The Marlow Warlord - An Anglo-Saxon Burial

Site of the Marlow Warlord burial
Photograph: University of Reading

The discovery of a warrior burial in Berkshire, England, could change our understanding of southern Britain in the early Anglo-Saxon period. The burial of the aptly named “Marlow Warlord” was discovered on a hilltop affording views of the Thames valley. Archaeologists from the University of Reading have dated the burial to the late 5^th to early 6^th Century.

Isolated Burial

Unlike many burials of the time, the Marlow Warlord was not buried in a cemetery but set apart from the rest of the community directly overlooking the River Thames. He was buried along with a collection of expensive luxuries and weapons, including a sword in a decorated scabbard, spears, bronze and glass vessels, and other personal equipment.

The remains of the Marlow Warlord are unearthed. 

Photograph: University of Reading

The pagan burial had remained undiscovered for more than 1,400 years until metal detectorists Sue and Mick Washington of the Maidenhead Search Society came across it in 2018 and reported finding a copper alloy bowl to the Portable Antiquities Scheme.

"The nature of his burial and the site with views overlooking the Thames suggest he was a respected leader of a local tribe and had probably been a formidable warrior in his own right" – Professor Gabor Thomas, University of Reading.

Copper alloy bowl recovered from site
Photograph: University of Reading

A team led by the Department of Archaeology at the University of Reading conducted a full survey and excavation in August 2020. The burial was at a very shallow depth, making the excavation necessary to protect it from farming activity, especially ploughing.

Archaeologists conducted a targeted excavation to recover the very fragile bronze vessels and recovered a pair of iron spearheads which suggested it was likely to be an Anglo-Saxon grave.

Professor Thomas, a specialist in Early Medieval Archaeology at the University of Reading, said:

“We had expected to find some kind of Anglo-Saxon burial, but what we found exceeded all our expectations and provides new insights into this stretch of the Thames in the decades after the collapse of the Roman administration in Britain.”

This is the first burial of its kind found in the mid-Thames basin and suggests that the people living in this area may have been more important than historians previously suspected. The nature and location of his burial suggest he was a respected leader of a local tribe and a formidable warrior in his own right. Analysis of the human remains was carried out at the Department of Archaeology, University of Reading, to establish the man’s age, health, diet, and geographical origins.

Imposing Figure

Sword and scabbard found with the remains. 

Photograph: University of Reading

The ‘Marlow Warlord’ was in his late 40s/early 50s, 6’ – 2” to 6’ – 6” tall compared to the height of the average Anglo-Saxon male which was 5’ – 7”. Analysis of his skeleton and associated grave goods showed that he was right-handed, spent a long time riding a horse, and suffered from osteoarthritis.

For the first eight years of his life, he lived on a chalky site like where he was buried. His DNA indicated that he had come from across the sea from what is now Germany, Denmark, or the Netherlands.

Early Saxon Period

The early Anglo-Saxon period was one of great change in England with substantial levels of immigration from the continent. The collapse of the Roman administration around 400 AD created a vacuum which led to the formation of new identities and power structures.

At the time the Marlow Warlord lived, England was occupied by local tribal groupings, some of which extended into Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, such as Wessex, Mercia, and Kent. The region of the mid-Thames between London and Oxford was previously thought to be a ‘borderland’ with powerful tribal groups on each side. This new discovery implies that the area may have been populated by important groups of its own.

For more information see:

https://archive.reading.ac.uk/news-events/2020/October/pr848532.html

Watch: How the 'Marlow Warlord' was discovered >>>

Watch: Who was the 'Marlow Warlord'? >>>

Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement - Part 2

 

Food

The extraordinary preservation of material at Must Farm provides a unique opportunity to examine food that was being stored, processed, and possibly eaten shortly before the fire. The food and drink mixtures from Must Farm are exceptional in prehistoric Brit­ain. They represent the remains of porridges, stews, brewing mashes, doughs, and sugary or oily liquids, all of which were being stored or potentially even eaten or drunk at the time the settlement burnt down.

Residue of food in one of the Must Farm bowels
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

A coarseware bowel found beneath Structure 5 was half full of a thick porridge-like mix of roughly ground wheatmeal. The wooden spatula used to stir this porridge was still leaning against the inner edge of the bowl.

Meat was very evidently an important dietary component. Animal remains included large and small mammals, fish, birds, reptiles and amphibia. Pig/wild boar, followed by sheep/goat, red deer, and fish (pike and perch) were the main animal foodstuffs.

The considerable evidence for fish consumption at Must Farm is unparalleled in British later prehistory, partly because of the exceptional preservation and the recovery methods employed. Evidence for Late Bronze Age fishing practices is provided by fragments of knot­ted net – possibly fishing net – that were associated with a possible ceramic net weight, in Structure 4.

