This course will introduce students to the archaeological evidence for the introduction and establishment of an Anglo-Saxon population and culture in England in the period of the 5th to 7th centuries AD.  This was a major watershed in the history of Britain, comprising the demise of Roman control of the provinces of Britannia and the foundation of the English kingdoms in the island.

The course is structured to pay equal attention to the two principal categories of site representing the Anglo-Saxon population and its use of the land in this period, namely settlement sites and cemeteries. Due attention will be drawn to the wide range of artefacts used in Early Anglo-Saxon England in both contexts, particularly in light of the publication of a report of an analytical research project that has produced a new chronological framework. Consideration will also be given to the evidence for ritual and religious life in this period, including the re-connexion with the Roman world involved within the Conversion to Christianity. The introductory lecture will consider the historiography and continuing controversies within this field of archaeology. Both the lectures and the seminars will seek to illustrate the relationship between general principles and perspectives and specific sites or finds.

• knowledge of the nature of the archaeological record for the early Anglo-Saxons in England.
• that they understand the difficulties in integrating archaeological, historical and linguistic evidence.
• that they understand the evidence for the burial record, settlements, artefacts and landscape of early England.
• that they understand current debates about early Anglo-Saxon England.

METHODS OF TEACHING: 10 lectures; 1 seminar.

The course will be delivered through 10 weekly lectures (10.00 a.m., Tuesdays) and weekly seminars, of which all students will be encouraged to attend at least five. The lectures will systematically present and explain the topics covered in the course, with particular attention to the evidence and methods used to interpret. Seminars will vary in focus, from directed reading to discussion of specific sites or finds through plans or photographs, to essay planning and preparation.

Intellectual Skills:

• the ability to evaluate evidence of varying quality and source
• the ability to correlate information from lectures, seminars and independent reading
• the ability to present their knowledge in a coherent manner in essay and exam conditions

 Discipline Specific (including practical) Skills:

The ability to demonstrate an understanding of archaeological evidence and its limitations

 Transferable Skills:

• the ability to write cogently and critically in an assessed essay and under examination conditions.
• the ability to understand complex arguments and evaluate the evidence in support of them.
• to work independently and produce work to deadlines.

The assessed essay, examination, and non-assessed seminars, require the student to demonstrate critical analysis of the archaeological evidence for the Early Anglo-Saxon period.

1 1.5 hour exam that is 100% Contribution that will take place in January 2016.

The opportunity for reassessment in this module - Students who fail or are unable to sit the examination in the January exam will be eligible to be assessed by means of 2,000-word coursework essay on a topic chosen from a list of questions and to be submitted by the general deadline for summer re-sit coursework in Archaeology in the following summer.

1.         The Early Anglo-Saxon Period: its definition and approaches. (29-09-15)

2.         Rural settlement sites. (6-10-15)

3.         The agrarian economy of Early Anglo-Saxon England. (13-10-15)

4.         Early Anglo-Saxon burials and cemeteries. (20-10-15)

5.         Identities in the Early Anglo-Saxon population. (27-10-15)

READING WEEK (3-11-15)

6.         Religion and the Conversion to Christianity. (10-11-15)

7.         The organization and economics of production and trade. (17-11-15)

8.         Early Anglo-Saxon art and artefacts: the meaning of style. (24-11-15)

9.         Early Anglo-Saxon social structures. (Professor C Scull 1-12-15)

10.       Kingship and polities in Early Anglo-Saxon England. (Professor C Scull 8-12-15)

Arnold, C J  1997(2nd ed)  An archaeology of the early Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, London

Bruce-Mitford, R L S  1975, 1978, 1983  The Sutton Hoo Ship Burial, vols 1-3, London.

Carver, M  1998  Sutton Hoo: burial ground of kings?, London

Dark, K  2000  Britain and the end of the Roman Empire, Stroud.

Dumville, D N  1977 Sub-Roman Britain: History and Legend, History 62, 173-92

Esmonde Cleary A S  1989 The ending of Roman Britain, London

Faulkner, N  2000  The decline and fall of Roman Britain, Stroud.

Gelling, M  1988  Signposts to the Past, (2nd ed), Chichester

Harke, H 1997  Early Anglo-Saxon social structure, in Hines, J (ed), The Anglo-Saxons from the migration             period to the eighth century: an etrhnographic perspective, Woodbridge, 125-70.

Hawkes, S C  1989  The South-East after the Romans: the Saxon Settlement, in Maxfield, V (ed) The Saxon             Shore, 79-95, Exeter

Higham, N  1992  Rome, Britain and the Anglo-Saxons, London

Hines, J  1990  Philology, Archaeology and the Adventus Saxonum vel Anglorum, in Bammesberger, A &             Wollman, A (eds) Britain 400-600 Language and History, Heidelberg

James, E  2001  Britain in the first millennium, London.

Lapidge, M & Dumville, D N (eds)  1984  Gildas: New Aproaches, Woodbridge

Lucy, S  2000  The Anglo-Saxon way of death, Stroud.

Powlesland, D  1997  Early Anglo-Saxon settlements: structures, form and layout, in Hines, (ed), 101-24.

Sims-Williams, P  1983a  The settlement of England in Bede and the Chronicle, Anglo-Saxon England 12, 1-41

Sims-Williams, P  1983b Gildas and the Anglo-Saxons, Cambr. Med. Celt. Stud. 6, 1-30

Wacher, J  1985 (2nd ed)  Towns of Roman Britain, London

Wilson, D M  1984  Anglo-Saxon Art: from the seventh century to the Norman Conquest, London

Yorke, B  1990  Kings and Kingdoms of Early Anglo-Saxon England, London

PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS IS A SELECTIVE BIBLIOGRAPHY, ESPECIALLY IN RESPECT OF INDIVIDUAL SITE REPORTS.

General: The Development of the Topic and its Issues

C. J. Arnold, Roman Britain to Saxon England, 2nd ed. (London, 1984).

C. J. Arnold, An Archaeology of the Early Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms, 2nd ed. (London, 1997).

H. W. Böhme, Germanische Grabfunde des 4. bis 5. Jahrhunderts zwischen unterer Elbe und Loire (Münster, 1974).

H. W. Böhme, ‘Das ende der Romerherrschaft in Britannien und die angelsächsische Besiedlung Englands im 5. Jahrhundert’. Jahrbuch des Römische-Germanischen Zentralmuseums, 33 (1986), 469–574.

M. O. H. Carver (ed.), The Age of Sutton Hoo (Woodbridge, 1992).

S. Esmonde Cleary, The Ending of Roman Britain (London, 1989).