Places,perceptions,boundariesand tasks:
rethinking landscapesin wetland archaeology
ROBERTVAN DE NOORT and AIDAN O'SULLIVAN
INTRODUCTION
This paper is an elaboration of one of the chaptersin
our Rethinking.Wetldnd Archaeology (Van de Noort
& O'Sullwan 2006), and concernsthe archaeological
study of wetland landscapes.In this book, we argue
that many approachesto the archaeologyof wetlands
have failed to influence our peers and colleagues
in the broader field of landscape archaeology and,
indeed,archaeologyitself, and thus the great promise
of wetland archaeology remains unfulfilled (Coles
2001).
This failure to influence and inform the broader
archaeological debates can be attributed to three
aspectsof currentresearchin the landscapearchaeology
of wetlands. First, many researchprojectsremain decontextualized geographically, as if wetlands were
islands out at sea, rather than surrounded by nonwetland landscapes.Second, wetland archaeology
frequently appear as being de-contextualizedin time,
as if wetlands were timelesslandscapes,disconnected
from the changes surrounding them. Third, most
wetland landscape projects are disconnectedfrom
current theoretical debates in archaeology and
are thus not actively attempting to contribute to
contemporary archaeologicaldebate.
This critique does not originate with ourselves,,
but with external commentators who, for example,
when reviewing compilations of wetland research
papers or conferenceproceedings,comment on this
multi-period isolationism of wetland archaeology
(eg Evans 1990). From thesecritiques, it is apparent
that the potential benefits of wetland archaeology
to broader debates are fully recognized, but that
wetland archaeologists must interact fully with
current theoretical debatesif that potential is to be
re a l i zed( eg S c ar r e19 8 9 ; T i l l e y 1 9 9 7 ; H a s e l g ro v eet
a l 2 0 0 1) . Rec ent ly ,s i mi l a r c ri ti c i s m h a s b e e ne c h oed
from within the field of wetland archaeology (eg
Gearey 2002).
The aim of this paper is to demonstrate how
such a (re-)engagementwith mainstream landscape
archaeologycould be achieved.We need to start with
a considerationof the meaning and etymology of the
words 'landscape'and 'wetland', as the way in which
we understandtheseterms in archaeologicalresearch
has beenchanging.'Sfewill subsequentlylook at how
we should reconsider the archaeological study of
wetland landscapes,and finally, provide a casestudy
of how this reconsiderationcan be made to work.
.LANDSCAPE'
\7hat is a'landscape'?The Oxford EnglishDictionary
defines the word as 'a view or prospect of natural
inland scenery, such as can be taken in at a glance
from one point of view; a piece of country scenery'
and 'a picture representingnatural inland scenery,as
distinguishedfrom a sea picture, a portrait, etc'. The
duality of meaning can be explained by considering
the origin of the word. Etymologically, the term
originated in the Dutch language (landscbap or
landscap) sometime during the Middle Ages, it was
adopted during the renaissancefor a particular genre
of painting and was only then adopted into English
towards the very end of the sixteenth century. The
Oxford English Dictionary names Richard Haydocke
(rn Lomazzo's (G. P.) Tracte containing the artes of
curious paintinge) as the first person to use the word
landscapein English in 1598 in the sentence:'In a
table donne by Crsar Sestiuswhere hee had painted
Landskipes'.
In its original medieval meaning, however,
landscapehad nothing to do with painting or art, but
was a geopoliticalidea, or an ideologicalconcept.In
this original sense,the suffix -schap or -scap did not
mean uiew or perspectiue, but skill or ability as in
the modern English workman ship and craftsmanship
(and surviving in its corresponding Dutch word
'Wirtschaft
ambachtschap), or in the German word
('economy').Thus, the original meaning of the word
landscape was the perception of the ability to live
in, on and from the land. The Dutch planner Hans
79
A R C H A E OL O G Y F R O M
THE
WETLANDS:
RECENT
S c hoen( 1993) e x p re s s e dth i s l a n d s c a p ea s s o methi ng
that was not in front of one's eves. but existed
betweenthe ears.
Dur ing t he r e n a i s s a n c eth
, e c o n c e p t o f l andscape
gained currency, and the philosopher Tom Lemaire
( 1970) ar gued th a t th e d e v e l o p m e n t o f sci enti fi c
knowledge, and the growth of the market system,
changedthe perception of landscapeinto something
that could be (increasingly) controlled, observed,
enjoyed and used for acquiring ever greater riches.
The new genre of landscapepaintings was produced
principally for the nouueauxriche who investedtheir
earnings from manufacture and trade into land.
