The Walkington Wold burials in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England, comprise the skeletal remains of 13 individuals from the Anglo-Saxon period which were discovered in the late 1960s, during the excavation of a Bronze Age barrow. Subsequent examinations have concluded that they were decapitated Anglo-Saxon criminals, and that the site is the most northerly of its kind known in England.
Archaeologists Rod Mackey and John Bartlett discovered the burials while excavating the Bronze Age barrow at Walkington Wold, about 2 kilometres (1.25 miles) west of the Yorkshire village of Walkington, from 1967 to 1969. [1] Twelve skeletons were unearthed, ten of which were without skulls, though eleven skulls were also found, most of which were without jawbones. All were buried randomly, though three appeared to have been buried together, with most of the skulls well away from the bodies. Some of the skulls were found at the centre of the barrow mound, while the bodies were all located at the perimeter. Theories of their identity included victims of a late Roman massacre, Anglo-Saxon executions, or even a Celtic head cult. [2]
The skeletons were re-examined in 2007 by archaeologists Jo Buckberry from Bradford University and Dawn Hadley from Sheffield University. [3] It was revealed that in fact 13 individuals were unearthed in the late 1960s, all had been aged between 18 and 45, and, while eight of the skeletons and nine of the skulls were identified as certainly male, none were identified as female. Radiocarbon dating showed that the remains range from the mid 7th century to the early 11th century. It also indicated that the apparent "triple burial" in fact consisted of separate burials in the same location. Examination of the skeletons revealed that their owners were subjected to judicial execution by decapitation, one of which required several blows. Furthermore, the heads were probably displayed on poles as warnings to others, which was a known practice in Anglo-Saxon England. While the burial site is ideally situated for public display on a rise by a road, the absence of jawbones from most of the skulls suggests that they fell off as the heads decomposed on the poles.
The crimes of the men are unknown, owing to the lack of any associated documentation. The burial site is between Walkington and the deserted village of Hunsley, adjacent to the modern hamlet of High Hunsley, at the boundary of the then hundreds of Welton and Cave. [4] The use of an ancient barrow site situated on the boundaries between communities indicates that the executed were excluded from the community, even in death. According to Mackey, the site had been known locally as "'Hell's Gate' – suggesting there was a folk memory [from] when it was used as an execution site." [5]
While Walkington Wold is "unusual in being the most northerly example yet found of an Anglo-Saxon execution cemetery", the site contributes evidence that such execution cemeteries were used periodically over a long time, being established long before their first documentation in the 10th century, and that men, rather than women, tended to be executed for crimes in mid to late Anglo-Saxon England. [6] It also demonstrates continuity over a period which includes the upheavals of Scandinavian invasion and settlement. [7]
The selection of a Bronze Age barrow for the burials fits a pattern of Anglo-Saxon re-use of ancient barrows and mounds. Such barrows were thought to be the haunt of dragons, goblins and the like, and the executed criminals at Walkington Wold, excluded from normal human society by their criminal activity and subsequent executions, were made outcasts in death by their association with such spirits. [8]
The Danelaw, as recorded in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, is a historical name given to the part of England in which the laws of the Danes held sway and dominated those of the Anglo-Saxons. Danelaw contrasts with West Saxon law and Mercian law. The term is first recorded in the early 11th century as Dena lage. Modern historians have extended the term to a geographical designation. The areas that constituted the Danelaw lie in northern and eastern England.
The Yorkshire Wolds are low hills in the counties of the East Riding of Yorkshire and North Yorkshire in north-eastern England. The name also applies to the district in which the hills lie.
Duggleby Howe is one of the largest round barrows in Britain, located on the southern side of the Great Wold Valley in the district of Ryedale, and is one of four such monuments in this area, known collectively as the Great barrows of East Yorkshire. Duggleby Howe is believed on the basis of artefacts recovered to be of Late Neolithic date, but no radiocarbon dates are available. Howe as a place name is believed to have originated from the Old Norse word haugr.
John Robert Mortimer was an English corn-merchant and archaeologist who lived in Driffield, East Riding of Yorkshire.
The Arras culture is an archaeological culture of the Middle Iron Age in East Yorkshire, England. It takes its name from the cemetery site of Arras, at Arras Farm, (53.86°N 0.59°W) near Market Weighton, which was discovered in the 19th century. The site spans three fields, bisected by the main east-west road between Market Weighton and Beverley, and is arable farmland; little to no remains are visible above ground. The extent of the Arras culture is loosely associated with the Parisi tribe of pre-Roman Britain.
Walkington is a village and civil parish in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It is situated approximately 3 miles (4.8 km) to the south-west of the town of Beverley on the B1230 road, and Beverley Grammar School.
Wauldby is a region in the Yorkshire Wolds within the civil parish of Welton in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England. It contains the gentrified hamlet around Wauldby Manor Farm, and a few other minor dwellings including Little Wauldby Farm.
