Archaeology
Search for Saint Guthlac’s hermitage reveals prehistoric henge
A team of archaeologists from Newcastle University have uncovered a prehistoric henge during a search for Saint Guthlac’s hermitage.
Saint Guthlac was a Christian hermit and saint, who in AD 699-701, established a hermitage on what was a deserted island in the Fenlands at Crowland, England.
The biographer, a monk known as Felix, provides an account of Guthlac’s isolation in the Vita Sancti Guthlaci (Life of Saint Guthlac), and said that Guthlac built his hermitage into a robbed out prehistoric barrow mound.
According to tradition, Guthlac led a holy ascetic life and gave sanctuary to Æthelbald, future king of Mercia, who was fleeing from his cousin Ceolred.
After Guthlac’s death in 714, his uncorrupted body was discovered 12 months later that inspired a small monastic community and cult. This led to the establishment of Crowland Abbey in the 10th century to honour the saint, which survived until the Dissolution in the 1530s.
Archaeologists have previously tried to find the hermitage and barrow from Felix’s accounts, which have long been thought to be in Anchor Church Field to the north-east of Crowland.
Recent excavations at Anchor Church Field by archaeologists from Newcastle University and the University of Sheffield have uncovered a previously unknown Late Neolithic or early Bronze Age henge, a type of circular earthwork and one of the largest ever discovered in eastern England.
It is likely that during Guthlac’s time, the henge would have been a prominent feature above the marshes of the Fenlands, and would be seen by hermits as a unique landscape with a long and sacred past.
Archaeological evidence indicates that the henge was reoccupied during around Guthlac’s lifetime, indicated by large quantities of ceramics, bone combs, and fragments of high-status drinking vessels from the Anglo Saxon period.
Unfortunately, any traces of structures from this period have been destroyed through later activity.
“We know that many prehistoric monuments were reused by the Anglo-Saxons, but to find a henge—especially one that was previously unknown—occupied in this way is really quite rare,” said Dr Duncan Wright, Lecturer in Medieval Archaeology at Newcastle University.
“Although the Anglo-Saxon objects we found cannot be linked with Guthlac with any certainty, the use of the site around this time and later in the medieval period adds weight to the idea that Crowland was a sacred space at different times over millennia,” added Dr Wright.
Excavations also uncovered the remains of a 12th century hall and chapel, built by the Abbots of Crowland probably to venerate St Pega, Guthlac’s sister, who was herself an important hermit in the region. The hall would have been used for elite accommodation, perhaps for high-status pilgrims who were visiting Crowland.
Header Image Credit: The Anchor Church Field Project
Sources : Newcastle University | Sacred Landscapes and Deep Time: Mobility, Memory, and Monasticism on Crowland’ by Duncan W. Wright and Hugh Willmott. Journal of Field Archaeology DOI: 10.1080/00934690.2024.2332853
This content was originally published on www.heritagedaily.com – © 2023 – HeritageDaily
A new study, published in the journal Antiquity, suggests that the ancient Pueblo culture used conch-shell trumpets for communication.
The focus of the study is the site of the Chaco Canyon in north-west New Mexico. Located in Chaco Culture National Historic Park, Chaco Canyon contains numerous small dwellings and multi-story buildings known as great houses.
Based on the density of structures, archaeologists speculate that the site was once a bustling metropolis, inhabited by as many as 2,300 people during its height from AD 1050 to 1130.
Conch-shell trumpets have been found in burial contexts at Chaco Canyon, which today are used in contemporary Pueblo ritual practices.
Using a Soundshed Analysis model, archaeologists have digitally modelled the sound of a conch-shell trumpet being sounded at a great house in relation to other features in the landscape. Soundshed Analysis calculates the distance a sound can travel from a point, taking into account both the type of sound and environmental conditions such as elevation and ambient noise.
“Chaco Canyon is surrounded by over one hundred understudied great house communities”, says lead author Professor Ruth Van Dyke from Binghamton University. “We sought to determine if extra-canyon great house communities demonstrated relationships similar to Chaco Canyon between landscape, community layout, and sound.”
In this case, the team modelled the sound of a conch from great houses at five Chacoan communities to determine whether it would reach all habitation sites within the community.
They found that if somebody blew a conch-shell trumpet from the great house at the centre of all five Chacoan communities, the sound would have reached almost all of the surrounding settlements.
This suggests that ancient Puebloans may have managed their land-use and community structures around the sound of trumpets. The sound was potentially used to signal communal activities, such as religious ceremonies.
“This is not unlike the idea of a medieval church bell calling a community to mass”, states Professor Van Dyke.
It also indicates how Chacoan heritage sites should be managed going forward.
“Soundscapes were meaningful dimensions of past experiences, landscapes, and environments and are important facets of social interaction in the ancient world,” observes Professor Van Dyke. “Management of archaeological and heritage sites should incorporate consideration of the auditory environment.”
Header Image Credit : Shutterstock
Sources : Antiquity | Seashells and sound waves: modelling soundscapes in Chacoan great-house communities – Ruth M. Van Dyke, Kristy E. Primeau, Kellam Throgmorton & David E. Witt. https://doi.org/10.15184/aqy.2024.54
This content was originally published on www.heritagedaily.com – © 2023 – HeritageDaily
Archaeologists have discovered a 7000-year-old Neolithic mega-site near the village of Jarkovac in Serbia.
The discovery was made by a team from the Cluster of Excellence ROOTS, an initiative launched by several research institutions from across academia.
In a press statement announced by the Christian-Albrechts-Universität zu Kiel (CAU), a geophysical study has led to the discovery of a 13-hectare settlement with defensive ditches near the Tamiš River in Serbia’s Vojvodina province.
Based on the objects found in situ, the settlement is associated with the Vinča culture (also known as Turdaș culture), a Neolithic people that lived in Southeast Europe between 5400 to 4500 BC.
Named for its type site, Vinča-Belo Brdo (a large tell settlement in Belgrade), the culture is most known for constructing mega-site settlements, many of which were considerably larger than most other contemporary culture settlements in Europe.
ROOTS doctoral student and co-team leader Fynn Wilkes, said: “A settlement of this size is spectacular. The geophysical data also gives us a clear idea of the structure of the site 7000 years ago.”
Black angular anomalies apparent in the geophysics indicate a large number of burnt houses, suggesting that the settlement may have been abandoned or destroyed during conflict.
Archaeological evidence from other Vinča sites have led archaeologists to speculate that intergroup competition, conflict, and likely violence might have been a characteristic of the region during the Neolithic period.
Also uncovered are material traces of the Banat culture (5400-4400 BC), a regional people that emerged in the Banat area of the Pannonian Basin. “This is also remarkable, as only a few settlements with material from the Banat culture are known from what is now Serbia,” added Fynn Wilkes.
During the same research campaign, the team investigated several Late Neolithic circular features in Hungary together with partners from the Janus Pannonius Museum in Pécs. These so-called “rondels” are attributed to the Lengyel culture (5000/4900-4500/4400 BC).
Header Image Credit : ROOTS
Sources : CAU
This content was originally published on www.heritagedaily.com – © 2023 – HeritageDaily
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