Thus,, these new paintings, with perspective and
realism, expresseda new understanding of what a
lands c apewas, a s s o me th i n gth a t c a n b e s e en,ow ned
and exploited. Nevertheless,throughout the early
modern period, landscapepaintings were never free
of t heir polit ic a l (a n d m a n i p u l a te d )c o n te x t.Thus, i n
the sixteenthcentury, PieterBreughelthe Elder often
c hos eas t he t o p i c o f h i s w o rk p e o p l ere s ti ng,eati ng,
dr ink ing, play i n g m u s i c , e n j o y i n g th e m sel vesor
s im ply being o u td o o rs ,,b u t n o t ma n i fe s tl yw orki ng
(eg The Haruesters, c 1565), in landscapes that
wer e f r equent l y a s m u c h i m a g i n e d ra th e r t han real
(eg Tbe Return of the Hunters, c 1565), and in the
ninet eent h c e n tu ry ' , Io h n C o n s ta b l e ' s l a ndscapes
(eg The Haywain, 1821) present the rural poor in
a ' nat ur aliz ed ' c o n te x t, j u s ti fy i n g th e s o ci al order
of t he c ount r y s i d e ,w i th p e o p l e b e i n g p a r t of the
lands c apein m u c h th e s a m ew a y a s th e fa rm ani mal s
( Lam ber t 2005 , 1 4 -1 6 ).
The academicstudy of the landscape(as opposed
to the geographical study of nature and natural
landscapesas advocated by von Humboldt in the
nineteenth century) only developed around 1900,
and the German geographer Otto Schliiter (78721952) was the first to argue that landscape was
the central topic of geography. His landscape
was the visible landscapeas a reflection of human
society. It had become disconnectedfrom its sociopolitical context, and the concept of landscapewas
accrediteda 'face value', which forms the basis for
the functional analysisof landscapes.His distinction
between the Kuburlandschaft ('cultural landscape')
and I,Jaturlandschaft('natural landscape') is still
commonplace in much geographical and archaeological landscape research in continental Europe,
whilst similar ideasof the role of culture in the making
of landscapeswas advocatedin the English-speaking
world by the American geographer Carl Sauer
( 1889- 1975) ,f o r e x a rn p l ei n h i s T h e Mo rp hol ogy of
Landscape(1925).
BO
PERSPECTIVES
In recent years, post-modern cultural geography
in the English-speakingworld has (unwittingly?)
returned to the medieval, and wittingly to the precapitalist, concept of landscape. For example, the
British geographer Dennis Cosgrove (1984) defines
the landscapeas: 'an ideologicalconceptrepresenting
a way in which peoplewould have signifiedthemselves
and their world through their imagined relationship
with nature'. There has been a broad acceptance
of the idea that, in the modern world, landscapeis
not the representationof a society's reality, but the
environment experiencedthrough human/nativeeyes
which can be (actively and passively)manipulated.
Landscapes always present a certain perception,
which is politically biased or coloured, zrnd every
landscape has a political context. Alongside many
archaeologists(eg Barrett et al 1991; Bradley 1993,
1998,2000; B arrett 1994; B radl eyet al 199 4; Tllley
1994; H i l l 1995; C ooney 2000; McOmish et al
2002), we would argue that the same is true for past
l andscapes.
..STETLANDS'
\fhat is a 'wetland'? The etymology of the word
shows that it is a modern',twentieth century,creation.
According to the Oxford English Dictionary it was
first defined in the Nez Scientistin 7965 (17 June,
76313: "ilTetlandsare defined to include marshes,
bogs, swamps and any still water lessthan six metres
d e e p ' )a n d a g a i nr n N a t u r e i n 1 9 6 9 ( 1 9 A p r i l, 2 3 9 1 2 :
'\Tetland
ecosystemsin the lirnited senseof this work
are defined as ecosystemswith a watertable, above,
at or very near the substrate surface,,the substrate
remai ni ng saturated throughout the yea r ') . O nly
one earlier use of the word is recorded, dated to
1955 (S ci enceI' l ew s Letter,29 October 28 112: 'The
wetland partridge is about twice the sizeof the valley
quai l ' ), but beforethat date, w etl andsas a wor d did
not exist, and only emergedin the twentieth century
out of a growing concern about the habitat of birds,
and especi al l yducks, l eadi ngto a number of f eder al
laws in the USA that used the term wetland as a
genericterm for such habitats. That the pressurefor
such laws came principally from the hunting lobby
matters not, but it explains the early preoccupation
with generic,rather than specific,wetland protection.
During
the UNESCO-sponsored International
Convention on Vetlands in Ramsar,,Iran., in 1970,
the term becameinternationally recognized.
