Landscape Continuity and the Fossilization of Roman Fields

Abstract

Excavation has increasingly highlighted aspects of the continuity of settlement from the fourth into the sixth centuries. This paper offers an additional set of evidence to show that continuity of the field and cropping units associated with settlement is also detectable from this period using excavation, landscape and later manuscript evidence. The recognition that some late Roman ditches underlie later medieval headlands of open-field systems has been well explored already. In the east Midlands area of Northamptonshire and Cambridgeshire recent work indicates that in some cases a fossilization of Roman fields took place. That fossilization is indicated by areas of small medieval furlongs associated with sites of late Roman and early medieval date, and could indicate continuity within the farmed landscape with little interruption to the farming system.