David Thomas Yates. Land, Power and Prestige: Bronze Age Field Systems in Southern England.
Woodward, Ann
DAVID THOMAS YATES. Land, Power and Prestige: Bronze Age Field
Systems in Southern England. xii+204 pages, 56 figures, 8 plates, 24
tables. 2007. Oxford: Oxbow; 978-1-84217-231-5 hardback 30 [pounds
sterling].
Prehistoric fields in Britain have been studied by several
generations of eminent and gifted archaeologists. Now this remarkable
volume breaks new ground on three fronts: firstly it summarises nearly a
century of survey work and existing theoretical interpretations,
secondly it brings together the mainly unpublished results from fifteen
years' worth of developer-funded excavation in lowland England, and
finally it employs these results to demonstrate the validity of one of
the theories in the most elegant and thought-provoking manner.
Throughout the text is a joy to read.
[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]
Introductory sections summarise the socio-economic theories
advanced by Kristiansen and Rowlands in the 1980s. These theories
emphasised that the offshore land blocks of Scandinavia and Britain were
linked, by sea trade, into the dynamic exchange systems of Bronze Age
Europe and the Aegean. Thus the areas nearest to the key sea crossings
demonstrated most evidence for societies organised on hierarchical lines
and economic complexity. Zones in south Scandinavia and southeast
England were seen to support some of the greatest concentrations of
later Bronze Age metalwork in Europe, much of it imported, but what was
being exchanged in return? It was suggested that reciprocal commodities
would have included stock, preserved meat and animal products, but
direct archaeological evidence for this was slight.
Following a masterly summary of the existing evidence for upland
Bronze Age landscapes, Yates explains the complex methodology that he
employed to access the results from commercial fieldwork in England
since 1991 (the so-called 'grey literature'). Mainly relating
to gravel terraces or areas of loess in riverine, estuarine and marine
zones, this extensive research has revealed a vast body of data relating
to later Bronze Age field boundaries, droveways, stock proof fencing,
watering holes, cow pens, sheep races, gateways for stock handling,
ringworks, and associated votive deposits. The central chapters provide
summaries of the data, region by region. Lists of sites are supplied in
handy tables at the back of the book, while illustrations provide plans
of key sites and distributions of contemporary metalwork. Furthermore a
series of reconstruction paintings depicting selected sites offers a
thoughtful human dimension to the arguments.
Figure 12.3, which shows the stunning coincidence between the
clusters of dense distribution of later Bronze Age metalwork and
discrete zones of contemporary field systems along the Thames Valley
neatly illustrates Yates's main conclusion. The extensive blocks of
co-axial fields provide exactly the firm evidence for intensive stock
rearing, and the related social implications, that Rowlands had
envisaged. With the development of land enclosure and settled farming,
kinship relationships and ties of lineage came to be supplanted by the
rise of self-made individuals--a form of nouveau riche, or aggrandisers,
acquisitors or accumulators in the parlance of various recent
commentators. 'Groupies' were attracted and entertained at
lavish feasts where displays of gift-giving and conspicuous destruction
of wealth served to enhance the powers of leadership. Yates does not
neglect to discuss 'ordinary folk': the ditch diggers,
seafarers, herders and metal smiths, all of whom had important parts to
play in the new system. And he concludes his discussion with a short
chapter on symbolic aspects of the field layouts; this calls attention
to the concept of The Grid: a new mind-set which encompassed an
'inherently antinatural' sense of order. The fields themselves
may have been highly visible status symbols within the power hot spots along the shores and river valleys.
The book ends with an extremely important section which summarises
some of the practical problems encountered during the gathering of the
necessary research data from Historic Environment Records and the
'grey literature', and emphasises that some serious changes
need to be effected in the formulation of specifications and the written
briefs for commercially-funded projects. It would be advantageous to
consider more extensive sampling strategies, particularly in relation to
boundary ditches and associated features. And at present there is little
provision, within specifications, for absolute dating or environmental
analysis. Unless changes can be implemented it is less likely that many
of the detailed research directions that have been highlighted by Yates
can be pursued in the future. That would be a great pity, as this
crucial volume has set out a wonderful data-rich platform from which a
penetrating research agenda could be developed.
It can be suggested that this agenda might also include a parallel
treatment of 'grey literature' relating to excavated field
boundaries on the chalk and limestone uplands. There are hints that
these field systems may have been founded a little later, lasted
slightly longer and were more involved in crop production. Were these
areas perhaps integrated into the riverine power systems in some way, as
Rowlands originally suggested?
ANN WOODWARD
Institute of Archaeology and Antiquity,
University of Birmingham, UK
