Markets in Early Medieval Europe: Trading and 'Productive' Sites, 650-850

Major sites such as Hamwic and Dorestad typically dominate any discussion of early medieval trade and emporia - this study is altogether atypical in many ways. Comprising nineteen papers taken from a conference held at Worcester College, Oxford in 2000, the focus here is very much on the smaller, more rural trading centres and inland markets of Northern Europe. The contributors reflect very different approaches to the material, including studies that examine up-to-date historical, archaeological and numismatic evidence from Britain, Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway and Sweden dating from the 7th to 9th century. The authors consider the rather controversial use of metal-detecting in identifying and defining new sites and patterns of interaction and exchange, highlighting its positive contribution. Contributors include Mark Blackburn, David Griffiths, Lars Jorgensen, Michael Metcalf, Julian D Richards, Peter Sawyer and Astrid Tummuscheit.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Oxbow Books
• Release date: Jun 30, 2019
• ISBN: 9781911188483

Book preview

MARKETS IN EARLY MEDIEVAL EUROPE

Markets in Early Medieval Europe

Trading and ‘Productive’ Sites, 650–850

Edited by Tim Pestell and Katharina Ulmschneider

Windgather Press

is an imprint of Oxbow Books

First published in the United Kingdom in 2003. as a paperback in 2019 by

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© Windgather Press 2003

Paperback edition: ISBN 978-1-911188-47-6

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Cover Illustrations

Front: the gold bow brooch found at Tjitsma in the 1950s.

Collection Fries Museum, Leeuwarden.

Back: the excavated Early Medieval manor and market

at Tissø, Denmark. Lars Jørgensen.

Contents

List of Illustrations

Contributors

Abbreviations

Preface

1Introduction: Early Medieval Markets and ‘Productive’ Sites

Katharina Ulmschneider and Tim Pestell

I History, Numismatics and the Early Medieval Economy

2Production and Distribution in Early and Middle Anglo-Saxon England

James Campbell

3‘Productive’ Sites and the Pattern of Coin Loss in England, 600–1180

Mark Blackburn

4Variations in the Composition of the Currency at Different Places in England

Michael Metcalf

5The Hinterlands of Three Southern English Emporia: Some Common Themes

Ben Palmer

II Trading and ‘Productive’ Sites in the British Isles

6Markets and ‘Productive’ Sites: A View from Western Britain

David Griffiths

7Markets Around the Solent: Unravelling a ‘Productive’ Site on the Isle of Wight

Katharina Ulmschneider

8The Early Anglo-Saxon Framework for Middle Anglo-Saxon Economics: The Case of East Kent

Stuart Brookes

9Exceptional Finds, Exceptional Sites? Barham and Coddenham, Suffolk

John Newman

10Six Middle Anglo-Saxon Sites in West Norfolk

Andrew Rogerson

11The Afterlife of ‘Productive’ Sites in East Anglia

Tim Pestell

12Middle Anglo-Saxon Lincolnshire: An Emerging Picture

Kevin Leahy

13The Anglian and Anglo-Scandinavian Sites at Cottam, East Yorkshire

Julian D. Richards

III Markets and Settlements on the Early Medieval Continent

14Markets and Fairs in Norway and Sweden Between the Eighth and Sixteenth Centuries

Peter Sawyer

15Manor and Market at Lake Tissø in the Sixth to Eleventh Centuries: The Danish ‘Productive’ Sites

Lars Jørgensen

16Groß Strömkendorf: A Market Site of the Eighth Century on the Baltic Sea Coast

Astrid Tummuscheit

17Tjitsma, Wijnaldum: An Early Medieval Production Site in the Netherlands

Caroline Tulp

18The Fate of the Ports of the Lower Seine Valley at the End of the Ninth Century

Jacques Le Maho

19San Vincenzo in the Making: The Discovery of an Early Medieval Production Site on the East Bank of the Volturno

Matthew Moran

Bibliography

List of Illustrations

Figures

Table

Contributors

Mark Blackburn Department of Coins and Medals, Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge

Stuart Brookes Institute of Archaeology, University College, London

James Campbell Worcester College, University of Oxford

David Griffiths Kellogg College, University of Oxford

Lars Jørgensen Department of Danish Prehistory, National Museum, Copenhagen, Denmark

Kevin Leahy North Lincolnshire Museum, Scunthorpe

Jacques Le Maho CNRS, Rouen, France

Michael Metcalf Department of Coins, Ashmolean Museum, Oxford

Matthew Moran School of World Art Studies and Museology, University of East Anglia

John Newman Field Team, Archaeological Service, Suffolk County Council

Ben Palmer Exeter College, University of Oxford

Tim Pestell Department of Archaeology, Norwich Castle Museum

Julian D. Richards Department of Archaeology, University of York

Andrew Rogerson Finds Identification and Recording Service, Field Archaeology Division, Norfolk County Council

Peter Sawyer Trondheim, Norway

Caroline Tulp Institute of Archaeology, University of Groningen, The Netherlands

Astrid Tummuscheit Department for Prehistoric Archaeology, University of Kiel, Germany

Katharina Ulmschneider Worcester College, University of Oxford

Abbreviations

Preface

In 1989, a gathering of distinguished archaeologists and numismatists met in Oxford to discuss the growing number of Middle Anglo-Saxon sites, dubbed ‘productive’, then being revealed by metal-detection. Ten years on, and thousands of metal-detected artefacts later, the two editors of this volume organised another conference on a similar, though somewhat broader, theme, as an update. Fittingly it was again in Oxford that, in December 2000, Worcester College played host to a meeting, this time international, of historians, archaeologists and numismatists, to reconsider the knotty problems of trade and economics in Early Medieval Europe.

The success of this event has owed much to the award of a conference grant by the British Academy and in particular to the generosity of Mr David Newkirk of London. Without their kind support, neither the conference nor this subsequent book would have been possible. We are also very grateful to the Danish National Museum for a generous grant for the publication of the extensive illustrations to accompany Lars Jørgensen’s contribution on Lake Tissø.

The essays contained in this volume are essentially those papers as delivered to the Worcester College conference, modified to a greater or lesser extent. Indeed, such has been the enthusiasm for the publication of the conference’s proceedings that only one paper delivered is not included. By way of compensation we are very grateful to Stuart Brookes for contributing an article on the economic framework of Middle Anglo-Saxon Kent. It will also be apparent that there is no survey of the continental sources for markets and fairs in the period covered by this volume. Such a contribution was intended, but unfortunately circumstances prevented Prof. Johanek from submitting his paper. In its place the editors would like to draw attention to his two important and still highly relevant surveys on the topic in 1985 and 1987.

Finally, we owe debts to the many people involved at different stages in this project. For his enthusiastic response to our publication proposal, and assistance in the production stages, we would like to thank Richard Purslow of Windgather Press. Thanks are also due to Joy Southam and Fiona Fergusson, and to all the contributors for their prompt and efficient responses to our many requests for clarification. We would like to acknowledge Philip Salmon, Martin Ulmschneider, and the staff of Worcester College for their help in the smooth organisation and running of the conference. Last but not least, we owe a debt of gratitude to Julia and Philip for all their support and tolerance.

CHAPTER 1

Introduction: Early Medieval Markets and ‘Productive’ Sites

Katharina Ulmschneider and Tim Pestell

This book presents the first survey of inland markets and smaller trading sites in Early Medieval Northern Europe between the seventh and ninth centuries. The period is one of considerable interest to social and economic historians, archaeologists and numismatists alike. Not only did it herald the revival of international trade networks after two centuries of disruption and upheavals during the Migration period. It also witnessed the emergence of a large-scale silver coinage, which was to act as a common currency for the kingdoms and peoples of the North Sea littoral. The scale and importance of this economic renewal can be seen most vividly in the sudden emergence of the great emporia or wics, which sprang up along the coasts of Northern Europe. These extensive international trading stations, such as Hamwic, Dorestad and Quentovic, with their large amounts of coinage and foreign goods, have long been at the centre of studies of Early Medieval markets and trade (among others see Jankuhn et al. 1973; Hodges and Hobley 1988; Hodges 1989a; Clarke and Ambrosiani 1991; and most recently Hill and Cowie 2001).