Bradley (2000) has argued that people in the past
did not think in terms of environmental systemsor
P L A C E S , P E R C E P T I O N S ,B O U N D A R I E S A N D T A S K S
ecosystems,but developed 'native ecologies',,using
their own terms to define specific topographical
features or places. Recent cultural anthropological
studies have come to similar conclusions (eg Lopez
'We
7986; Ingold 1995; Harris 2000).
can assume
that people in the past living within and outside the
wetlands would have understood theselandscapesin
terms of particular landforms, rather than by using
the broad, genericterm 'wetlands', and proof of this
is abundantly available in the form of place-names.
These never include the generic term wetland as a
prefix or suffix. Instead, we find plenty of English
place-names(often deriving from Anglo-Saxonroots)
indicating specific kinds of wet landscapesor wet
features,,with suffixes such as -ings, -h^y, -moor,
-dyke, -fen, -levels, -fleet, -pool, -mere, -beach,
-ford, -bridge, or -on-the-water and -on-the-Marsh.
We find the same in Irish, Dutch, German, French.
Danish and many other E,uropeanlanguages.
Rethought wetland archaeology should similarly
deconstruct the concept of wetlands when attempting
to understand how people in the past engagedwith
these landscapes.It should develop an empathy for
the characteristicsof the many wetlands as seenand
understood by the people we study.
RETHINKING TF{E LANDSCAPE
ARCHAEOLOGY OF \TETLANDS
Examining the terms 'landscape'and 'wetland' leads
us to two suppositions.First, that 'landscape'is not
simply the representationof a society'sreality, and
that as archaeologistswe cannot 'read the landscape'
as a direct reflection of its daily use and function,
without the awareness that landscapes represent
politically biasedand coloured perceptions,and that
landscapes have been actively created, re-created
and manipulated within political contexrs. Thus,
landscapestudiesmust be hermeneutic- the (wetland)
landscapedoes not carry innate information. Second,
that the term 'wetlands' is not often a useful unit for
analysis,as it meant nothing to the people we study
and attempt to understand.
These suppositionsform the basis from which we
have developed a 'rethought' approach to wetland
landscapeswhich, we envisagefor the future, would
include the following sevencharacteristics.
CONTEXTUALIZATION
First, the landscape archaeology of wetlands has
to be contextualized. This includes geographical
contextualization, as no wetlands exists within a
space void of other landscapes,and interactions
between wetland and non-wetland landscapesare
omnipresent, both in the physical (eg the run-off
of nutrients-rich water from hills into a bog) and
cultural (eg the use of stone axes and non-wetland
treesto build a trackway) spheres.Contextualizatron
should extend to include the passingof time and the
cultural changessurrounding the conditions, and it
should also include the socio-politicalconrext of the
researchers,
who should make their theoreticalstance
explicit, as we always interpret our data 'through a
cloud of theory' (Johnson 1999).
It must be acknowledged here, that more and
more wetland archaeologistsrecognizethe need for
the geographical contextualization of their work,
but the specializednature of the work has frequently
preventedbroader theoreticalexplorations.
DECONSTRUCTING THE WETLAND META-NARRATIVE
Second,
we
must
deconstruct
the meta-narrative
of
wetlands, acceptingthat this terln had no significance
'Where
for people in the past.
the term wetland is used
as shorthand for the mosaic of ecosystemsof wet
and damp places,or for defining the area where wetpreserved archaeological and palaeoenvironmental
remainsmay survive,this should not becomethe basis
for cultural analysis.
In the study of the Humber \Tetlands in northeast England, the archaeologyof the later prehistoric
period suggests,for example, that there was a near
diametrical opposition in the perception of alluvial
wetlands and peatlands (Van de Noort 2004).
Archaeological survey of the former found few
monumental sites, or types of sites traditionally
associatedwith death and burial. Instead,the survey
identified 'hunting camps' and 'flint production
sites', field systems, settlements and sites of
industrial activities,including salt winning and metal
production or, if one wishes,the archaeologyof 'daily
life'. The palynological evidenceindicatessomething
similar; the opening up of the indigenous forest
throughout the Neolithic and Bronze Ages, with
little remaining woodland by the start of the Iron
Age. In contrast, the archaeology of the peatlands
offers a dearth of settlementsand field systems,and
there is also a pronounced lack of finds of flint or
pottery. Instead, the antiquarian finds of bog bodies
from Thorne and Hatfield Moors in the Humberhead
Levels and a large number of Bronze Age and Iron
Age bronze objects 'ritually deposited' in the moors
and floodplain mires, testify to a perception that
B1
ARCHAEOLOGY FROM THE WETLANDS: RECENT PERSPECTIVES
is strikingly different from that attributable to the
minerogenicwetlands.
