Sue Harrington

The Tribal Hidage, attributed to the 7th century, records the named groups and polities of early Anglo-Saxon England and the taxation tribute due from their lands and surpluses. Whilst providing some indication of relative wealth and its distribution, rather little can be deduced from the Hidage concerning the underlying economic and social realities of the communities documented. Sue Harrington and the late Martin Welch have adopted a new approach to these issues, based on archaeological information from 12,000 burials and 28,000 objects of the period AD 450–650. The nature, distribution and spatial relationships of settlement and burial evidence are examined over time against a background of the productive capabilities of the environment in which they are set, the availability of raw materials, evidence for metalworking and other industrial/craft activities, and communication and trade routes. This has enabled the identification of central areas of wealth that influenced places around them. Key within this period was the influence of the Franks who may have driven economic exploitation by building on the pre-existing Roman infrastructure of the south-east. Frankish material culture was as widespread as that of the Kentish people, whose wealth is evident in many well-furnished graves, but more nuanced approaches to wealth distribution are apparent further to the West, perhaps due to ongoing interaction with communities who maintained an essentially ‘Romano-British’ way of life.

The roots of England lie within the fertile soil of its earliest kingdom, that of the people of Kent. Here, for a brief moment under King Æthelbert of Kent (c.560-616) this corner of England was transformed into the first Anglo-Saxon and Christian kingdom. But who were the Anglo-Saxons and what happened in Kent during the Dark Ages after the departure of the Roman legions in AD 410? This book draws archaeological and historical evidence together for the first time in one volume to explain how Kent became the most important place in England, noted for its power, culture, wealth and international contacts and why, by the ninth century, it had become absorbed by its more powerful neighbours, the Anglo-Saxons.

Grave goods show that women were identified as weavers in the early Anglo-Saxon period, rather than specifically spinners, as occurs later. A key piece of weaving equipment found in migration era burials is the iron beater, shaped during this period like a sword. Spear shaped beaters appear later in the seventh century. This study is centred on a corpus of sword and spear shaped beaters not only from Anglo-Saxon England (centred on East Kent), but also from Norway, where the earliest examples are found and from Alamannia. Conclusions are drawn about the processes and social composition of textile production, including any separation of weaving and spinning, and discuss why tools associated with the women's task of weaving should be shaped as objects with masculine associations.