The Medieval period in East and North-East Wales

Bob Silvester

1a) Settlement and houses: higher-status sites

Strengths

· depth of past and current research on stone and earthen castles

• solid base of fieldwork evidence for moated sites

Weaknesses

· insufficient study of sites in their setting

· sparsity of detailed earthwork plans

· little information on llysoedd

Research opportunities

• The landscape context both of earthen and stone castles and of moats

• corpus of detailed plans

• assessment of the llysoedd in north-east and east Wales

1b) Settlement and houses: lower-status sites

Strengths

• vernacular structures of late medieval date

• known deserted rural settlements

Weaknesses

• Imposition of a political border may be meaningless in settlement terms

• fieldwork evidence biased towards the uplands

• excavation has not kept pace with identification

Research opportunities

• fieldwork targeted at lower altitude, enclosed lands.

• excavation of specific rural settlement sites

1c) Settlement and houses: urban areas

Strengths

• historic settlement surveys of the early 1990s

• some detailed town research

Weaknesses

• urban growth, plan morphology and other issues not addressed

• village development very poorly known

Research opportunities

• prioritise settlements within the urban hierarchy

• opportunities should be taken for excavation of prioritised urban sites wherever possible

2) Land use and enclosure

Strengths

• an impressive and diverse range of agrarian landscapes

Weaknesses

• few landscapes studied in detail

• the archaeologist’s contribution smaller than those of the historian and historical geographer

Research opportunities

• historic landscapes to be studied holistically

• regionality issues

• analysis of specific landscapes

3) Natural resources and industry

Strengths

• untapped potential of medieval industry in the region

Weaknesses

• virtually no research and little information

Research opportunities

· preparation of a basic framework for medieval industry; an audit

· extensive study of those industries where physical remains still apparent

4) Coastal and waterway activity

Strengths

• up-to-date statement of current knowledge on coastal archaeology

• several important natural waterways with considerable potential

Weaknesses

• Absence of assessment of inland waterways

Research opportunities

• assessments of the major rivers

5) Religious archaeology

Strengths

• the pan-Wales assessment of historic churches

• some led studies of individual churches

• intermittent study of major monastic houses

Weaknesses

• little detailed recording of individual churches

• absence of a plan corpus

• a range of issues including siting, origins, external influences and archotecural chronologies

• chapels largely overlooked

• properties of lesser monastic orders little studied

Research opportunities

• development of corpus of accurate church plans

• study of fabric and architecture of individual churches on back larger church conservation projects

• analysis of the landscapes within which monastic properties functioned