MemberlistThe Library Index  FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 
Castles in the air. (NEW CONCEPTS)
Reply to topic Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3
View previous topic :: View next topic  
Ishmael


In: Toronto
View user's profile
Reply with quote

But here's the kicker.

All of these castles must actually exist. Somewhere. But where? Go find them!

If Nonesuch = Taj Mahal, that might tell you where to start looking.
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Castles, for those that are not already in front of me, is also about imagined battles.......
Send private message
Ishmael


In: Toronto
View user's profile
Reply with quote

The battles may not be imagined. They may only be moved geographically and temporally.
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Ishmael wrote:
The battles may not be imagined. They may only be moved geographically and temporally.


I explored this when I wrote Hero.
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Ishmael wrote:
But here's the kicker.

All of these castles must actually exist. Somewhere. But where? Go find them!

If Nonesuch = Taj Mahal, that might tell you where to start looking.


I have had a look, but I think I will stick with the current structure for now. Castles is in part about how as opposed to where to look, so is more influenced by A Question Of Perspective.


WC wrote:



Whittington Castle

.....................

Unless my eyes deceive me....

It's not a castle.



The How leads to the Where
Send private message
Hatty
Site Admin

In: Berkshire
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Where this Whittington Castle is comes as no surprise. On the London to Holyhead route, near the fort of Old Oswestry at the border between England and Wales. The site was 'incorporated into Wat's Dyke' according to Wiki which has never been dated definitively due to the inadequacies of carbon dating methods.

Its function may have been a toll point as well as 'fort' as per Roman forts/toll points at Hadrian's Wall.

The A5 London Holyhead Trunk Road is a major road in England and Wales. It runs for about 181 miles (291 km) (including sections concurrent with other designations) from London, England to Holyhead, Wales, following in part a section of the Roman Iter II route which later took the Anglo-Saxon name Watling Street.

Why would anyone think Watling Street to be an Anglo-Saxon name?
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Hatty wrote:
Where this Whittington Castle is comes as no surprise. On the London to Holyhead route, near the fort of Old Oswestry at the border between England and Wales. The site was 'incorporated into Wat's Dyke' according to Wiki which has never been dated definitively due to the inadequacies of carbon dating methods.

Its function may have been a toll point as well as 'fort' as per Roman forts/toll points at Hadrian's Wall.

The A5 London Holyhead Trunk Road is a major road in England and Wales. It runs for about 181 miles (291 km) (including sections concurrent with other designations) from London, England to Holyhead, Wales, following in part a section of the Roman Iter II route which later took the Anglo-Saxon name Watling Street.

Why would anyone think Watling Street to be an Anglo-Saxon name?


I hadn't spotted your Whit=Wats=Watling
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

H wrote:
The site was 'incorporated into Wat's Dyke' according to Wiki which has never been dated definitively due to the inadequacies of carbon dating methods.


I did a little research and we have ERDDIG CASTLE, described as a motte and bailey which uses natural defences ( beginning to worry about natural) and also Wat's Dyke on the west side.Sometimes known as Wristleham Castle. Maybe constructed by Hugh Avranches in the late 11th century. Rather unusually for a castle it has paths cut into the mighty earthworks, (hey folks needed to get out)........... No evidence for timber remains.


'The castle of Wristleham' was mentioned in King Henry II pipe roll of 1161 and in 1574 the site was called the 'ruin of a castell great'


http://www.castleuk.net/castle_lists_wales/117/erdigg.html

Guys, this is Wats Dyke. It's another castell in the air.
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

HAMWIC

Not much is known of that great king of Wessex..... King Ine


Ine is noted for his code of laws (leges Inae or "laws of Ine"), which he issued in about 694. These laws were the first issued by an Anglo-Saxon king outside Kent. They shed much light on the history of Anglo-Saxon society, and reveal Ine's Christian convictions. Trade increased significantly during Ine's reign, with the town of Hamwic (now Southampton) becoming prominent. It was probably during Ine's reign that the West Saxons began to mint coins, though none have been found that bear his name.

Ine abdicated in 726 to go to Rome, leaving, in the words of the contemporary chronicler Bede, the kingdom to "younger men". He was succeeded by Æthelheard.


Still if his reign remains, according to Stenton, "obscure" .... (Hey it's the Dark Ages) we can travel to Southampton to see the fruits of King Ine's contribution to Anglo Saxon urbanism.

It's just for the life of him..... Wiley could not actually see any sign of Hamwic....

We know it must be there as we are told it's there. It's a prominent site, arguably one of the most prominent sites in Anglo Saxon Britain. I just couldn't see it......

Perhaps you can help?
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Southampton is a city of about quarter of million folks, most famous for its port, for the great part of its history there was little knowledge of the famed Hamwic.

There is a reference to an early Saint, Saint Willibald, who departed from nearby Hamblemouth on his travels.......

