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Crop marks

Iron Age
round house,
St Fagans, Wales

Celtic round houses (National Museum of Wales) |
Gardens in Iron Age Britain
Long before the arrival of the Romans, forests had been cleared
from most of Britain to make way for grazing land and fields. During
the
Iron Age, from about 800 BCE to
about 100 BCE, the British Isles were home to many
different, complex societies. We know very little about their
gardens, but crop marks and other remains show us where crops
were raised and homes built.
Houses were often round, though rectangular dwellings are also known. A
farmstead might have a single house with outbuildings clustered together within
each enclosure, or several houses within a single enclosure. A farmstead was
typically delineated as well as
protected by an encircling ditch. Dirt dug out of the ditch was piled between
the ditch and the enclosed land to create a dike, and this dike was often
topped with a wooden palisade or hedge. You can see this in the recreated Celtic
round houses shown at left, below.
Gardens (think, “guard-en”) and fields were likewise marked
and protected by
ditches, dikes, and hedges. Larger fields were cultivated by hand or by plows
pulled by cattle. Seeding was done by hand, and the seed was then covered by
raking or harrowing.
Though not recorded until Anglo-Saxon times, this 10th
century prayer reflects an earlier tradition of reverence for the earth mother.
erce
.
erce
.
erce
.
earth mother give you
the all ruler eternal lord
acres growing and flourishing
increasing and strengthening
high shafts, shining harvest
.
and there broad barley harvest
.
and there white wheat harvest
.
and all earth’s harvest
.
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erce
. erce
.
erce
.
eorþan modor geunne þe
se alwalda ece drihten
æcera wexendra and wridendra
eacniendra and elniendra
scafta hehra scirra wæstma
.
& þæra bradan bere wæstma
.
& þæra hwitan hwæte wæstma
.
& ealra eorþan wæstma
.
Anglo-Saxon invocation, 10th C,
British Library Cotton Caligula A. vii
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The difference between farming and gardening is
sometimes blurred. Farming -–
agriculture -- involved livestock as well as plants,
and its goals were utilitarian. Gardens -–
horticulture –- did not involve raising animals, and
the goals might be utilitarian, recreational, or
ornamental, singly or in combination.
Low lying fields along streams and rivers
provided meadows for hay and pastures for grazing.
Woodland was carefully managed,
sometimes for timber but more often for
slender, flexible withies, or branches.
Trees were
coppiced (cut as
“stools,” close to the ground, so
that the stump would
send up shoots) or
pollarded (branches
pruned back above the reach of grazing animals
and allowed to send
out shoots). Trees that respond well to such
management include beech, hazel, hornbeam, linden,
maple, willow, and yew.
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Coppicing |
Pollarding |
Pollard tree in Bayeax tapestry |
The time allowed between harvests depended upon the size branches needed.
Coppiced trees were harvested about every 5 years; pollarded, about every 15
years. Small side branches and leaves were used for fodder (“pollard hay” or
foliage), for wattle used to construct the walls of buildings, for fences,
for fuel, and also for containers such as baskets and panniers. Carefully
managed, these trees continued to produce for centuries because they remained in
a juvenile state, never growing old.
Although our focus here is gardening
rather than farming, it is interesting to consider the
crops growing in the fields of Iron Age Britain, among
them grains such as barley (two varieties, one for beer
and the other for flour or porridge); oats, rye, and
several varieties of wheat.
Other field crops included
legumes, like beans and peas; lamb’s quarters (AKA fat
hen, Chenopodium album); wild carrot, Daucus
carota; and nettles (Urtica spp).
Flax (Linum usitatissimum) was raised for linen,
and
dye plants like madder (for red dye), weld (yellow),
and woad (blue) were widely cultivated and highly
valued. |
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[Britain] bears grain, cattle, gold, silver, and
iron. These...
are exported from the island...
Strabo |
Iron Age livestock included
dairy and meat animals -- cattle, hogs, sheep, and
goats. Chickens, ducks, and geese were also
domesticated, but not always for the table (eating these
animals was sometimes taboo). Cats, dogs, and hares were
kept as pets.
In addition to the crops listed above,
archeologists have found remains of each of the plants
below at British sites dating to
before the Roman invasion. Nearly every plant
listed also appears in later herbals as a seasoning, medicinal, or
cosmetic; many are still grown today.
That these plant remains were
found in Iron Age contexts in Britain means only that they were
present in the environment. Were they grown in Iron Age
gardens, or gathered from the wild? How were they used?
We don’t know. But these familiar plants have been part
of the human experience for millennia. |
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Plants found in Iron Age Britain |
Fruits
-
Apple/crab apple,
Malus sylvestris
-
Blackberry/bramble, Rubus
fruticosus
-
Bird cherry, Prunus cerasus, P.
avium
-
Cloudberry, Rubus chamaemorus
-
Dewberry, Rubus caesius
-
Elderberry, Sambucus nigra
-
Grape, Vitis vinifera
-
Hawthorn, Crataegus spp.
-
Sloe, Prunus domestica insititia,
P. spinosa
-
Raspberry, Rubus idaeus
-
Rowan, Sorbus aucuparia
-
Strawberry, alpine, Fragaria vesca
Vegetables
-
Bean,
Vicia faba minor
-
Carrot,
Daucus carota
-
Pea, Pisum sativum
-
Turnip,
Brassica rapa
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Grains
-
Barley,
Hordeum vulgare
-
Rye
Secale cereale
-
Wheat, bread,
Triticum aestivum
-
Wheat, club,
Triticum aestivo-compactum
-
Wheat, einkorn,
Triticum monococcum
-
Wheat, emmer,
Triticum dicoccon
-
Wheat, spelt,
Triticum spelta
Fiber and dye plants
Herbs
Nutsts
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