Fish were often eaten either raw or only partially cooked and the fish bones were commonly consumed along with the flesh: fish bones, scales, and teeth (including fish heads) were a regular feature of human excrement.

Two other noteworthy foodstuffs from the settle­ment are milk and honey/beeswax. Organic pot residues of these were widespread suggesting that their use was relatively com­mon.

Cattle are barely represented at Must Farm representing less than 4% of the animal remains in total. Although pigs were clearly an important dietary component, there is little evidence to suggest that they were being raised and slaughtered at the settlement.

Items of pottery from Must Farm
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

The occupants of Must Farm processed emmer wheat into meal and flour and used these ingredients for making stews, dumplings, and bread. They used ceramic bowels to eat their porridge, mixed their dough in wooden ‘dough’ troughs and carried their drink­ing water in buckets.

Overall, the evidence from Must Farm makes clear that later prehistoric food practices in Britain are more complex and more varied than has previ­ously been recognized. As the Must Farm researchers point out, the food-related evi­dence is outstanding and allows us to imagine not only the food tastes of Must Farm’s occupants’ but also the ‘recipes’ they used. We learn about the food harvested, made, stored, and consumed.

Fabric Production

Must Farm has produced extraordinary evidence of fibre processing and fabric production. All the fabrics from the Must Farm pile-dwelling were made from plant fibres, predominantly flax, although lime bast was also used.

Illustration of one of the Must Farm textiles showing the weave and thread direction
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

Processed flax fibre was in turn spun and spliced into thread, which was then wound onto wooden dowels or into balls. The site produced at least 8 spindle whorls, 36 dowels or bobbins wound with thread, a number of balls of thread, as well as a cone of thicker cord.

One of the finest examples of textiles was found in Structure 1. This large, fine piece of folded cloth was woven from threads of around 0.3 mm in diameter and must have been made by a highly experienced weaver.

Artefact distributions, suggest that different stages of textile production were performed across buildings. For example, flax was probably processed in Structure 1, with the spinning of fibres into yarn carried out across Structures 2, 4 and 5 (if not all buildings). This was then finally woven into textile on the warp-weighted loom located back in Structure 1.

Wider Connections

The beads, appear to have travelled distances, possibly from Iran, Egypt, Switzerland, and Ireland. The site’s location on a waterway networked into the North Sea made it easier for its inhabitants to acquire objects from further afield.

Socketed bronze axe
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

Nine logboats, ranging in date from the late Early Bronze Age to the Early Iron Age, were found in the Must Farm chan­nel, upstream of the pile-dwelling. Wooden trackways or causeways may have provided a connection between the river and fen-edge.

Comparison with other settlements

The Iron Age Glastonbury ‘Lake Village’ in Somerset is comparable to Must Farm, in terms of size, location and economy. Unlike Must Farm, Glastonbury Lake Village could only be reached by canoe. This limited means of access would have provided an enhanced level of protection.

Glastonbury and Must Farm both represent villages rather than just one or two family groups. A minimum of five structures were in use at the same time at Must Farm. Glastonbury Lake Village was more extensive and accommodated forty roundhouses. At its peak it has been estimated that there were thirteen houses in use.

The Must Farm roundhouses were raised up above the water on tall piles while the lake village settlement was raised above the water by adding large amounts of brushwood and logs, and clay directly to the wet peat. This material was par­tially retained by lines of upright posts, both within the settlement and forming a palisade around the exterior.

The remains of a wooden bucket that contained scrap bronze
associated with Structure 4
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

At Glastonbury, the village was located on a sig­nificant water transport route, as was Must Farm. Glastonbury relied on the neighbouring dryland for the basis of its food economy, despite the exploitation of wetland resources. The same was true at Must Farm.

Late Bronze Age sites in Ireland such as Ballinderry crannog No. 2, Co. Offaly and Rathtinaun, Co. Sligo, are still amongst the richest settle­ment sites from the period, in terms of artefacts despite the discovery, in the last decade, of significantly more ‘dryland’ settlements in Ireland.

Late Bronze Age crannogs or lake-dwellings have produced evidence for livestock (animal bones) and food production (saddle querns), as well as domes­tic pottery, wooden finds, and basketry. Some sites have produced evidence of high-status goods, such as socketed axes, bronze rings, swords, and spearheads, and amber and lignite.

For example, Late Bronze Age wetland settlements, like Rathtinaun, Co. Sligo, have produced evidence for industrial or metalworking activities, such as layers of burnt stone, clay mould fragments, saddle querns in large numbers, and evidence for large hearths and fires.

Abandonment of Settlement

The summer/early autumn end date for the settlement is indicated by the 3–6 month old lambs killed in the fire. The rarity of fruit stones and seeds (sloes, cherries, hazel nutshell) suggests much of the settlement’s occupation was during the spring/early summer months when such fruit was absent.

