Scale and Scale Change in the Early Middle Ages: Exploring Landscape, Local Society, and the World Beyond

330 Pages·2011·9.35 MB·English

by  Julio Escalona

SCALE AND SCALE CHANGE
IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES
THE MEDIEVAL COUNTRYSIDE
Editorial Board under the auspices of Yale University

Paul Freedman, Chair, Yale University

Isabel Alfonso, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientifícas, Madrid
Monique Bourin, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne
Sandro Carocci, Università di Roma ‘Tor Vergata’
Piotr Górecki, University of California, Riverside
P. C. M. Hoppenbrouwers, Universiteit Leiden
Jeppe Netterstrøm, Aarhus Universitet
Sigrid Schmitt, Universität Trier
Phillipp Schofield, Aberystwyth University
Lluís To Figuera, Universitat de Girona

Previously published volumes in this series are listed at the back of this book
Volume 6
SCALE AND SCALE CHANGE
IN THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES:
Exploring Landscape, Local Society,
and the World Beyond
Edited by
Julio Escalona and Andrew Reynolds
H
F
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

Scale and scale change in the early Middle Ages : exploring
landscape, local society, and the world beyond. -- (The
medieval countryside ; v. 6)
1. Social history--Medieval, 500-1500--Case studies.
2. Sociology, Rural--Europe--History--To 1500--Case
studies. 3. Land tenure--Europe--History--To 1500--Case
studies. 4. Power (Social sciences)--Europe--History--To
1500--Case studies. 5. Europe--Historical geography.
6. Archaeology, Medieval--Europe. 7. Landscape
archaeology--Europe.
I. Series II. Escalona, Julio. III. Reynolds, Andrew
(Andrew J.)
940.1-dc22

ISBN-13: 9782503532394
© 2011, Brepols Publishers n.v., Turnhout, Belgium
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced,
stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise,
without the prior permission of the publisher.
D/2010/0095/164
ISBN: 978-2-503-53239-4
Printed on acid-free paper
CONTENTS
Acknowledgements vii
List of Illustrations ix
Introduction 1
The Early Middle Ages: A Scale-Based Approach
JULIO ESCALONA 9
Part I: Territories, Landscape, and Settlement
Early Medieval Rural Societies in North-Western Spain:
Archaeological Reflections of Fragmentation and Convergence
ALFONSO VIGIL-ESCALERA GUIRADO AND
JUAN ANTONIO QUIRÓS CASTILLO 33
Debating Scale and Scale Change in the English Landscape:
Four Case Studies from the Late Roman Period
into the Middle Ages
ANDREW REYNOLDS 61
Changing Scales of Local Power in the Early Medieval
Iberian North-West
MARGARITA FERNÁNDEZ MIER 87
Part II: Local Society and the World Beyond
Changes in Scale in the Italian Countryside from
Late Antiquity to the Early Middle Ages
ALEXANDRA CHAVARRÍA ARNAU 121
On Suretyship in Tenth-Century Northern Iberia
WENDY DAVIES 133
Scale Change on the Border: The County of Castile
in the Tenth Century
JULIO ESCALONA AND FRANCISCO REYES 153
Part III: Large-Scale Systems in Local and Regional Perspective
Tributa and Historiae: Scale and Power at a Turning
Point in Post-Roman Spain
SANTIAGO CASTELLANOS 187
Circuits of Power in a Fragmented Space: Gold Coinage
in the Meseta del Duero (Sixth–Seventh Centuries)
IÑAKI MARTÍN VISO 215
Exchange, Coinage, and the Economy of Early Medieval England
GRENVILLE ASTILL 253
Bibliography 273
Index 305
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
There are a number of people and institutions to which we would like to
express our gratitude. This book is the main output of the research pro-
ject ‘The Foundations of the European Space: Community, Territory and
Political Systems in Early Medieval Europe’, funded by the Plan Nacional de
I+D+i of the Spanish Ministry of Education and Science (HUM2004-01812/
HIST). We would like to thank the Instituto de Historia of the Consejo Superior
de Investigaciones Científicas (Spain) and the Fondazione Palazzo Bricherasio
(Turin, Italy) for kindly hosting two of our meetings. Wendy Davies deserves
special mention for receiving us at a gathering at Woolstone, which was also at-
tended by Dr Richard Reece, who provided particularly stimulating comments
and suggestions related to our research theme. The whole group is grateful to
Andrew Reynolds and the Institute of Archaeology (UCL) for logistic support
during that same meeting. In all our working sessions, Adela Cepas provided en-
thusiastic and constructive input. Carolina Carl did a fine job with the translation
and/or style improvement of Chapters 2, 4, 7, 8, and 9. STRATO, Ruth Pliego,
Paula Ballesteros, and Felipe Criado kindly gave permission to reproduce photo-
graphs in Chapters 2 and 9.
The fact that this book exists at all is due to the support of Simon Forde, Isabel
Alfonso, and Paul Freedman: we thank them for their careful reading of the text
and their invaluable suggestions and amendments. Needless to say, the editors
maintain responsibility for any remaining shortcomings.
Finally, we thank our publisher, Brepols, for materializing the results of our
project, especially our editor Ruth Kennedy, for her professionalism and patience.