However, such perceptions of specific types of
wetlands do not translateacrosscultural boundaries.
A contrasting perception of peatlands is shown in
the study of the lowlands of North Holland. Jan
Besteman(1990) considersthe early medieval sociopolitical context of patrons and clients. The king,
occupying the top of the feudal pyramid, would have
been perceivedas the landowner of any wilderness
such as the peatlands of North Holland. However,
with the declining control of the Carolingian
kings over their vassals after the middle of the
ninth century, the latter usurped the peat bogs for
themselves.Continuing erosion of political structures
and increasing geographical distance between the
seatsof the local elitesand the areasof reclamationin
the subsequentcenturiesgave rise to groups of 'free
farmers'. These 'free farmers' were no longer bound
by oath, obligation or tax to their patrons, and these
apparently marginal wetland landscapeshad become
fundamentallyattractive placesto live.
The landscapeas understood by the people living
within the wetlands would include a differentiation
of the many landscape features, producing native
ecologies,,which would have included a detailed
knowledge of where to fish, where to build houses
and to obtain building material from,, where to take
cattle for grazine in the spring months, and where the
spirits, gods or ancestorslived. Particular streams,
hummocks, trees and fields would have been known
by their individual names (eg Summerfield;Fishlake),
with distinct connotations and memoriesattachedto
t hes ef eat ur e sa n d n a me s(e gN e l s o n 1 9 8 3 ) .
PERCEPTION
Third, we should approach the significance of
specificlandscapesfrom the perspectiveof the people
'We
we study.
cannot hope to start to understand
the significance and meaning of trackways, bog
bodies, lake settlementsand so on if we approach
wetlands from a modern, functionalist perspective.
Furthermore, we must also recognize that the
perceptionof wetlands,and other typesof landscapes,
differs betweeninsidersand outsiders.
The most 'extreme'exampleof wetland occupation
is probably provided by the Marsh Arabs of Iraq and
Iran. These are best known to western observers
through the writings of travellers such as \Tilfrid
Thesiger. He described in the 1950s a people who
lived on reed islands, who built architecturallyspectacularcommunal meeting houses (mudhif) of
B2
dried reeds, fished and hunted from long canoes
(mashuf), and grew rice and kept water buffaloes in
the marshes(Maxw el l 1957; Thesi ger 19 59, 7964;
Young 1977). However, the Marsh Arabs were
regardedwith distrust by the Iraqi government,who
saw the marshes as a refuge for bandits, smugglers
and rebelsdisdainful of externalcontrol, and as bases
for Shi'ite resistancegroups (Lamb 2003). After the
unsuccessfulShi'ite rebellionsimmediately following
.War,
the First Gulf
the Iraqi governmentconstructed
canalsand drains acrossthe marshes,while the marsh
villageswere bombed and their peoplesexpelled.
An historical example of such contradictory
perspectives
of wetlandscomesfrom the Humberhead
Levelsregion in the seventeenthcentury.The drainage
of the Hatfield Chaseby the Dutch engineerCornelius
Vermuyden was financed by external monies, and
under royal authority. The Chase was describedin
1608 as 'utterly wasted' as it produced little or no
revenuefor the crown or the big landowners,but the
commonersenjoyedthe myriad resourcesprovided by
the various wetlands:the higher, free-drainingislands
were used as arable land, typically; the minerogenic
floodplains were used for grazing stock and as hay
land, the meadowsand ings provided the main source
of food for livestock and plough animals; the lowest
terrestrial areas, the carrs, moors and wastes, were
extensively exploited as seasonal pastures and as
such formed an essentialpart of the rural economy,
enabling the use of some of the higher ings as hay
lands.Furthermore,historicalsourcesshow that peatcutting, for fuel and as building materials ('turves'),
was an important activity by the thirteenth and
fourteenth centuries.The wet parts of the landscape
were also valuable for seasonalgrazing throughout
the Middle Ages and the post-medievalperiod; for
providing reeds for building, thatching and basket
making, but even more importantly for fishing and
fowling. Unsurprisingly,the commonerssided during
the EnglishCivil War with the anti-royalists.This was
not predicatedin socio-politicalterms, but represents
a choice that expressedtheir social identity. As part
of their reformed social identities, the commoners
sabotaged much of the smaller drainage works,
culminating in their attack on the drainageengineers'
village at Sandtoft (Van de Noort 2004).
ENCULTURATION
Fourth, we should recognize that all through the
human past, and indeed in the present, the natural
environment has been perceived as dynamic and
sometimes even alive. and often as imbued with
P L A C E S . P E R C E P T I O N S .B O U N D A R I E S A N D T A S K S
supernaturalpowers (eg Nelson 1983; Ingold 1995).
