Description
Book SynopsisIn bringing together these papers,
Archaeological Approaches to Medieval Europe demonstrates the need for active participation of different disciplines in formulating questions about and interpretations of material culture in the Middle Ages. It celebrates the coming of age of historical archaeology, of which medieval archaeology is a subdiscipline. The papers collected are striking for their diversity of approaches and subject matter. They reflect the spirit of an open area excavation where specialists from many disciplines with diverging methodologies meet and work side by side. No paper is specifically devoted to an excavation report, although the majority of contributors made use of data from such reports. The collection is intended primarily as a sampler, but a thematic unity emerges around the potential of archaeological approaches to contribute to a political ecology of the medieval period. The volume is an indispensable offering for archaeologists and historians of the M
Table of ContentsAcknowledgements
Introduction by Kathleen Biddick
PART I: Organizing Space and Managing Resources
The Multiple Estate: A Model for Tracing the Interrelationships of Society, Economy, and Habitat by Glanville R. J. Jones
Fieldwork and Documentary Evidence for the Layout and Organization of Early Medieval Estates in the English Midlands by David Hall
The Forest: Woodland and Wood-Pasture in Medieval England by Oliver Rackham
PART II: Forming and Transforming Agricultural Systems in Temperate Europe
Field Edge, Forest Edge: Early Medieval Social Change and Resource Allocation by Kathleen Biddick
Some Ecological Dimensions of Medieval Field Systems by H. S. A. Fox
Environmental, Ecological, and Agricultural Systems: Approaches to Simulation Modeling Applications for Medieval Temperate Europe by William S. Cooter
Early Medieval Agriculture in Coastal Holland: The Evidence from Archaeology and Ecology by William H. TeBrake
PART III: Reconstructing Material Worlds from Artifacts
North Sea Trade Before the Vikings by Richard Hodges
Morphological Analysis of Medieval Fine Pottery: Provenance and Trade Patterns in the Mediterranean World by Janet E. Buerger
The Archaeozoology of the Anglo-Saxon Site at West Stow, Suffolk by Pamela Crabtree
PART IV: Time-Depth and Settlement: Overview and Case Studies A Diachronic Model for Settlement and Land Use in Southern Burgundy by Carole L. Crumley
An Experimental Model for Early Medieval Settlement in Southwestern Burgundy by Walter E. Berry
Castle and Countryside: Capalbiaccio and the Changing Settlement History of the Ager Cosanus by Stephen L. Dyson
PART V: Context and Concerns
Current Research
Concerns in Medieval Archaeology in West Germany by Walter Janssen
Contributors
