Shaping Medieval Landscapes by Tom Williamson
The English landscape of today owes much to changes and transformations that took place in the medieval period, i.e. before the large-scale planned enclosures from the 1700s onwards. What went before was a much more open system of fields with regional variations in the configuration of settlement, fields, hedgerows, roads and paths. Throughout this book Tom Williamson discusses the dichotomy between 'planned' and 'ancient', 'woodland' and 'champion' landscapes; between areas where nucleated villages were separated by regular open fields, as opposed to isolated farms and small hamlets with fields enclosed by hedges and larger amounts of woodland. Collating a great deal of information from an area extending from the Thames to the Wash, Williamson reveals fresh insights into the complex social, economic and demographic pressures that led to regional variation in landscape types.
'..if what you really want is to get right down in the dirt with Medieval farmers, to see the land as they saw it, to understand how it worked and how they drew life from it, this is the book for you.' Current Archaeology. 'a wonderful piece of work , Williamson's best yet'. Christopher Taylor 'This is an extremely interesting and original argument... Research on the history of the medieval landscape has neglected the influence of environment and geography in recent years, and this book firmly places them back on the agenda...' British Archaeology
Tom Williamson is Professor of Landscape History at the University of East Anglia. He has written widely on landscape archaeology, environmental history and the history of landscape design.
| SKU | Unavailable |
| ISBN 13 | 9780954557584 |
| ISBN 10 | 0954557581 |
| Title | Shaping Medieval Landscapes |
| Author | Tom Williamson |
| Condition | Unavailable |
| Binding Type | Paperback |
| Publisher | Windgather Press |
| Year published | 2004-12-01 |
| Number of pages | 214 |
| Cover note | Book picture is for illustrative purposes only, actual binding, cover or edition may vary. |
| Note | Unavailable |