The Peak Dwellers

LONGBURY BANK, Dyfed is a native British early medieval settlement occupied in the 6th and 7th centuries A. D. The excavations in 1988–89 produced a series of artefacts which provide evidence of high status: imported Mediterranean pottery; continental pottery and glass; fine metalworking debris; and an unusual Type G penannular brooch. The site is unusual in being undefended and it is suggested that it belongs to a newly recognized class of undefended high status secular sites, other possible examples of which are discussed. The site is placed in its historical and landscape context through the use of pre-Norman and later documentation which appears to show a major shift in settlement in the 8th or 9th centuries.