern Mercia, and throws a new light on general historical processes in the 9th to the early 11th centuries.     

Three Deserted Medieval Settlements on Dartmoor: A Report on the late E. Marie Minter's Excavations

HOUNDTOR, HUTHOLES AND DINNA CLERKS are three deserted medieval settlements on the granite uplands towards the eastern side of Dartmoor Forest, Devon. Houndtor and Hutholes were small villages comprising eleven and six buildings respectively; Dinna Clerks was an isolated homestead. Extensive excavation at these sites by the late Mrs E. Marie Minter revealed a long sequence o f superimposed houses, divisible into two periods. Those of the first were built of turf. Although their remains were few, and in some places confusing, they provided much information on the construction of this type of building in the South- West of England. During the second period commencing in the middle of the 11th century, the houses of turf were gradually replaced by those of stone. The excavation of the well-preserved remains of the long-houses and their associated barns and corn-driers and the recording of the gardens and some of the open fields have given a clear insight into the ecology of a community dependent upon mixed farming at altitudes between 1100 and 1300 ft above sea level. The excavation of these settlements has also demonstrated how the deterioration of the climate in the late 14th and early 14th centuries led to their eventual desertion.