However, despite their undoubted importance, it is becoming increasingly clear that the emporia were not the only sites acting as markets or actively participating in international and regional trade between the seventh and ninth centuries. An expanding body of archaeological and numismatic evidence, mostly derived through metal-detecting, has not only begun to reveal the existence of many smaller, less well-documented trading places during this period. It has also started to challenge the notion that such rural sites were of little importance to the economic system as a whole (contra Hodges and Whitehouse 1983, 92 and 101).

It was with the aim of redressing this longstanding imbalance in research at a European level, and drawing together recent advances made in the study of smaller, more rural, trading sites, that a conference on ‘The Archaeology of Inland Markets, Fairs, and Productive Sites’ was held at Worcester College, Oxford, in December 2000. There were three major objectives.

The first was to survey and assess the current knowledge of the so-called ‘productive’ sites of Anglo-Saxon England. This term (which remains archaeologically somewhat unsatisfactory) was first used by numismatists during the 1980s, when a boom in metal-detecting activity in England led to the discovery of new types of sites yielding unusually large quantities of coins and sometimes metalwork (for example, Booth and Blowers 1983; Blackburn and Bonser 1986, 65–80). However, as many of the following essays show, a lack of systematic archaeological investigation frequently left the function or interpretation of such places unclear. A first attempt at assessing these sites was made at an important symposium on ‘productive’ sites organized by Mark Blackburn and Michael Metcalf in Oxford in 1989. Unfortunately, the proceedings of the 1989 meeting were never published (Blackburn, this volume), although some of the important papers delivered then have since been circulated privately (for instance Blackburn, Rogerson and Margeson, unpublished).

The continued recovery of material from known ‘productive’ sites, the discovery of important new examples, and the opportunities for more detailed archaeological investigations in the intervening eleven years, have provided the chance to revisit the entire question of ‘productive’ sites and their interpretation. A key objective of the Worcester College conference was therefore to bring together and publish all of the latest evidence for ‘productive’ sites in England, many for the first time, and to develop and assess new strategies for the study and interpretation of these mainly metal-detected sites. Given some of the recent debates surrounding the term ‘productive’ site, it should be pointed out that it is used in this volume to refer to ‘places, whether excavated or metal-detected, that produce large quantities of coin and metalwork finds’ (Ulmschneider 2000b, 62–3).

It is the large scale of the coinage found on ‘productive’ sites, second only to that of the great emporia, which, together with their location along major lines of transport and communication, first led to the suggestion that they represent the places of former markets, fairs and/or settlements involved in trade (Metcalf 1984a, 27 and 41). Despite having been known to exist for some time now, the recognition and acceptance of ‘productive’ sites in the literature has generally been slow. For instance, their discussion is notably lacking in McCormick’s monumental Origins of the European Economy (2001), and with the exception of John Moreland’s contribution, finds little space in Hansen and Wickham’s recent The Long Eighth Century (2000).

Much of this problem stems from the unusual circumstances under which these sites have been revealed and the unconventional recovery of their finds. Because most ‘productive’ sites have been identified by hobby metal-detecting, there has been a general lack of controlled archaeological excavation. As a result, the artefacts recovered not only lack archaeological context, but, perhaps even more unsatisfactorily, they almost always represent only a small proportion of the range of finds that might be expected from such sites. Metal-detectorists generally screen out non-ferrous metalwork in their searches, and not all of them choose to recover other classes of object seen on the surface, such as ceramics. This highly selective recovery strategy, naturally, is at variance with any archaeological research agenda, and has contributed to the tension between some archaeologists and detector users. One of the greatest remaining challenges for archaeologists is to persuade all finders to submit their finds for archaeological examination and to provide accurate findspots for their material (Lewis 2002, 332). Often, the disclosure of such data has depended upon the personal initiative of archaeologists who over the years have built up close contacts with local metal-detectorists. It is only since the later 1990s that this process of liaison has become more formalised with the introduction of the Portable Antiquities Scheme in England and Wales, which employs archaeologists to seek out metal-detectorists and convince them of the need to have their finds and sites recorded (Hobbs 2001).*