There seems to have been little effort by the occupants of Must Farm to return and recover precious frag­ments of their lives, despite the obvious material wealth that had been lost. Retrieving precious items in the aftermath of the fire may there­fore have been taboo.

The abandonment of wetland settlements is likely to have been a complex social process. The death of a person strongly associated with the dwelling such as a tribal leader or shaman, can result in abandonment and the dwelling may even be burnt down.

Conclusion

In the mid-9th century BC, a disaster happened to a small community when fire swept through their palisade-enclosed pile-dwelling settlement, built only a year earlier across a narrow sluggish river channel in a wetland landscape.

The fire caused the collapse of the structures, and as the floors burnt through, the contents of the buildings and walkways came crashing down into the shallow muddy waters below and were buried by river borne silts. The occupants escaped with their lives and in a matter of hours, they lost their homes and possessions, as well as their means of subsistence: tools, food stores, livestock.

A wooden artefact from Must Farm - exact use unknown
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

The Must Farm settlement gives us a rare glimpse of life in the Bronze Age. There were live lambs inside the buildings at the time of the fire, beside rushes and flax harvested in late summer and willow withies cut when the leaves had fallen in the winter.

The Bronze Age settlement at Must Farm, with its remarkable survival of a wide range of evidence, provides a unique opportunity to think about how people understood their worlds. The anthropolo­gist, Clifford Geertz, considered that the important questions we should ask of any society are: who do people think they are; what did they think they were doing, and to what end did they think they were doing it?

In the words of Volume 1 contributor Aidan O’Sullivan:

“… the objects found at Must Farm – beads from Iran, Switzerland, Ireland; amber long circulating from the Baltic regions; a bucket and other bronze fragments from Ireland – all hint at far-flung water-borne connections. But for all that, most of the objects recovered, including pottery, wooden bowls, platters, buckets and troughs, balls of thread and woven, twined and knotted fabrics of flax and lime bast indicate that they were doing ordinary, routine things; living in houses, chatting, sleeping, cooking and eating, raising children, storing stuff, making clothes, managing resources, presumably all the time, feeling that they were ‘at home’.”

The people who inhabited Must Farm possessed a deep-rooted familiarity with erecting structures in the wet: knowledge of piling and of which timbers to cut at what lengths; knowledge of how to support heavy roofs, elevated floors, and hearths above an active waterway.

The skill displayed by the architecture sug­gest that this was not the first or only pile-dwelling to be founded in the wetland. As construction could have required labour input from beyond the resident group, this building knowledge may have been widely available in the local community, sug­gesting wetland living was commonplace.

For more information see:

“Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement: Vol. 1. Landscape, architecture and occupation.” (2024). Edited by Mark Knight, Rachel Ballantyne, Matthew Brudenell, Anwen Cooper, David Gibson & Iona Robinson Zeki

“Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement: Volume 2. Specialist reports.” (2024). Edited by Rachel Ballantyne, A. Cooper, D. Gibson, Mark Knight & I Robinson Zeki

Both volumes are freely accessible via the Must Farm website

https://www.mustfarm.com/bronze-age-settlement/

Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement - Part 1

 

Close-up of post-excavation plan showing the positions of Structures 1,2,4 and 5
(c) Must Farm Website

Introduction

In previous posts I have written about the Must Farm Bronze Age settlement in Cambridgeshire, in Britain. Now that the results of post-excavation analysis have been published, it is an opportune time to revisit this amazing archaeological site.

Must Farm pile dwelling settlement, Vols 1 and 2, highlight the wonderful and, in many ways, unparalleled archaeology of the Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement. It provides an account of life in a damp but extremely well-connected setting on the northwest fringes of Europe nearly 3000 years ago.

Must Farm is the most completely preserved prehistoric settlement in Britain and has been called Britain’s Pompeii. It has provided a unique insight into the lives of people towards the end of the Bronze Age. The excavation of the Must Farm settlement challenges many of our ideas about the material worlds that people inhabited, shedding new light on aspects of architecture, food, woodland management, landscape change, and wetland living.

A 3D model of one of Must Farm's large storage vessels
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

The settlement comprised a palisade enclosing five stilt-raised houses. It was built in the mid-9th century BC and destroyed by fire less than a year after construction. The occupants escaped but the remains of all five buildings and their artefact-rich contents collapsed into the riverbed. It is currently the only Late Bronze Age pile-dwelling settlement known in Britain.

Five Structures

The technique of pile-driving would have been well-known to the fen-dwellers, but this method of construction is not common in other wetland settlements on the British mainland. Each roundhouse consisted of a circular space with a hearth, the household’s primary source of light, at its centre. Archaeologists believe that the hearth may have been suspended above the floor by a clay-built ‘plate’ or ‘box’ set beneath a clay-lined hood or flue.