ILLUSTRATIONS
Chart
Chart 1, p. 256. Single-coin finds from southern England. After Blackburn,
‘“Productive” Sites and the Pattern of Coin Loss in England, 600–1180’, p. 32.
Figures
Figure 1, p. 43. Tedeja castle (Trespaderne, Burgos). Photograph by kind
permission of Aratikos.
Figure 2, p. 48. Excavation of early medieval agricultural terraces in Monte Gaiás
(Santiago de Compostela). Photograph courtesy of Paula Ballesteros and
Felipe Criado.
Figure 3, p. 57. The church of San Tirso at Zaballa (Iruña de la Oca, Álava),
showing underlying early medieval housing structures. Photograph by J. A.
Quirós.
Figure 4, p. 224. Coins of the LATINA MUNITA series. After Cabral and
Metcalf, A moeda sueva, p. 305.
Figure 5, p. 232. Monte Calavre (Almendra, Vila Nova de Foz Côa, Portugal), the
setting of the episcopal see of Caliabria. Photograph by Iñaki Martín Viso.
Figure 6, p. 240. Egitania (Idanha-a-Velha, Idanha-a-Nova, Portugal): view of the
excavation area where a tremis of Egica-Witiza (698–702) was recovered.
Photograph by Iñaki Martín Viso.
x Illustrations
Figure 7, p. 241. Tremis of Chindasvinth struck in Barbi, found at the episcopal
complex in Ávila. Photograph courtesy of Ruth Pliego.
Figure 8, p. 244. View of the Tintinolho hill fort (Cavadoude, Guarda, Portugal).
Photograph by Iñaki Martín Viso.
Maps
Map 1, p. 34. Main sites mentioned in the text.
Map 2, p. 38. Distribution of rural settlement in the south of Madrid, sixth to
seventh centuries.
Map 3, p. 52. Distribution of rural settlement in the south of Madrid, eighth to
ninth centuries.
Map 4, p. 71. The development of the Wasperton cemetery between the fourth
and seventh centuries. After Carver, Hills, and Scheschkewitz, Wasperton, p.
5, fig. 1.2. Reproduced by kind permission of Martin Carver.
Map 5, p. 76. The Anglo-Saxon boundary of the Stanton St Bernard estate,
Wiltshire, showing the incorporation of a pre-existing, probably Roman,
settlement as a boundary feature. Reproduced by kind permission of Martin
Carver.
Map 6, p. 80. The early medieval crossroads burial at White Horse Stone, Kent.
Reproduced by kind permission of Martin Carver.
Map 7, p. 83. Planned rectilinear settlement pre-dating the manorial phase at
Goltho, Lincolnshire. Reproduced by kind permission of Martin Carver.
Map 8, p. 93. The Conventus Asturum, with the Roman-period gold-mining areas
and the main places mentioned in the text.
Map 9, p. 106. The territory of the Conventus Asturum in the Suevic and
Visigothic periods: major sites and areas mentioned in the text.
Map 10, p. 115. Contrasting scales of tenth- and eleventh-century territories in
the study area. After Fernández Mier, ‘La territorialidad y el poblamiento’,
Sánchez Badiola, and Muñiz López.
Map 11, p. 132. Main places mentioned in the text.