Landscapes of Governance: Assembly sites in England 5^th -11^th centuries - by  STUART BROOKES

Thursday 27th June 2013 – 8pm at Liston Hall Garden Room, Liston Road, Marlow
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Stuart’s talk will be based on his shared three-year research project bringing archaeology, place-names and written sources together in a national study of early medieval assembly sites.

Arbitration, negotiation and dispute settlement were fundamental to the formation of kingdoms and ultimately the nation state of England, but the assembly sites where such activities occurred have never previously been comprehensively studied as archaeological sites.

Assembly sites were important at many levels of early medieval society, royal, regional, local and urban, providing a means whereby royal and official prerogative met with local concerns. Place-names of sites indicate varying origins, in some cases referring to pre-Christian gods, while other terms relate to earlier monuments, such as burial mounds and standing stones, or seemingly mundane features such as crossroads, bridges and settlements.

Stuart Brookes, who was one of the joint Project Leaders for this venture, is Honorary Senior Lecturer at the UCL Institute of Archaeology. He previously gave MAS an excellent talk on Anglo-Saxon civil defence in the Viking age.

Entrance £3.50, members £2.50 – Car park adjacent – Disabled access – Free refreshments

For all enquiries including membership, please ring Joy Blake on 01628 523896

Entrance £3.50 (£2.50 for members). Free refreshments

 http://www.marlow-archaeology.org/