Standing at the threshold, the interior space to the right would have been furnished for food preparation; that to the left, for textile production. At the ‘back left’ young lambs may have been kept beside a quiet area to the ‘back right’ reserved for sleeping. Wattle partitioning may have separated different areas within the roundhouses. The presence of slender split and mortised timbers may indicate simple items of furniture.

The rectangular form of Structure 4 is unusual for the period but not unknown. The size and shape of this building results from it being secondary to the original pile-dwelling layout, squeezed between the existing roundhouses and palisade walkway.

The positioning of beads at the site seems to indicate that some would have
formed composite necklaces of amber, glass, stone and jet.
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

The buildings contained a similar set of artefacts (pots, buckets, troughs, loom weights, spindle whorls, bobbins, axes, gouges, sickles, querns, beads, seed caches etc.). A prime example is the number and combination of axes, gouges, and sickles in the metalwork collection with each structure equipped with a similar toolkit.

The resources utilized in the construction of the site itself point to a substantial work force behind the felling, moving and erection of timbers, particularly for the palisade. To undertake work of this scale, the residents may have drawn on shared labour from the wider com­munity.

The framework of the roof was comprised of mostly alder and ash poles used as radial rafters that bridged the outer and inner rings of vertical posts. The roofing material comprised a combination of turf, possible thatch, and clay.

The floor consisted of lightweight wattle interwo­ven around radial floor joists made of slender alder poles. It was supported underneath by a mass of alder poles, driven into the riverbed at an angle and bowed over to form an arch. An intermediate ring of short vertically driven ash and alder stakes provided additional support to the floor.

In the middle of the settlement, there was a particularly well-preserved central walkway. This structure was over 5.9m long, made of a continuous, metre-wide, hazel hurdle panel, founded on small-diameter stakes, and supported by poles which were tied into the floors of the adjacent build­ings.

Image showing palisade posts
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

Wood and Woodworking

The wood used to construct the Must Farm Settlement was sourced from a range of habi­tats and floated up or down the river. Less buoyant green oak logs may have been rafted together with ash and other more buoyant species to facilitate their movement.

The felling season for the trees used was between September and March in a single winter. At the time of the pile-dwelling’s construc­tion and occupation, the main species were oak and hazel, together with less evident ash, lime, beech, and elm. Ash wood was used in large quantities and was readily available and accessible nearby.

Axe or adze was most commonly used to fell or shape wood. There was no evidence of the use of saws. Gouges or chisels were also occasion­ally employed in the building process. The jointing technol­ogy used for the bulk of the structures was functional, consisting of axe cut, with somewhat rough mor­tise holes. The level of skill displayed suggests that the people involved were non-specialist woodworkers.

Most of the wood was used in an unchanged form with the bark still intact. This included the piles of the main structures and the palisade as well as the lighter sections such as roof rafters and floor supports.

Fifteen two-piece wooden buckets, made from hollowed-out alder logs with a separate base, are thought to have been used to store or transport liquids such as water or milk. A collection of bronze objects was found in one of these containers.

Other wooden artefacts involved in textile production include 40 wooden bobbins, 36 of which still had threads or fibres wrapped around them. Wooden hafts or handles belonging to several bronze tools and weapons were also recovered.

Late Bronze Age socketed axe complete with handle
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

Nine axe hafts of ash, oak and field maple were identified, three with the bronze socketed axe-heads still attached. Nine spear shafts or fragments of shafts, mainly of ash, were also found, two inserted in spear heads.

Perhaps, one of the more exciting artefacts found at Must Farm was an almost complete cartwheel made of alder planks together with fragments of a second, from Structure 3. An alder yoke designed to harness a single animal was also found in this building.

Household Equipment

At Must Farm, culinary equipment (pots, querns, troughs, and buckets); tools (sickles, gouges, axes) and textile-related items (loom weights, spindle whorls, plant fibre bundles and sticks of yarn), were consistently situated on the eastern side of buildings.

Various pots during the pottery re-fitting exercise
Photo: (c) Must Farm Website

Four of the five main buildings included a mix of jars, bowls, and cups, finewares and coarsewares, most of which were grouped within the eastern side of each building which may have been the ‘kitchen’ area.

Culinary tools include querns, stirrers and scoops, and chopping/serving boards. Fragments were found from at least six possible quernstones, three of which are traditional saddle querns.

Pottery is one of the most common categories of find from the Late Bronze Age. Some 128 individual vessels were identified, including at least 38 jars, 49 bowls and 12 cups. Most of the jars were medium or large, with capacities in the region of 4–6 litres and 10–19 litres, respectively.

The collection of at least 49 glass beads is unparalleled in a British context. All but one of these were monochrome, probably originally blue, green or turquoise in colour. In contrast, the bead necklaces were present in significant numbers only in the two larger roundhouses (Structures 1 and 5) while dogs were present only in Structure 5.