Enculturing nature - and the spirits within them
- forms a key theme of human behaviour, which can
be favourably studied in wetland landscapeswith
its high-resolutiondating and close associationwith
palaeoenvironmentalsourcematerial.
Christopher Tilley (1994) has argued that tracks
and paths are primary human artefacts. They were
one of the first modifications people made to their
environment, forming a medium through which
the environment could be integrated with the
psyche and transformed into a landscape,that is,
an environment which reflects and is interpreted
by human beings. The environment thus becomes
'encultured'into landscape(Tilley
1.994,206-7). The
concepts of paths and roads, and the journeys that
they enable, are powerful metaphors (Tilley 1999,
178), recognized by the Romans and even by us in
our modern, so-calledrational culture (egexpressions
such as 'taking the high road' and 'road to success'
use paths as metaphors).Thus the path is not just a
route from one place to another; more importantly,
it transforms a wilderness full of unknowns into a
cultured landscape,a known place.
'Wetland
archaeology is particularly well-placed
to study enculturation, for example, though the
contextualized research of trackways. Prehistoric
trackways in mires' from the Neolithic Sweet
Track through to medieval toghers in Ireland,
were the principal cultural elements in otherwise
un-encultured landscapes. The contexts of many
prehistorictrackways include specificobjectsthat can
be understood as votive or ritual deposits,suggesting
that the locales where these depositions had been
placedwere viewed as beingconnectedwith ancestors,
ghosts or gods (Cosgrove 7993). Objects include the
unused jade axe found adjacent the Neolithic Sweet
Track (B 6. J Coles 1986), the wooden disc wheels
beneaththe Neolithic Nieuw-Dordrecht trackway in
the BourtangerMoor in the easternNetherlands(Van
d e r Sanden2001, 1, 4 1 -2 ), th e ma n y b ro n z ew e a p ons,
artefactsand skeletal remains alongsidethe Fag Fen
stake alignment, now reinterpreted as a series of
trackways (Pryor 2001), the bog bodiesalongsidethe
first century AD Valtherbrug in the Bourtanger Moor.
Furthermore, many excavators have commented on
the limited functionality of trackways, for example,
because it did not connect two complementary
regions (eg the Nieuw-Dordrecht trackway), it was
only in use for a very short period (eg the Sweet
Track)'' it was periodically extended (eg the NieuwDordrecht trackway) or becausethe trackways had
been partially destroyedsoon after their construction,
as was the case for the second century sc Corlea I
trackway in the Irish Midlands (Raftery 1990).
These contextual observations suggest that the
function of these, invariably long, trackways was
not simply linking two areas of relative dry land
acrossa wetland. Rather, we would argue that these
trackways were often constructed with the objective
to enculture the wilderness landscapesin between,
or to make a statementabout the prowess of culture
over nature. On a number of occasions,this idea was
restated,through additional depositions or through
extensionsof a track that in fact led nowhere.
BOUNDARIES AND EDGES
Fifth, specialattention should begivento the boundaries
and edgesof the landscapesor native ecologies.From
our observationsof the perceived dynamic nature of
the natural environment,it follows that the boundaries
and edgesof theselandscapesare often given particular
significance,for example as 'natural places'in the sense
usedby Richard Bradley(2000).
Stockerand Everson'sstudy (2003) of the $Titham
valley in Lincolnshire, England, offers an outstanding
example of the longevity of the significanceof some
natural places in wetlands. In the Middle Ages, the
River Witham was the boundary of the independent
state of Lindsey. Researchfound that the medieval
monasterieswere located at strategic points along
the valley where causewaysprovided accessacross
the river and its extensiveriparian wetlands. In the
Middle Ages, the causewayswere already of great
age, and excavationsof one of them, at Fiskerton,
showed a predecessorof Iron Age and Roman date
(Field & Parker Pearson2003). The causewayswere
also associatedwith votive depositions,which occur
in this area only at the terminals of the causeways.
In turn, thesevotive depositionswere found to be in
the vicinity of Bronze Age barrow cemeteries.Stocker
and Everson thus argue that specific locales within
the \Titham valley were perceived as places where
one could cross this boundary for a period in excess
of two millennia, despitethe evolving nature of this
wetland landscape.Bronze Age perceptionsendured,
in one way or another, into the Middle Ages,with the
medievalmonasterieseffectivelyChristianizingpagan
practicesand beliefs.
MARGINALITY
AND
LIMINALITY
Sixth, we should distinguish clearly between
marginality and liminality. The concept of liminality
is frequently invoked where wetlands are traversed.
