The proposed PhD research project

The project aims to utilise the corpus of Anglo-Saxon Charters for Berkshire, Hampshire, Wiltshire and Somersetshire as a source with which to reconstruct aspects of the landscape of Later Anglo-Saxon Wessex. The integration of these data within a GIS application will create an interactive resource susceptible to rigorous spatial analytical tech niques. Year 1 would involve collection of all published transcriptions of solutions of Anglo-Saxon charter bounds. Charters previously studied at undergraduate and MA level will be used to develop a methodology suitable for modern GIS applications. Year 2 will see this developed methodology employed over the entire study area with a view to unde rstanding and subsequently modelling local and regional landscapes. Year 3 will see the various analytical technique s used to answer both specific questions of the data and to assess the findings within the broader context of Angl-Saxon landscape studies.

Some images from the study area.

The view south-east from Roundway Hill, north of Devizes. The Downs at Roundway Down represent the north-western most extent of the Vale of Pewsey. To the left you can see the southern facing scarp slope of the Wiltshire Downs. This slope continues eastward towards Great Bedwyn and is crowned by the Wansdyke - a vast linear bank and ditch earthwork of debatable origin. To the south (the far horizon in the picture) is the north facing scarp of Salisbury plain. East of that lies the parish of Upavon where the many streams of the Pewsey Vale, in particular the eastern and western tributaries of the Avon that congregate at Scales Bridge, Rushall and flows south to Salisbury and beyond.

The floor of the Vale is littered with Chalk hills. Picked Hill lies just south of Adam's Grave and has a remarkable but natural conical shape. Woodborough Hill, just west of Picked Hill has a distingushed shape as does the slow rissing mounds of Etchilhampton Hill in the West of the Vale and Stoke Elm to the east of Beechingstoke. These chalk outcrops survive on a valley floor made up principally of Upper Greensand. The Geology is essentially cretaceous, dominated by Chalk, Upper Greensand and Gault Clay.

Salisbury Cathedral? No, although there is a reason why 'The Cathedral of the Valley' as it is known to the locals, looks so similar to the great cathedral at Salisbury. Both the manors of Potterne and Bishop's Cannings belonged to the Bishop of Salisbury and as a consequence the church at Bishop's Cannings sports some of the more fashionable architectural features of the day. The church of Bishop's Cannings is provided with 2 hides in the Domesday book suggesting that it was probably a minster church and estate centre. Minster churches are thought to represent the first phase of church construction in England and served as a base from which a group of priests might serve a large dispersed population. The more abundant parish churches reflect a growing affluence amongst local land owners and appear on the landscape around AD 950-1150.

Indeed, Bishop's Cannings may take its name from the area within which it is located - Cannings Hundred. The hundred was a unit of local government that came into operation possibly as early as the 10th century and was still used as late as the late 19th century. It takes its name from the number of 'hides' that it incorporates although even by the time of Domesday few 'hundreds' contained exactly one hundred hides. The Domesday hidage assessment for the estate of Bishop's Cannings totalled 70. However, including the hidage assessment for Allington and All Cannings, now located in the hundred of Studfold, the total comes to 100. The 'Cannings' place-name of both Bishop's Cannings and All Cannings (literally meaning 'Old' Cannings) are part of a group of place-names ending in -ingas. Elsewhere, these have been interpreted as representing an earlier tribal territory (Dodgeson, 1996). The suffix '-ingas' is believed to denote 'the people of-'. Thus, Hastings becomes 'the people of Haeste'. There is a further reference to a region known as belonging to the Canningas. It can be found in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle entry for AD 1010 when a Viking army is said to have crossed the Thames and raided as far as Cannings Marsh.