In Part 2, I shall look at food, wood and woodworking, fabric production, wider connections, the comparison with other settlements and abandonment.

For more information see:

“Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement: Vol. 1. Landscape, architecture and occupation.” (2024). Edited by Mark Knight, Rachel Ballantyne, Matthew Brudenell, Anwen Cooper, David Gibson & Iona Robinson Zeki

“Must Farm pile-dwelling settlement: Volume 2. Specialist reports.” (2024). Edited by Rachel Ballantyne, A. Cooper, D. Gibson, Mark Knight & I Robinson Zeki

Both volumes are freely accessible via the Must Farm website

https://www.mustfarm.com/bronze-age-settlement/

 

Grace O’Malley – Ireland’s 16th Century Pirate Queen

           

Modern representation of Grace O’Malley. (Makerva/Deviant Art)

            Clew Bay was home to Rockfleet Castle, the stronghold of Grace O’Malley, or Granuaile as she was known. O’Malley was the leader of a clan of pirates that controlled the Irish coastline through violence and intimidation. She had hundreds of men and over twenty ships under her command, raiding rival clans and merchant ships at will.

Eventually, government officials had had enough and in 1574 a fleet was sent to raid O’Malley’s castle. She and her men turned the fleet away in a violent counterattack which caused the government ships to retreat. However, she was captured and imprisoned in 1577 but was soon out and plundering again.

Gráinne Ní Mháille

Grace O’Malley (Gráinne Ní Mháille) was born in Ireland around 1530 as a daughter of the wealthy nobleman and sea trader, Dubhdara O'Malley, who commanded the biggest fleet of ships in Ireland. For hundreds of years, the O’Malleys had been sailing their ships around the coasts of Ireland, Scotland and northern Spain, trading, fishing, and plundering.

Clew Bay (c) By Mariusz Z - flickr.com, CC BY-SA 2.0

            During her reign, she acquired several other castles through conquest and marriage, including Doona on Blacksod, Kildavnet on Achill Island, and the O’Malley Castle on Clare Island.

Queen Elizabeth used the feuding between Irish chieftains to her advantage, replacing Chieftains with those who promised to be loyal to her and adopt English law.

Sir Richard Bingham

At the age of fifty-six, Grace O’Malley was finally captured by Sir Richard Bingham (1528 – 1599), a ruthless governor that was appointed to rule over Irish territories. She closely escaped the death sentence, but over the course of time her influence, wealth, and lands faded, until she was on the brink of poverty.

She wrote to Queen Elizabeth explaining her plight. She asked the queen to give her “free liberty during her life to invade with fire and sword all your highness’ enemies without any interruption of any person whatsoever.” In the guise of fighting for the queen, she could continue her life at sea, unhindered by the English and free from Bingham’s control.

‘The meeting of Grace O'Malley and Queen Elizabeth I.’ (Public Domain)

Historic Meeting

Her situation took a turn for the worst when her dearest son, Tibbot na Long (‘Toby of the Ships’), was captured by Bingham and was facing execution. In September 1593, O’Malley secured an historic meeting with Queen Elizabeth I, the woman against whom she had rebelled and in whose hands her life and her son’s life now lay. The meeting took place at Greenwich Castle. Their conversation was conducted in English, as Grace spoke no Latin and Elizabeth spoke no Irish.

Sir Richard Bingham 
from Wikipedia

Grace explained to the queen that her actions were merely to protect her family and her people. The queen listened with admiration and pity as Grace told her story and how she suffered at the hands of the English, and particularly Sir Richard Bingham. In this amazing meeting of two powerful women, Grace managed to convince the queen to free her family and restore much of her lands and influence.

Decline and Death

However, growing political unrest and turmoil in Ireland, culminated in the demise of the old Gaelic way of life and the end of the world of clans and chieftains. By this time, Grace was old and weary. She lived out her last years in the comfort of her fortress at Rockfleet Castle where she died around 1603.

                          Rockfleet Castle. (Mikeoem/CC BY SA 4.0)

Grace O'Malley is not mentioned in the Irish annals, so documentary evidence for her life comes mostly from English sources. As a pirate, she was largely written out of Irish history, so limited information exists of her life. She successfully defended the independence of her territories at a time when much of Ireland fell under the English rule and is still considered today ‘the pirate queen of Ireland.’ Her story lives on in the many folk stories, songs, poems, and musicals which help to preserve the legend of the Pirate Queen.

For more information see:

https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/grace-o-malley-16th-century-pirate-queen-ireland-001773

https://www.rmg.co.uk/stories/topics/grace-o-malley-irish-female-pirate

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eduNvLx3CM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0eduNvLx3CM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PCSckpGE5OQ  

Archaeologists uncover sunken prehistoric fort in Clew Bay Island

 

View of Clew Bay by Mariusz Z - flickr.com, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=89626431

My first glimpse of Clew Bay and its many islands was in the early sixties while descending from Croagh Patrick after climbing the mountain in the dark. A newspaper article reminded me of that occasion. The Irish Independent recently reported the discovery of a sunken prehistoric fort on an island in Clew Bay off the north Mayo coast. The fort may be as significant as Inis Mór’s Dún Aengus.

