What are they worth? An examination of Anglo-Saxon Mercian settlements incorporating the name-element Worth (original) (raw)
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makes its contributions in three main areas, pragmatic, theoretical and historical: * Pragmatic: this is an ‘open source’ paper. Its findings arise from several datasets which are published online, primarily at http://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/42650, as an integral part of this paper. Readers are invited not only to use these datasets to check Alaric's claims, but to develop them for their own purposes. * Theoretical: we often work on the implicit assumption that place-name survival is random, and therefore unbiased evidence for the time at which the names were coined. This may not be the case, however. In using a number of different, relatively large datasets to sketch how stable place-names were in early medieval England and Wales and in what circumstances, this paper begins to address fundamental sociolinguistic questions about how place-names were coined, accepted, and maintained. * Historical: as a case-study for the historical implications of its theoretical explorations, the paper analyses the early medieval language-shift in eastern Britain from Celtic and Latin to English. A key approach here is to compare English evidence with a region which to a large extent experienced linguistic continuity throughout the first millennium, Wales. Early medieval Wales suggests the degree to which place-names might be unstable despite substantial linguistic continuity. We have little more hard evidence for continuity of names from the Roman period in Wales than in England, and England arguably shows no greater loss of Roman place-names than we should expect in any region of post-Roman Britain.
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A paper stemming from frustration with the orthodoxy that the polities which preceded the historically-attested Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of the seventh century onwards were known as (or can be termed) 'regiones' (forgive the unconventional punctuation, this site doesn't provide the functionality to italicise words). Scholars in the 1980s and 90s were keen to advance or else accept a model of kingdom formation whereby competition between smaller, proto-kingdom units – more often than not labelled 'regiones' – resulted in the emergence of a smaller number of much larger kingdoms, only they made one crucial error; no-one undertook a due diligence exercise to ascertain whether or not the terminology being (re)employed was suitable for application to the pre-historical period circa 550-650, the key period for these postulated “building-block” territories. By going back to the source material from which such authors have drawn their justificatory examples – early charters, histories and hagiographies – it becomes clear that it is inappropriate to characterise polities of the late-fifth, sixth and early-seventh centuries using Latin words (regio, provincia, pagus) since there is not a shred of evidence for the survival of any of the terms from Late-Roman practice, and plenty of justification for such terminology having arisen in conjunction with the literate culture of the Church begun by St Augustine’s famous mission to Kent at the very end of the sixth century, leading to profound changes to both religious and political elite structures in the two centuries that followed. When the evidence is collated, sifted through and assessed, in south-east England at least there are positive signs that 'provincia' and 'regio' were used from the latter half of the seventh century in specific ways to refer to specific types of political unit, up until the early ninth century when such significances began to wane and the terms are found used in an increasingly scattergun way. Mercia in particular emerges as the kingdom which time and again sought to impose such structures on the territories outside its heartlands, in marked contrast to its great southern rival Wessex, from which there is no such evidence.
This is a study of settlement and society in the parish of Torosay on the Inner Hebridean island of Mull, through the earliest known settlement-names of two of its medieval districts: Forsa and Moloros. The earliest settlement-names, 35 in total, were coined in two languages: Gaelic and Old Norse (hereafter abbreviated to ON). The settlement-toponymy provides irrefutable evidence that ON-speakers settled locally and named their settlements in ON. In subsequent centuries, long after ON ceased to be spoken locally, these ON settlement-names were perpetuated by local Gaelic-speakers. Many of these ON settlement-names are still used locally and are recorded on modern maps; others have fallen out of use. The same can be said of the earliest settlement-names of Gaelic origin. New etymological analysis of the earliest known forms of these settlement-names, considered alongside local pronunciation where available, forms the basis of this thesis. Much of this analysis challenges previous research. A number of the settlement-names have not hitherto been located or been subject to etymological analysis, no previous study having comprehensively engaged with their earliest forms. The earliest known forms are recorded in fiscal evaluation dating to the final decade of the 15th century and, as such, the settlement-names provide a window on the Late Medieval period. The settlement-names also provide an invaluable insight into settlement and society in the Norse period; i.e. the period in which ON was spoken locally. Norse is employed here as both an adjective, as in the Norse period, and a noun, in reference to speakers of ON. Thus, application is broadly to what is now Scandinavia and contemporary inhabitants thereof, as opposed to the more typical modern application of Norse to Norway and its inhabitants. Individual place-name elements employed in ON settlement-names provide an insight into how the local landscape was perceived and utilised agriculturally by these immigrant ON-speakers. In some cases, proposed personal names identify individuals associated with specific settlements. At least one ON settlement-name is likely to provide evidence of the religion of those who coined the name. Syntactic analysis of the Gaelic settlement-names highlights the possibility that some were coined in the Early Medieval period. It also identifies names which are perhaps unlikely to have been coined before the early 10th century. Loan-words borrowed in both directions, i.e. from Gaelic to ON and from ON to Gaelic, are identified and these reveal something of the chronology of individual settlement-names, in addition to providing evidence for language contact. The distribution of ON settlement-names and the fiscal status of settlements bearing ON names can also reveal something of the status of immigrant ON-speakers and the status of local Gaelic-speaking communities. The date of the earliest known forms probably post-dates the period in which these ON names were coined by around six centuries and this clearly allows for significant displacement of settlement-toponymy. However, settlement-names of ON origin apply to both settlements of principal and of relatively low fiscal status and the implication is that there was a significant amount of continuity in settlement-toponymy up to the date of the earliest known fiscal sources. The dearth of contemporary textual sources for the Early Medieval and Norse periods and of local archaeology relating to these periods identifies these settlement-names as invaluable sources of information for contemporary settlement, society and language in the districts of Forsa and Moloros. Part One Chapter 1 sets the research in context in providing geographical, geological, topographical, tenurial, ecclesiastical and fiscal information for the two districts. Chapter 2 comprises a review of previous studies on local settlement-toponymy. Chapter 3 identifies the sources which provide the earliest known forms and outlines the employed methodology. Chapter 4 provides an historical framework and engages with Norse toponymy furth of Mull across Britain and Ireland. Chapter 5 presents discursive analysis addressing the predominant research questions. Chapter 6 presents conclusions. Part Two The place-name survey presents raw spatial data and etymological analysis, where not included in chapter 5, for each of the 35 settlement-names.
A three-dimensional analysis of Leicestershire early medieval place-names
Transactions of The Leicestershire Archaeological and Historical Society, 2022
This analysis derives from a larger study of Anglo-Saxon settlements in Mercia centred on place-names containing the term worth (Aldred 2021), part of which incorporated a study of the distribution of early place-name types in Leicestershire. This considered their geographical relationships with each other, with landscape features, resources and their relative elevations above Ordnance Datum (AOD), making the study in three dimensions. I had intended to include dating evidence, making it four-dimensional but, apart from the Domesday Book, there is scant evidence for the precise date of establishment of many of these settlements.
‘For the Protection of All the People’: Æthelflæd and Her Burhs in Northwest Mercia
Midland History, 2018
The fortifications, or burhs, constructed between 910 and 915 by AEthelflaed, Lady of the Mercians, across much of the western Midlands have often been understood as part of a broader programme initiated by her brother Edward, king of the Anglo-Saxons, as part of the conquest of the Danish parts of the province of Mercia. This study seeks to understand them on their own terms, attempting to characterise their nature as built elements in the early medieval landscape, and placing them within the context of textual sources directly associated with AEthelflaed and her husband AEthelred. It is concluded that, whilst AEthelflaed's burhs undoubtedly shared features with those constructed by her brother and their father, Alfred the Great, they also formed a particular corpus of their own with shared characteristics, and were conceived with several purposes, political, social and ecclesiastical as well as military, intended to answer problems specific to AEthelflaed's Mercia.
Hybrid place-names as evidence of military settlement in the Danelaw and in Castile
Conflict and Collaboration in Medieval Iberia, 2020
In the Danelaw hybrid place-names combining an Old Norse personal name and an Old English habitative element, generically referred to as Grimston hybrids, have traditionally been regarded as indicators of in-comers taking over (and renaming) existing settlements, plausibly within a context of Viking conquest in the ninth century. In this paper, I will explore whether equivalent Islamo-Romance hybrids in Castile might similarly be a direct legacy of the Islamic conquest and partition of the region in the early eighth-century. Certain characteristics of the Castilian hybrids, such as their apparent antiquity and concentration in prime sites, seem to support the hypothesis, however this should only be regarded as a first tentative approach to the subject. What is clear is that the tradition and quality of place-name analysis in Britain are clearly superior to the Spanish situation where such methodology has been largely ignored in recent years, and I suggest that much can be learnt by studying the British bibliography on toponymy and settlement.
As the largest Anglo-Saxon gold find to date, the Staffordshire Hoard has been touted as a great potential source for new insights into not only Anglo-Saxon history, but specifically the seventh-century kingdom of Mercia – claims which are explored in the course of this paper. The development of a geographical, political, religious and cultural backdrop creates a necessary historical context for the study of the hoard. A brief exploration of the different classifications of known hoards and the types of weaponry represented by the Staffordshire hoard begins building a material foundation for the interpretation of the hoard, while a survey of other Anglo-Saxon finds from England further develops an archaeological context from which the unique characteristics of the Staffordshire Hoard can be better understood. Focusing specifically on the pommels, helmet pieces and shield pieces, the initial classification of artefacts and typological analysis plays a crucial role in the study’s two major areas of investigation, namely what the material evidence suggests in terms of the date and purpose of the hoard’s deposition and its significance within Mercia. The evidence collected through contextual analysis and artefact classification is then examined as a whole to gauge the hoard’s immediate contribution to Anglo-Saxon studies. Length: 20,600 words
Anglo-Saxons in Devon: place-name formation in Exeter's hinterland (2005)
Place-name evidence often features in attempts to understand the transition by which British Dumnonia became Anglo-Saxon Devon. For example, the EPNS survey in the early 1930s argued that, because less than one percent of Devon's place-names are of pre-English origin, the English conquest here must have been so complete that 'no considerable native population remained to complicate the life of the new settlers'. Yet this argument discounted not only pre-English river-names but also the place-names derived from them, assuming that the latter were entirely English formations. It also took little account of the processes of place-name formation and replacement over time. What I'd like to do today is to explore these two issues in more detail.