An Anglo‐saxon Execution Cemetery at Walkington Wold, Yorkshire

Abstract

This paper offers a new perspective on a previously insecurely dated Anglo-Saxon cemetery at Walkington Wold in east Yorkshire (Fig. 1). The results of excavations at the site were published in 1973, but more recent examination of the skeletal material, including the acquisition of radiocarbon dates, casts new light on the cemetery and its significance. Rather than being of late Roman or early post-Roman date, as has been previously suggested, it can now be demonstrated that the cemetery includes a series of burials of mid-and later Anglo-Saxon date. The cemetery consists of a number of decapitated individuals but, contrary to earlier speculation, it is unlikely to represent a massacre, and is more plausibly interpreted as an Anglo-Saxon execution cemetery, used periodically over perhaps as much as a couple of hundred years. the excavationsBetween 1967 and 1969 two Bronze Age barrows at Walkington Wold were excavated by J.E. Bartlett and R.W. Mackey on behalf of the East Riding Archaeological Society (Bartlett and Mackey 1973). During these excavations 12 burials were discovered cut into the southern part of Barrow 1 (Fig. 2), which was located 36 m to the south-west of Barrow 2. The orientation of the burials was apparently random, and the methods of disposal varied. There were eight extended supine burials and four flexed burials, at least two individuals were interred in shallow graves while three were buried together in the same grave (Bartlett and Mackey 1973, 25). Among these burials, there were two complete inhumations, and a further ten inhumations containing individuals without crania, interpreted as decapitations. Eleven disarticulated crania, OXFORD JOURNAL OF ARCHAEOLOGY 26(3) 309-329 2007

Chest Burial: A Middle Anglo‐saxon Funerary Rite From Northern England

“…Second, these burial containers tend to appear in graves where other uncommon objects appear. This pattern has been noted not only in the present study, but in various studies concerning the entire Anglo‐Saxon period (Hirst 1985, 32–3; Buckberry 2004). During the seventh–eleventh century in northern England the majority of interments were plain earth‐dug graves (Buckberry 2007, 118; Craig 2010, 132), and therefore it seems viable to consider that an elaboration such as a chest would have been utilized as a higher‐status rite.…”

An execution in medieval Sicily: Computerised tomography scan analysis and 3D reconstruction of an ancient forensic context

“…It has been abundantly demonstrated that in many societies, some individuals underwent funeral treatment that differed from the usual burial practice (Binford, ). These differences, identifiable at the archaeological level, may be symptomatic of motivations connected to religious beliefs and the magical sphere, such as belief in vampires and revenants (Cornelio‐Cassai & Cavallari, ; Redi, Forgione, Savini, & Amoretti, ), or may be an expression of the marginal role played by some individuals within the social order of the community, as would be the case for outlaws (Buckberry, ). According to this shared assumption, our burial represents a funerary custom that clearly falls within the category of so‐called deviant or atypical burials, which are often interpreted as indicative of social marginality and deviancy (Murphy, ; Reynolds, ).…”

The Diagnosis and Context of a Facial Deformity from an Anglo‐Saxon Cemetery at Spofforth, North Yorkshire

“…First, that all of the published osteological examples of impaired individuals who have received nonnormative burial are adult males. Adult males also comprise most of all kinds of deviant burial from the Anglo‐Saxon period (Buckberry & Hadley, : 311, 315–6; Reynolds, : 155–6). It is unclear whether it would have been considered appropriate to afford women or children deviant funerary rites in any context, whether motivated by criminal behaviour, physical incapacity or mental illness, and therefore whether we should expect disability to be reflected in deviant burial of women or children.…”