Late Bronze Age Fort

Archaeologist, Michael Gibbons, told the Irish Independent that surveys suggest that Collanmore island is effectively a fort dating from the late Bronze Age (1100-900 BC). Several large ramparts were uncovered cutting across the strip of land linking the island to the shoreline. The ramparts are faced with large limestone blocks and extended for 200 to 300 metres.

The size and scale of the ramparts suggest that the island was of major strategic importance at the time. Late Bronze Age hillforts are the largest monuments built in Ireland and can measure up to 320 acres in area, with kilometres of defensive ramparts.

Michael Gibbons told the Independent:

“They were built by warlord dominated societies and we have very good evidence they were in active use during periods of warfare between various tribes.”

Grace O’Malley or Granuaile

Statue of Grainne Mhaol Ni Mhaille (Grace O'Malley, 1530-1603), the Irish Pirate, located at Westport House, Co. Mayo, Ireland. (Suzanne Mischyshyn/CC BY SA 2.0)

Clew Bay was the stronghold of the O'Malley clan during the Middle Ages – the most famous member of whom is Grace O'Malley or Granuaile, the Pirate Queen. Granuaile controlled a fleet of ships and possessed several castles, including those on Clare Island and Achill, and at Rockfleet near Newport.

According to legend, Clew Bay has 365 islands - an island for every day of the year. Ringforts are Ireland’s most common field monument, with about 45,000 recorded examples. They are circular areas, measuring c.24-60m in diameter, usually enclosed with one or more earthen banks, often topped with a timber palisade.

Ringforts

While the term ‘ringfort’ dominates, other terms are also used such as rath, lios, caiseal and dun. Rath and lios are normally used to describe monuments with earthen banks while caiseal (cashel) and dun are more generally used in relation to sites with stone-built enclosures. Stone forts or cashels are the equivalent of earthen banked ring forts but are much less common. Dating of ring forts is difficult but most of those that survive are thought to have been built well after the first century with many built or used right into the medieval period (800 – 1500 AD).

The Bronze Age

The Bronze Age in Ireland was a period of high population density and human activity sustained for a much longer interval than any other time before or since. It is estimated that the Irish Bronze Age sustained a population in the region of 2 m until 800 BC.

Prehistoric enclosures echo the overall pattern of evolving population trends, occurring during times of higher population. The basic causes of population change are tied to social, political, and economic systems. They can be expressed through factors such as famine, economic instability, political unrest, and changes to marriage patterns that lowered fertility rates within kinship networks.

Ireland’s Ancient Routeways

By the end of the Bronze Age a modern pattern of routeways crossing the midlands, joining west and east, and east and north, can be observed. Ireland’s modern-day network of towns and roads echoes ancient networks of routeways that connected significant points in a landscape. Towns were eventually established in the places where this internal network intersected with maritime connections with the world beyond Ireland’s shores.

Climate Change

Archaeologists tell us that during the eighth century BC, there is evidence of abrupt climate change. Across northwest Europe, wetter oceanic weather became more prevalent, leading to a dramatic rise in groundwater. The evidence suggests 800–780 BC was a period of environmental decline. Society’s capacity for resilience was weakened by larger-scale social and economic changes in Europe. This resulted in the most dramatic collapse in Ireland’s population until the potato famine of the 1840s.

The population of Ireland recovered to quite high levels during the Early Iron Age with levels of activity around 400 BC like those sustained in Ireland throughout the Bronze Age. Environmental disaster strike hardest at the sections of society most exposed – the sick, very young, and very old. Likewise, political unrest and war can have devastating results for entire age-cohorts of young men in particular.

Summary

Archaeologists are excited to discover that one of the many islands in Clew Bay, County Mayo, is a sunken prehistoric fort which dates from the late Bronze Age. Several large ramparts extending 200 to 300 metres and faced with large limestone blocks were uncovered. The size and scale of the ramparts suggest that the island was of major strategic importance at the time.