83
F
ARCHAEOLOGY
FROM
THE
IX/ET'LANDS: RECENT PERSPECTIVES
Liminality is a notoriously fluid concept. Originally
proposedby Van Gennep(1908)',the conceptis linked
to 'rites of passage'to describethe formalized rituals
and practices that accompany one's transition from
one particular state into another, especiallythe rites
associatedwith birth, reaching adulthood, marriage
and death. As part of these rituals, symbolic or real
'thresholds'needed
to be crossed,with the thresholds
constituting liminal zones. As economic and ritual
activities are not, on a landscape level, mutually
exclusive,the recurrenr equation of liminality with
marginality is often mistaken.Although some liminal
zones were to be found in what were considered
marginal landscapes,others (eg the threshold passed
by newlyweds in the modern world) are located
within settlementsor within areasin economicuse.In
other words we must be very specificwhen identifying
placesthat were liminal.
The lake-dwellings in the Holderness region in
East Yorkshire provide an example of liminality that
is unconnectedfrom marginality. A reappraisalof the
'Sfest
Furze 'lake-dwelling'showedthat the sitewas in
effect a Late Neolithic or Early Bronze Age trackway
across a sinuous wetland that had developedin the
Bail and Low Mere complex (Van de Noort 1995;
seealso Fletcher& Van de Noort this volume). These
elongated mires may have been seen as a boundary
between the world of the living and the world of the
dead, with evidenceof two burial mounds to the east
of the former meres, and somewhat tentatively, a
settlementon their west bank. The trackway at West
Furze that crossed these wetlands included several
features that could have symbolized this liminal
space, most notably the wicket or doorway at the
easternterminal of the short trackway. The symbolic
function of this boundary was further reinforced with
a number of human skulls.
TASKSCAPES
Seventh'we should not underplay the importance of
many wetland landscapesas taskscapes,areaswhere
the rhythm of daily life determines the significance
of how these wetland landscapesare perceived.The
'
p hr as e' t as k s c ap ew
a s c o i n e d b y T i m In g o l d ( 1993)
to focus on the concept that the manner in which
landscapesare experiencedand perceived is closely
related to the activities or tasks that are undertaken
'With
in particular landscapesat particular times.
this, Ingold has effectively returned to the original
concept of landscape, as in the Dutch landschap.
As we have argued akeady, the insiders' view of
wetlands is one that offers myriad resources,ranging
B4
from eels,fish and shellfish,to peat for fuel, reedsfor
roofing, to summer pastures and hay lands. Raised
bogs can also be used intermittently for short-term
seasonal grazing by burning the top layer of the
bog, for the preservationof butter, the seasoningof
'We
wood and the curing of leather.
should recognize
that these activities, though seemingly economic
practices,are things that people do every day, albeit
in specificcultural and social conditions.
It is thereforenot surprisingthat the overwhelming
majority of trackways excavated from wetlands
are not the long tracks described previously as
playing part in enculturation processes, but are
short tracks, often little more than 10m in length.
In contrast to the long, over-designedand possible
ceremonial tracks, these short trackways were
usually simple narrow pathways, platforms or
bundles of brushwood used to crearepassing places
at especiallywet and boggy placesalongsideexisting
'We
routes through the landscape.
recognize that
large linear causewaysthat traverse a bog from one
edge to another represent a very small proportion
of the total number of known sites (MacDermott
1998, 7; S tanl ey 2003, 65). The absenceof exot ic
objects and bog bodies at these locations reinforces
the concept that the short trackways were used
functionally in everyday lives and had, in the eyesof
the people that used them, little in common with the
large trackways that were constructed for specific
occasi ons.
RETHOUGHT \TETLAND LANDSCAPES:
A CASE STUDY INTO THE EARLY
RECLAMATION OF'INCLESMOOR'
In this case study, into the early reclamation of
Inclesmooror Thorne Moors, we want to show how
a rethought landscapearchaeology of wetlands can
be undertaken. Long-standing research interests,
into the history of reclamation and the exploitation
of these wetlands, are neither forgotten nor
ignored, but new, deeper, information is uncovered
through contextualization: consideration of the
appropriatenessof the wetland concept,comparisons
between insiders' and outsiders' perceptions,,the
introduction of the enculturation concept, special
attention to boundaries and understanding the
wetland landscapesas taskscapes.
'Inglesmoor'
is the medieval name for the Thorne
Moors, in the Yorkshire Humberhead Levels. These
Levels were formed by the pro-glacial Lake Humber,
a meltwater lake that expanded and retracted with the
PLACES, PERCEPTIONS,
BOUNDARIES
AND
TASKS
ffiffi
k
1"ffi:i.