Even when both finds and findspots become known to archaeologists, the research and discussion of metal-detected sites can still be hampered by the requirement to keep certain find locations secret for fear of being looted by unscrupulous ‘nighthawks’.

This unsatisfactory situation has meant that there have been few opportunities to consider the archaeological nature of metal-detected ‘productive’ sites. While some archaeologists have as a result remained extremely cautious about metal-detectorists and their finds (and others have even seemed to demonise them – see for example the naïve comments of Langford 2002), the vast majority now agree that these finds have an enormous potential for archaeological research, which has yet to be fully realised and can no longer be ignored (Ulmschneider 2000a, 101; Pestell 2001b, 52; Lewis 2002, 333). This may be seen no more clearly than in the important discussions of Early Medieval trade and economics by James Campbell and Mark Blackburn (both this volume).

It is not only in England, however, that metal-detector finds, excavations, and historical research have begun to challenge fundamentally our understanding of trade and the economy in the Early Medieval period. The second major objective of the Worcester College conference, and its proceedings presented here, has been to compare, for the first time, developments in Britain with those on the Continent and in Scandinavia. By its nature such a survey and comparison cannot be exhaustive and has been based on a selection of recent or ongoing research projects undertaken in six European countries including the Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, France, Italy, and Scandinavia. The aim has been not only to exchange new research, ideas, and methodologies across the North Sea, but to re-ignite the debate on Early Medieval markets and trade on a European basis.

It will be immediately apparent that there are great differences in the research material and approaches between the different countries. For example, the Netherlands and Denmark, like England, have experienced the large-scale impact of metal-detecting. Denmark in particular has been at the forefront of collecting and utilizing the new information thus recovered, with many of the metal-detected sites being followed up with large-scale excavations ( Jørgensen, this volume). These are providing archaeologists with crucial evidence about the varying nature and functions of economic sites, and are starting to reveal an hitherto unsuspected complexity and structure to Early Medieval settlements, the economy and society. This work stands in stark contrast to many other European countries, such as Germany, France and Italy, where metal-detecting as a hobby remains largely illegal. Here important discoveries continue to be made through more traditional detailed, and often extensive, excavations and historical research, which allow rare insights into the network, contacts, and seasonality of market and trading sites, and their development over time (for instance Le Maho; Moran, this volume).

Finally, a third objective of the Worcester College conference was to establish a broad, interdisciplinary forum for discussing economic sites comprising archaeologists, numismatists and historians of the period. With the explosion of data available through metal-detector finds, trade and the economy has become one of the fastest moving fields in Early Medieval studies. As the papers in this volume show, its importance cannot be overemphasised. Equally, it is becoming clear that only a multi-disciplinary approach with an integrated research agenda will allow a fuller appreciation of the complex and sophisticated pattern of marketing, exchange, and trading-place hierarchies.