Thwing and Octon is a civil parish in the northern Yorkshire Wolds in the East Riding of Yorkshire, England.
The East Riding of Yorkshire is a local government district with unitary authority status, and is a ceremonial county of England. It is named after the historic East Riding of Yorkshire which was one of three ridings alongside the North Riding and West Riding, which were constituent parts a Yorkshire ceremonial and administrative county until 1974. From 1974 to 1996 the area of the modern East Riding of Yorkshire constituted the northern part of Humberside.
The archaeology of Anglo-Saxon England is the study of the archaeology of England from the 5th Century AD to the 11th Century, when it was ruled by Germanic tribes known collectively as the Anglo-Saxons.
Burial in Early Anglo-Saxon England refers to the grave and burial customs followed by the Anglo-Saxons between the mid 5th and 11th centuries CE in Early Mediaeval England. The variation of practice performed by the Anglo-Saxon peoples during this period, included the use of both cremation and inhumation. There is commonality in the burial places between the rich and poor - their resting places sit alongside one another in shared cemeteries. Both of these forms of burial were typically accompanied by grave goods, which included food, jewellery and weaponry. The actual burials themselves, whether of cremated or inhumed remains, were placed in a variety of sites, including in cemeteries, burial mounds or, more rarely, in ship burials.
An Anglo-Saxon burial mound is an accumulation of earth and stones erected over a grave or crypt during the late sixth and seventh centuries AD in Anglo-Saxon England. These burial mounds are also known as barrows or tumuli.
The Street House Anglo-Saxon cemetery is an Anglo-Saxon burial ground, dating to the second half of the 7th century AD, that was discovered at Street House Farm near Loftus, in the unitary authority of Redcar and Cleveland, England. Monuments dating back as far as 3300 BC are located in the vicinity of the cemetery, which was discovered after aerial photography revealed the existence of an Iron Age rectangular enclosure. The excavations, carried out between 2005 and 2007, revealed over a hundred graves dating from the 7th century AD and the remains of several buildings. An array of jewellery and other artefacts was found, including the jewels once worn by a young high-status Anglo-Saxon woman who had been buried on a bed and covered by an earth mound.
Polhill Anglo-Saxon cemetery is a place of burial that was used in the seventh and eighth centuries CE. It is located close to the hamlet of Polhill, near Sevenoaks in Kent, South-East England. Belonging to the Middle Anglo-Saxon period, it was part of the much wider tradition of burial in Early Anglo-Saxon England.
Shrubland Hall Anglo-Saxon cemetery is a 7th-century Anglo-Saxon burial site discovered at Shrubland Hall Quarry near Coddenham, Suffolk. The cemetery contains fifty burials and a number of high-status graves including "the most complicated Anglo-Saxon bed ever found." Bed burials, in which a female body is laid out on an ornamental wooden bed, usually accompanied by jewellery, are rarely found, and are considered of national importance. Only 13 bed burials have been found to date in the UK. The bed burial was one of two graves at the cemetery which were found within wooden-lined chambers. The second chamber contained a male skeleton with grave goods including a seax, a spear, a shield, an iron-bound wooden bucket, a copper alloy bowl and a drinking horn.
Bergh Apton Anglo-Saxon cemetery is a late-5th to late-6th century Anglo-Saxon burial site discovered at Bergh Apton, Norfolk. The site was excavated in 1973 and 63 graves were found. The south and west portions of the site had previously been destroyed. The state of preservation of the skeletal remains was described as "very poor" due to the acidity of the soil and the sex of individuals was determined by grave goods. Grave goods found at the site included weapons, shields, spears and jewellery. One grave, possibly of a minstrel-poet, was found to contain a lyre similar to that found at Sutton Hoo. Twelve of the graves were those of children aged under 12 years. No evidence for an Anglo-Saxon settlement adjacent to the cemetery has been found.
Julian Daryl Richards is a British archaeologist. He is a professor at the University of York, the director of the Archaeology Data Service (ADS), and the editor of Internet Archaeology. He is also the director of the Centre for Digital Heritage at the university, and the founding director of The White Rose College of the Arts & Humanities. His research focuses on the archaeological applications of information technology, as well as on Anglo-Saxon and Viking archaeology. He has led excavations at Cottam, Cowlam, Burdale, Wharram Percy, and Heath Wood barrow cemetery.
Dawn Hadley is a British medieval archaeologist and historian, who is best known for her research on Anglo-Saxon and Viking-Age archaeology, the archaeology of childhood, gender in medieval England, and funerary archaeology. She is Professor of Medieval Archaeology and a member of the Centre for Medieval Studies at the University of York.
Eaves-drip burial refers to the medieval funerary custom in Britain of burying infants and young children next to building foundations in churchyards.