1$-x
FIGURE1
The Inclesmoor Map, c 7407 (PRO MPC 56).
seasonsand the glaciers.The lake ceasedto exist not
later than c 11000 cal nc, when the icesheetblocking
the Humber Gap betweenthe Yorkshire \7olds and the
Lincolnshire \folds retreated, or possibly somewhat
earlier through silting of the lake itself (Bateman et
al 2000). The Lake Humber deposits were subject to
aeolian reworking during the Loch Lomond Stadial
of the Devensian,c 11500 to 10500 cal ec,, and this
reworking resulted in the formation of sandy dunes
or 'islands', resulting in extensiveundulated flatland.
Holocene sea-level rise initiated the development
of expansive wetlands in the Humberhead Levels.
Initially, the impact of sea-levelrise was restricted to
the Late-glacialriver channels,but from c 3200 cal rc,
the impeded arterial drainage resulted in widespread
paludifcation, and the onset of mire formation at
Thorne Moors (Buckland & Dinnin 1997).
Recent archaeological research has shown the
construction of a Neolithic trackway on nearby
Hatfield Moors (Gearey & Chapman this volume),
and it seemslikely that similar activity would have
taken place at Thorne Moors. To date, however, only
a very short Bronze Age brushwood trackway has
been identified (Buckland 1979), alongsidea number
of isolated finds of stone axes, and it is unlikely that
new archaeologicalsites will be discovered,as this
former milled peatland has been converted into a
nature conservation reserve(eg Van de Noort 2001).
The time-transgressive
nature of the development
of the mire would have initially involved a number of
smaller, mesothrophic, mires developing in the lowest
areas, with deciduous woodland surviving on the
higher grounds. The local impact of continued sealevel rise and impeded drainage was the evolvement
of a single, continuous ombrothrophic raised mire,
which drowned the forest (Dinnin 1997). This
raised mire appears to have survived more or less
undisturbed to the first half of the second millennium
85
V
ARCHAEOLOGY
FROM
THE
WETLANDS:
RECENT PERSPECTIVES
in the field (ibid., 159). The latter provided the basis
AD' when Sphagnwmimbricatum,having formed the
for the pictorial elaborations of the map, from the
b ulk peat up t o t h e n , d i s a p p e a re d(S m i th 1 9 8 5 ).
miniature villagesto the marshland vegetationon the
Medieval Thorne Moors was probably significantly
greater than the remnants surviving today, and the
as yet unenclosedand unexploited Moor.
The reasonsfor the drainage of Inclesmoor were
Moor and its lagg areaswould almost certainly have
for its exploitation for economic benefits,and there is
been explored and utilized by the local population,
little doubt that from the point of view of the formal
living on the hills on the edges of the wetlands. A
landowners, this benefit lay in the turves that were
charter from early in the fourteenth century gives the
sold in towns as fuel. For example, Thornton Abbey
picture as one of extensivelyusedpeatlandsfor turves,
paid Henry the Lacey 16,000 turves annually for the
both for fuel and as building materials, as hunting
rent of its turbary in Inclesmoor (ibid.,
and fishing grounds, for retting of hemp
154-5). The regional palynologicalrecord
and for seasonal grazing and hay making
(eg Smith 1985) indicates that woodland
(Thirsk 1953). The open waters were used
had become scarce aound this time, and
extensivelyas fisheries,especiallyfor eels.
the peat turves must have provided for an
By the early seventeenthcentury, Thorne
eager market. This external perception of
and Hatfield Moors were consideredfrom
the value of the Moor contrasts somewhat
the point of view of outsidersas wastes,but
with the insiders' perception, who valued
to the commoners, the wetlands provided
the natural diversity of the Moor.
invaluable resourceswhich enabled them
Following the Dutch philosopher Hub
to live self-sufficientlives.
(2003), we would argue that
Zwart
However,, the formal ownership of
FIGURE,2
is
there
another layer of perception to be
Thorne Moors had passed to Norman
The InclesmoorMap,
c 1 4 0 7 ( P R OM P C 5 6 ) :
discernedhere,and that is the moral stance
barons and institutions, even though the
detailof 'StoneCros'.
of the religious houses to the uselessness
rights of accessand use given to freemen
of the Moor. The wildernessof Inclesmoor
was occasionally recorded in charters.
was an affront to the ora et labora ('pray
Selby Abbey, founded in 1069 and one
and work') principle of the medievalmonasticorders,
of the earliest ecclesiasticalbuildings in Norman
northern England, had extensive landholdings,
and the reclamation of unproductive, ungodly land
would have been seen as an act of conversion: the
including \Thitgift in the north of Thorne Moors, and
Christian izationof the pagan wilderness.The Ch ristian
was gifted the easternpart of the Moors by John de
enculturation of wildernesses throughout Europe
Mowbray, Lord of Axholme,, in the early fourteenth
was organized and undertaken by monasteriesand
century, albeit he retained the rights of free chase.
ecclesiasticalinstitutions who had the organizatronal
Other owners of strips of land, from the River Ouse
'regardedthemselvesas stewards
in the north 'as far as the moor goes towards the
ability to do so, and
appointed by God, as co-creators,taking active part
south'. included the canons of Newhouse. St Peter's
in the management and restitution of
Hospital of York and the Abbey of
fallen nature' (ibid.,,1 1 1 ).