For further information see:

https://www.independent.ie/irish-news/archaeologists-uncover-sunken-prehistoric-fort-in-clew-bay-island/a18656517.html 

https://letterfromballinloughane.blogspot.com/2014/10/irelands-ringforts-not-just-home-for.html  

McLaughlin, T. R. 2020. An archaeology of Ireland for the Information Age. Emania 25, 7–30. 

https://www.ancient-origins.net/history-famous-people/grace-o-malley-16th-century-pirate-queen-ireland-001773 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KhaHOvIbOWs

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Clew%20Bay%20site%3Ayoutube.com&sca_esv=959a59c8beda7f19&sca_upv=1&sxsrf=ACQVn09Q4ByWdy9Xac0eg4ju1eV1Iy9OvA%3A1712241254651&source=hp&ei=b7oOZs6uKsqshbIP3oi64A8&i

300,000 Year-old Stone Artefacts Discovered

ASE Senior Archaeologist Letty Ingrey inspects the largest handaxe

Credit: Archaeology South-East/ UCL

Researchers at University College London have discovered some of the largest early prehistoric stone tools in Britain. The discoveries were made at Frindsbury in Kent where artefacts were recovered from deep Ice Age deposits above the Medway Valley. A total of eight hundred stone artefacts believed to be over 300,000 years old were recovered.

The unearthed artefacts included two very large flint knives described as “giant handaxes.” It is thought that this type of tool was usually held in the hand and may have been used for butchering animals and cutting meat.

The largest handaxe measured 29.5cm in length and is currently the third largest known to be found in Britain. ‘Giant handaxes’ like this are usually found in the Thames and Medway regions and date from over 300,000 years ago.

One of the handaxes at the point of discovery on site.
Credit: Archaeology South-East/ UCL

Letty Ingrey, a senior archaeologist from the University College London Institute of Archaeology, explained that they likely date back to an interglacial period approximately 300,000 to 330,000 years ago.

“While right now, we aren’t sure why such large tools were being made, or which species of early human were making them, this site offers a chance to answer these exciting questions.”

stated Ms Ingrey.

The site is thought to date to a period in the early prehistory of Britain when Neanderthal people and their cultures were beginning to emerge and may even have shared the landscape with other early human species. During this period the Medway Valley would have been a wild landscape of wooded hills and river valleys, where red deer, horses, now-extinct straight-tusked elephants, and lions roamed freely.

Excavations revealed artefacts in deep Ice Age sediments preserved on a hillside above the Medway Valley. 

Credit: Archaeology South-East/ UCL

        This exceptionally large axe may have had a specialised function in early human society, or relate to specific human groups, or even human species. Handaxes are stone artefacts that have been chipped, or knapped, on both sides to produce a symmetrical shape with a long cutting edge. 

The largest giant handaxe photographed from four different angles.

Credit: Archaeology South-East/ UCL

Throughout Africa and Europe, handaxes have been discovered at various archaeological sites dating back from 1.7 million to 300,000 years ago. By 200,000 years ago, many innovations had been made in stone tool technology. For example, large handaxes became less common and were replaced with a range of smaller tools in more diverse toolkits. Tools made of flakes were favoured over large cores.

Today, modern humans or Homo sapiens, inhabit the whole earth. Looking back over the last half a million years, the picture was much more diverse, with three distinct lineages appearing: Homo erectus in Asia; and Homo heidelbergensis giving rise to Homo neanderthalensis in Europe and Homo sapiens in Africa.

The Neanderthals thrived in Europe for around 300,000 years before modern humans arrived. Neanderthals occupied Europe for at least 100,000 years during a period when glacial cycles dominated the climate. Excavations in Ibex, Vanguard, and Gorham’s Caves in Gibraltar have revealed evidence of Neanderthal occupation dating to possibly as late as 28,000 years ago.

The ancestors of modern humans interbred with Neanderthals and another extinct line of humans known as the Denisovans. Modern humans, Neanderthals and Denisovans shared a common ancestor who lived roughly 600,000 years ago.

For further information see:

https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2023/jul/giant-stone-artefacts-found-rare-ice-age-site-kent

https://intarch.ac.uk/journal/issue61/6/full-text.html

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-kent-66112136

St Brigid (450-525 AD) – Feast Day: 1st February 2022

 

St Brigid's Rush Cross

On 1^st February, we celebrate the feast day of St Brigid of Ireland. Originally, this was a pagan festival called Imbolc which marked the beginning of spring.

Who was St Brigid?

St Brigid is one of the Patron Saints of Ireland, together with St Patrick and St Colmcille. She was born in Faughart, north of Dundalk, Co Louth in Ireland, approximately 450 AD and was the founder of the first monastery in County Kildare. Her father was a pagan chieftain of Leinster named Dubthach and her mother was a Christian slave named Brocca.

Dubthach’s wife insisted that he get rid of the slave girl. He sold Brigid’s mother to a poet but not the child in her womb for whom he was responsible. Later, the poet sold Brigid’s mother to a druid. As Brigid was filled with the Holy Spirit, she could not digest the druid’s ‘unclean’ food and

‘thereupon he chose a white cow and set it aside for the girl, and a certain Christian woman, a very God-fearing virgin, used to milk the cow and the girl used to drink the cow’s milk and not vomit it up as her stomach had been healed. Moreover, this Christian woman fostered the girl’.