At present archaeologists are only just beginning to understand and utilise the new sources that are becoming available. Central to any advance will be the continued refinement of data on coin-use and circulation. As Blackburn points out (this volume), the popularity of metal-detecting is revolutionising our knowledge of European coinage. His study of coin-loss patterns in England demonstrates a sudden burst in monetary activity around 700 with a volume of currency in circulation unparalleled in England until the thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries. Not only does this pattern appear to reflect wider European trends, on a more specific level it has provided new ways of comparing sites, raising the possibility that future research will be able to understand local and regional economic activity and interactions between sites. Already, the newly-developed statistical approaches of Michael Metcalf (2001 and this volume) are enabling the identification of areas of particular coin-loss and therefore coin-use. These, for example, may not only help to point to the location of mints which currently remain unidentified, but they can also highlight the importance of certain hinterland areas (and their resources) into which coins diffused from a market and mint place. The information from such studies will be of obvious importance to economic, political and social historians. For instance, the identification of more-or-less isolated ‘hot-spots’ of coin finds, as for example the primary porcupine sceattas in parts of the upper Thames valley, not only raises interesting questions about trade-routes and the way money was transferred into the region, but also potentially indicates the economic importance of the wool trade in the chalklands of the region already by the late seventh century, well in advance of our first documentary evidence of the mid eighth century (Metcalf, this volume).

Another theme which will need to be reassessed in the light of new discoveries is the thorny question of the influence of political power on the economy, and the extent of political control over coinage, markets and trade. This, of course, is a problem already long familiar from the study of the emporia (Palmer, this volume). Political power could clearly have a profound effect on the development and fate of a market and settlement. In her discussion of Groß Strömkendorf, Astrid Tummuscheit (this volume) shows how this settlement may be identified with the emporium of Reric, mentioned s.a. 808 in the Royal Frankish Annals. Excavations suggest that Groß Strömkendorf’s layout was structured in part by a central authority, especially from c. 770–90. That the Danish king Godfred came to relocate all the merchants to Hedeby over 130km away provides an ample demonstration of the importance of controlling economic exchange. An essentially similar phenomenon is expounded by Jacques Le Maho in his analysis of Rouen (this volume). From an organic landscape of ports and small trading places in the Lower Seine, many owned and run by monasteries, the political circumstances of Viking raids and settlement were to induce a profound change. While Rouen itself survived, becoming a refuge from Scandinavian raiders, the shifting balance of power saw the extension of royal control over the city and its development as an urban centre.

But how far did such political control reach? Metcalf draws attention to the eighth-century monetary economy being regionally integrated, but also displaying a free movement of currency between regions and kingdoms, while Blackburn can find no real evidence for political circumstances affecting the pattern of coin loss on three geographically and functionally very different trading sites (both this volume). In some cases attempts at gaining control of trading sites may have involved their relocation to more permanent positions. For instance, Lund’s ‘Fair of the Three Mounds’ was probably transferred from an earlier site at Uppåkra (Sawyer, this volume). However, many other Scandinavian markets and fairs seem to have been based on Lunar cycles and pre-Christian religious festivals, or simply grew up around temporary cult sites. Lars Jørgensen’s discussion of the spectacular aristocratic site at Lake Tissø in Denmark provides an important example of how a settlement with workshops and a large market area may have been attracted to a site of former cult activity, in this case based around ‘the lake of Tyr’. The monumental halls revealed by excavation at Tissø are not only comparable with the royal settlement of Lejre near Roskilde on Zealand, but possibly represent an extension of royal control and occupation over former religious practice and economic activity.

The extent to which social control by either secular leaders or religious institutions could provide a motor for trade and economic development is another important question raised by the presence of smaller ‘productive’ and inland trading sites. While the concept of planned emporia of Hodges ‘Type B’ is familiar to Early Medieval economic historians (Hodges 1989a, 51–2), the nature of ‘productive’ sites at present remains very much open to debate. For many scholars, the crucial role of the Church looms large. At San Vincenzo al Volturno, it was the presence of a monastery that was responsible for the assembly of tile, glass and metalworkers, and the subsequent production of a range of prestige goods such as belt buckles and bridle furniture (Mitchell 1994b; Moran, this volume). Similarly, many English sites such as Coddenham in Suffolk, Wormegay in Norfolk and that ‘near Carisbrooke’ on the Isle of Wight have been related to a former ecclesiastical presence (Newman; Rogerson; Ulmschneider, this volume; see also Palmer). A religious component can be clearly demonstrated by the eleventh century at many former ‘productive’ sites, as is the case in East Anglia (Pestell, this volume) and the role