T hor ont on ( Din n i n 1 9 9 7 , 2 2 -3 ).
In terms of the landscapearchaeology
By the early fifteenth century, the
of these wetlands, we can discern a
religious houses,possibly led by Selby
cultivated or encultured taskscape
Abbey, had commenced with the
with an ordered system of fields,
full-scale drainage of Thorne Moors
(Metcalfe 1960). The Inclesmoor
roads, canals and villages; the latter
often placed on the inside of the dike
M" p ( P RO M P C 5 6 ), d a te d to c 1 4 0 7
(Beresford 7986), shows a (hand-dug)
alongside the Rivers Ouse and Trent.
FIGURE
3
The village churchesare located at the
drain encircling the Moor, and in
The InclesmoorMap, c 1407
junctions of the dike with the roads
the northern third of Thorne Moors,
(PRO MPC 56): detailof
encroachingonto the Moor, and would
roads, drains, bridges, a sluice, several
w e t l a n dv e g e t a t i o n .
have been visible from deep inside
roadside crossesand settlementswith
Thorne Moors as is, for example, the
churches have appeared. The map
itself is thought to have been produced as part of
caseof the church of St Mary Magdalene at\Jfhitgift
(Van de Noort 2004, 135-7). The Inclesmoor Mup
the ongoing disputes of rights and ownership over
reinforcesthis reading of the landscape.The northern
the Moor, and was based on documentsheld at the
part shows a landscapeunder cultivation, with roads,
manor court at Snaith,supplementedby observations
B6
PLACES, PERCEPTIONS,
BOUNDARIES
AND
TASKS
CONCLUSION
FIGURE4
The villages of Eastoft and Haldenby on the River Don.
Redrawn from The Inclesmoor Mao. c 1407 (Keith Miller).
paths and canals,,villages with churches and stone,
road-side crosseson the most important landowner
boundaries. This encultured part of the Moor
stands in stark contrast to the Moor proper, where
uncultivated and, largely, unproductive plants thrive
unrestrained.
Of course, Thorne Moors is no exception in
respect to the medieval reclamation of wetlands,
and from the early twelfth century onwards
ecclesiastical
institutions acrossEurope were engaged
in reclamation projects. In western Europe north
of the Roman li*ets, Christianity was also part of
the political arsenal of the kings who derived the
legitimacy of their power from the divine rule of
the Christian God, and it is unsurprising that one
of the earliest wetland reclamations recorded, that
of the marshlands east of the River Elbe, organized
by the Bishop of Bremen in 1103, was undertaken
in the Saxon heartland. In the case of the early
reclamation of the Netherlands, Hub Zwart (2003,
111-12) describedthe role of Christianity '... as an
ideology, fthatl rendered the erection of dikes and
the reclamation of wetlands morally legitimate, or
even obligatory. A demarcation was introduced
between the "baptized" and humanized areas on
this side of the dikes, and the diffuse and unreliable
realms beyond. The dike materializeda form of moral
criticism, directed at previous generationsof pagans
who, faced with natural phenomena, had been
overwhelmed by a mixture of fear and awe. They had
regarded uncultivated nature as the abode of their
gods and had settledfor a more passiveattitude.Time
had come for the demystificationof nature.'
This paper has argued for a rethinking of the
landscape archaeology approach to wetlands,
based principally on the beliefs that the concepr
of landscape is something thar resides in people's
minds, rather than being a simple reflection of
culture-nature interactions, and that the concept of
wetlands had little meaning to rhe people we study
and try to understand.The paper proposesnew ways
of approaching wetland landscapesand has argued
specifically for the need to contextualize wetland
research: consider the (in-)appropriatenessof the
wetland name, appreciate the frequently diverging
perceptionsof people living and working in wetlands
from the perceptionsof outsiders,the importance of
the enculturation concept,the need to pay particular
attentionto boundariesand edges''and the significance
of wetland landscapesas taskscapes.
ACKNO\TLEDGEMENT
Catherine Rackham' for drawing attention to the
paper by H ub Zw art (2003).
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