When she was young, St Brigid wanted to join a convent. However, her father insisted that she marry a rich man to whom he had promised her hand. According to legend, Brigid prayed that her beauty be taken so no one would want to marry her and her prayer was granted. It was not until after she made her final vows that her beauty was restored. 

Brigid enlisted God’s help again to convince her father to give her land on which to build a convent. Her father agreed to give her as much land as her cloak could cover. It is said that the cloak grew to cover 2,000 acres of land! One of five ancient roads in Ireland that lead to Tara passed through Kildare.

St Brigid's Cathedral
Kildare, Ireland

According to tradition, around 480 AD Brigid founded a monastery at Kildare (Cill Dara: “church of the oak”), on the site of a pagan shrine to the Celtic goddess Brigit. Her monastery developed a reputation for hospitality, compassion and generosity. It was known as the ‘City of the Poor’. St Brigid worked with the sick, poor, and outcast.

As monastic communities grew, they attracted a resident local community. The monasteries provided for the spiritual needs of local families and taught the children. The monastery and the village grew together. The monks undertook tasks such as the creating and copying of literature and highly specialised metalware.

St Brigid’s Rush Cross

On one occasion, St Brigid was sitting by the sick bed of a dying pagan chieftain comforting him with stories of her faith in God. She told him the story of Christ on the cross while at the same time picking up rushes from the ground to make a cross. Before he died, the chieftain asked to be baptised. People made similar crosses to hang over the door of their homes to scare off evil, fire and hunger. Word spread of St Brigid’s kindness and faith and the making of the cross from rushes that we know today became associated with her name.

Saint Brigid as depicted
in Saint Non's Chapel, St Davids, Wales

It was said that St Brigid could miraculously milk her cows three times a day to provide a meal for visitors. According to the Celtic tradition, the guest was seen as Christ and hospitality was extended in that spirit.

Brigid later founded a school of art that included metalwork and illumination. It was at this school that the Book of Kildare, which Gerald of Wales praised as "the work of angelic, and not human skill," was beautifully illuminated. Sadly, this book was lost three centuries ago.

We can also see the merging of pagan and Christian art as Christianity gradually replaced paganism. For example, two of the grave slabs at Carrowntemple, Co. Sligo, bear art of the Early Christian period that is derived from the Celtic art of the preceding Pagan Iron Age. One of these is remarkably close to a design in the Book of Durrow and is datable to c. 650 AD.

The Celts worshipped hundreds of gods and goddesses. In some respects, the nature of the Celtic religion helped in the development of Christianity. Their belief in the indestructibility of the souls of the dead helped in understanding the resurrection of Christ. The Celts also had their own sacrifices and ritual meals which, in a sense, mirrored aspects of Christian message.

Brigid’s enduring legacy

St Brigid still lives on 1,500 years later in the minds and hearts of the people of Ireland. Her monastery grew and grew and people from all over Ireland came here, many of whom joined the monastery. St Patrick and St Brigid paved the way for Christianity in Ireland and later to Europe.

Hundreds of holy wells are dedicated to St Brigid in Ireland. Early Irish texts suggest that holy wells may have remained associated with non-Christian rituals and were even protected by the old religion. For example, it is believed that wells were used instead of baptisteries in Ireland, which may explain the large number of holy wells throughout the country.

More places names in Ireland are named after St Brigid than St Patrick himself. St Brigid is associated with fertility on the land. Straw doll-like effigies of St Brigid known as Breedeag were used to bless homes.

St Brigid’s relevance today.

St Brigid appreciated the importance of the land, nature and the seasons. At a time when our planet is threatened by global warming and climate change, Brigid reminds us of the need to confront these challenges now. Today, we can learn from her example of compassion, kindness, generosity, and hospitality, as the World deals with the consequences of poverty, war, population displacement and the current Covid-19 pandemic.

On February 1^st, 525, St Brigid died of natural causes. Her body was initially kept to the right of the high altar of Kildare Cathedral. In 1185, John de Courcy had her remains relocated in Down Cathedral. Today, Saint Brigid's skull can be found in the Church of St. John the Baptist in Lumiar, Portugal. The tomb in which it is kept bears the inscription,

"Here in these three tombs lie the three Irish knights who brought the head of St. Brigid, Virgin, a native of Ireland, whose relic is preserved in this chapel. In memory of which, the officials of the Altar of the same Saint caused this to be done in January AD 1283."

In 1905 Sister Mary Agnes of the Dundalk Convent of Mercy took a purported fragment of the skull to St Bridget's Church in Kilcurry. In 1928, Fathers Timothy Traynor and James McCarroll requested another fragment for St Brigid's Church in Killester, a request granted by the Bishop of Lisbon, António Mendes Belo.

For further information please see: 

References:

(1) Sacred Heart Messenger, February 2019 – article by John Scally

Videos

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UwJD00w9UM

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndQKbE0M7l8

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqpJkSfIrAc