Cremation and Inhumation in the Anglo-Saxon Cemeteries

Abstract

In his article on ‘The Strategy of Anglo-Saxon Invasion’ in the March number of ANTIQUITY,1 Mr K. D. M. Dauncey discusses the cremation cemeteries of Norfolk and Lincolnshire, and endeavours to draw from their distribution and their supposed relationship to the inhumation and the mixed cemeteries of the same and neighbouring areas certain conclusions which, if justified by the available evidence, would be of considerable historical importance. His claim is that the pure (or nearly pure) cremation cemeteries of this region can be regarded as ‘ primary’, not only from the chronological standpoint, compared With the inhumation or mixed cemeteries, but also socially, as indicative of military rather than civilian settlement. Their distribution is thus held to reflect certain strategic conceptions determining the course and the character of the earliest Anglo-Saxon occupation of the eastern Midlands.