Willibald was born in Wessex on 21 October around the year 700. At the age of three, Willibald suffered from a debilitating weakness that made it difficult for him to breathe. The illness nearly took his life, until his parents prayed to God, vowing to commit Willibald to a monastic life if he was to be spared from death. Miraculously, Willibald survived and at the age of five was received into a Benedictine monastery called Waldheim (now Bishop's Waltham) in Hampshire, England. Willibald spent his early childhood in prayer and contemplation, practising the monasticism created by his relative, Saint Boniface. In the year 722 Willibald decided to partake on a pilgrimage with his father and brother, Saint Winibald. The journey would take several years and Huneberc provides detailed descriptions of the locations and people visited. Despite visiting a diverse group of peoples, Willibald's priority was not evangelisation but exploration, and there is little evidence of successful or attempted conversions in the Hodoeporicon while traveling through Palestine.[5]



The record of his leaving dates to 778, and also refers to a "middle" Anglo-Saxon Southampton, and this record further gives the placename Hamwih, which orthodoxy now considers an error, as that should be....



of course ..... HAMWIC


So it's there..... it is just Wiley can't see it......
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Let's take a look.......

You can get a guided walk according to See Southampton, it has an illustrative map and some impressive looking huts.

http://seesouthampton.co.uk/works/saxon-town-of-hamwic/

It is thought that the Saxon Town lay in an area roughly from the present day football Stadium to St Marys Church, and inland from the water to the parks. The boundaries of the known town are continually being extended, and it has gradually emerged that Hamwic may well have been the largest and most important town in Saxon England, possibly with its own mint.


Yikes it's getting bigger and much more important, I really want to believe.....

Please Note – to avoid disappointment, Matt has asked us to make it clear that there are no remnants of this town surviving above ground; speaking from our experience, this will not prevent Matt from thoroughly entertaining you


OK so the huts are reconstructions and they don't know where the boundaries are.......but at this rate of expansion it will have been the most important Saxon town in the whole of.... well...where will it end?
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

So why haven't we heard about Hamwic?

Or for that matter Ludenwic?

Eh cripes.

London has a Ludenwic?
Wiki wrote:


Early Anglo-Saxon settlement in the London area was not on the site of the abandoned Roman city, although the Roman London Wall remained intact. Instead, by the 7th century a village and trading centre named Lundenwic was established approximately 1 mile (1.6 km) to the west of Londinium (named Lundenburh, or "London Fort", by the Anglo-Saxons),[1] probably using the mouth of the River Fleet as a trading ship and fishing boat harbour.

In the early 8th century, Lundenwic was described by the Venerable Bede as "a trading centre for many nations who visit it by land and sea". The Old English term wic or "trading town" ultimately derived from the Latin word vicus,[2] so Lundenwic meant "London trading town".

Archaeologists were for many years puzzled as to where early Anglo-Saxon London was located, as they could find little evidence of occupation within the Roman city walls from this period. However, in the 1980s, London was rediscovered, after extensive independent excavations by archaeologists Alan Vince and Martin Biddle were reinterpreted as being of an urban character.[3][4] In the Covent Garden area, excavations in 1985 and 2005 have uncovered an extensive Anglo-Saxon settlement that dates back to the 7th century.[4][5] The excavations show that the settlement covered about 600,000 m2 (6,500,000 sq ft), stretching along the north side of the Strand (i.e. "the beach") from the present-day National Gallery site in the west to Aldwych in the east.


That's another one.

Strange how we are (re)discovering these Saxon trading towns.....circa 1970 and 80, when the craze for local government rescue archaeology was in its prime. It's just a shame that you can't see more........
Send private message
Mick Harper
Site Admin

In: London
View user's profile
Reply with quote

However, in the 1980s, London was rediscovered, after extensive independent excavations by archaeologists Alan Vince and Martin Biddle were reinterpreted as being of an urban character.

Another fine example of THOBR's dictum: "If you can't find what you're looking for in the ground, look in the store cupboard."

Southampton (under whatever name) is certainly a Megalithic site of importance since a) they were obsessed by tides and b) Southampton has four of them every day. This is because of the curiously regular lozenge shape of the Isle of Wight. Which by the way features in our upcoming The Migration of Birds and Men.
Send private message
Wile E. Coyote


In: Arizona
View user's profile
Reply with quote

Mick Harper wrote:
However, in the 1980s, London was rediscovered, after extensive independent excavations by archaeologists Alan Vince and Martin Biddle were reinterpreted as being of an urban character.

Another fine example of THOBR's dictum: "If you can't find what you're looking for in the ground, look in the store cupboard."



Hamwic is as real as an Anglo Saxon church.
Send private message
Display posts from previous:   
Reply to topic Goto page Previous  1, 2, 3

Jump to:  
Page 3 of 3

MemberlistThe Library Index  FAQFAQ   SearchSearch   RegisterRegister   ProfileProfile   Log in to check your private messagesLog in to check your private messages   Log inLog in 


Powered by phpBB © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group