Early Medieval Britain
The Rebirth of Towns in the Post-Roman West

Traces the development of towns in Britain from late Roman times to the end of the Anglo-Saxon period using archaeological data.

Pam J. Crabtree (Author)

9780521713702, Cambridge University Press

Paperback, published 7 June 2018

246 pages, 35 b/w illus. 10 maps
22.9 x 15.4 x 1.3 cm, 0.35 kg

The growth and development of towns and urbanism in the pre-modern world has been of interest to archaeologists since the nineteenth century. Much of the early archaeological research on urban origins focused on regions such as Mesopotamia, Egypt, and Mesoamerica. Intensive archaeological research that has been conducted since the 1960s, much of it as a result of urban redevelopment, has shed new light on the development of towns in Anglo-Saxon England. In this book, Pamela Crabtree uses up-to-date archaeological data to explore urban origins in early medieval Britain. She argues that many Roman towns remained important places on the landscape, despite losing most of their urban character by the fifth century. Beginning with the decline of towns in the fourth and fifth centuries, Crabtree then details the origins and development of towns in Britain from the 7th century through the Norman Conquest in the mid-eleventh century CE. She also sets the development of early medieval urbanism in Britain within a broader, comparative framework.

Introduction
1. The end of urbanism in Roman Britain
2. Early Anglo-Saxon England: settlement, society and culture
3. Middle Saxon settlement and the rise of the emporia: the archaeology of the 'wics' and contemporary sites
4. Towns in late Anglo-Saxon England
Conclusions.

Subject Areas: Medieval European archaeology [HDDM], Archaeological theory [HDA], Medieval history [HBLC1], Early history: c 500 to c 1450/1500 [HBLC], European history [HBJD]