The Archaeology of Britain: An introduction from ... - waughfamily.ca

Middle Ages: churches, castles and monasteries
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bailey form declined in all of north-western Europe by the twelfth to thirteenth centuries, when
it began to flourish in southern and eastern Europe (Fehring 1991, 118). Continental parishes
formed much earlier due to Carolingian reforms, with a two-tier system of mother churches and
parish churches from c.800. This structure developed in England (and in Italy) much later, with
full parochial rights for village churches accruing from the eleventh to the thirteenth centuries.
However, the pace and precise character of parochial development is likely to have varied
between localities. Regional variations can be detected, such as the more tenacious survival of the
minster system in north-western and south-western England, and the absence of evidence for
minster frameworks in the areas of Viking settlement such as Yorkshire and East Anglia. The
consensus of current opinion favours a seigneurial origin for most local churches, in other words,
their foundation by a local lord. It has been argued that they began as privately owned churches,
possibly motivated by the financial gains to be made by the lord retaining a portion of tithes and
soulscot (paid for the burial of corpses) (Blair 1988, 12). While economic gain may have played
some part in motivating local lords to construct churches, social expectations must also have
played a role. The proprietary church became symbolic of thegnly rank, and represented a pious
act that it was believed would improve one’s chances of salvation. The current picture of church
origins also neglects the possibility that local communities either demanded that churches should
be provided for them, or instigated such building projects themselves.
Considerable debate still surrounds the issue of the origins and development of the parish
church and the castle (e.g. Blair and Pyrah 1996). In some quarters, there has been a recent
concern to investigate the domestic and ideological dimensions of castle life over that of military
functions, while the priorities of monastic archaeology have shifted away from religious and
social elements to focus on landscape and technology. Furthermore, the development of
environmental archaeology has made a substantial contribution to our understanding of medieval
life. Particularly in the case of monastic excavations, the evidence of pollen and plant and insect
remains has been used to reconstruct former environmental conditions. Animal bones and plant
macrofossils have yielded new information on the high status medieval diet, and skeletons excavated
from ecclesiastical sites have provided insights on health and demography. It is especially when
investigating the standards of daily life that archaeology makes its own unique contribution to
medieval studies.
Monastic studies have successfully incorporated a more integrated, landscape approach that is
still lacking in investigations of parish churches and castles. Research and recording of all three
types of settlement have assisted in refining a distinctive archaeological method for the study of
standing buildings. In contrast to these advances, there has been comparatively little interaction
between archaeological theory and the practice of medieval archaeology, an omission that is
gradually being redressed.
Key texts
Greene, J.P., 1992. Medieval monasteries. London: Leicester University Press.
Kenyon, J.R., 1990. Medieval fortifications. London: Leicester University Press.
Morris, R., 1989. Churches in the landscape. London: Dent.
Pounds, N.J.G., 1990. The medieval castle in England and Wales. A social and political history. Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press.
Rodwell, W., 1989. Church archaeology. London: Batsford/English Heritage.
Bibliography
Astill, G., 1989. ‘Monastic research designs: Bordesley Abbey’, in Gilchrist, R. and Mytum, H. (eds) The
archaeology of rural monasteries. Oxford: British Archaeological Report 203, 277–292.