Building Tradition from Hill-Fort to Cruck

The seeds from which this article grew were sown by a V.A.G. member, Mr. A. ·H. A. Hogg, when he addressed the Woolhope Club in 1973 on the subject of hill-forts with square or nearly-square buildings in them, and twin guard-rooms in inturned entrances, constructed. during the last seven hundred years before the Roman conquest.! He described how these are found in a belt some 50-60 miles wide from North Wales and the Dee estuary, along the Severn valley and the Marches, and across to approximately Portland Bill and SeIsey Bill. (Map 1). The hill-fort buildings are square or nearly so, up to 1 :1.2, and nearly all are four-post buildings with an earthfast post at each comer, though in a few cases there are six posts. In most instances they appear to have had ridged roofs, though at Glastonbury are some with nine posts, and a central post is found in five-post buildings at Ivinghoe Beacon in Buckinghamshire. In almost all cases these are arranged in streets, implying some defiinite organisation and planning.2 It is perhaps significant that those at Grimthorpe, Humberside, and Wandlebury, Cambridgeshire, are not. Also there was rebuilding on the same site over a long period, but, again perhaps significantly, at Rainsborough, Northants, and at Ivinghoe Beacon the buildings appear to be all of one period. Thus the few examples off the main belt of the distribution do not appear to conform exactly with what might be called the standard type. The guard-rooms appeared some two hundred years after the four-post buildings, but again are of square rooms, usually paired in the inturned entrances. He concluded by saying that he would not fmd it surprising if medieval historians were able to trace along the same belt evidence of the social and organisational ability displayed in the Iron Age. A late medieval distribution which might be compared with that of these hill-forts is that of crucks. The full cruck distribution (Alcock fig. 2,3 revised by Smith fig. 14) does indeed coincide as to region, but so much more thickly and with so many other regions as well that comparison at first appears hardly significant. However, if only the larger cruck buildings are mapped the distribution is very much closer. (Map 2). When apex types are considered, the distribution of form B closely matches that of the hill-forts clustered along the Welsh Marches. (Map 3). This is the type in which the blades meet on a vertical line and are joined together, each blade being cut to carry the ridge-purlin diagonally at the joint. It is possible to regard this as being the superior form of cruck apex, though chronologically not the latest. If type E is added, the resemblance is also close, and these two apex types have been considered together by Smith. 5 It does seem, therefore, that in these superior cruck buildings we have an example of medieval culture which follows the Iron Age distribution pattern. Can we infer from a study of maps 1, 2 and 3 that the people who settled along this belt in the 8th century B.C. brought with them a well-organised society and a building ability which was passed on to their descendants over a period of rather more than two thousand years? During the fifteen years in which he has lived on the Marches, the writer has noticed a comparatively high proportion of people with reddish hair and a tendency to freckles. Thus he was not surprised to fmd that when hair has been tested for reflectance values, there is an unusually large proportion of red hair on the belt, and a relatively high proportion of Blood Group 0.6 Equally, in the United Kingdom, of the nine districts into which the country was divided to show the distribution of colour blindness in men, the three highest are on or partially on the belt.7 The same pattern is shown by one of the Group's members when discussing the proportions of gene r and gene p.8 Having noticed the apparent link between the hill-fort and cruck distributions, the writer wondered if the same ability which had apparently remained in the region over this long period could be seen in other, non-vernacular fields. Using the Penguin Buildings of England series, all examples of ball-flower ornament mentioned were plotted on map 4. The distribution along the limestone belt from Dorset to Lincolnshire was to be expected, for it was here that the good stone which the craftsman could use to advantage was to be found. However, most of these examples are to be found in comparatively small concentrations on such things as piscinae, tomb recesses, friezes and doorways. The really exuberant, mainly external examples are found at Ludlow, Leominster, Hereford, Ledbury, Pershore, Gloucester, Salisbury and a number of ot4er places on the same broad belt from north-west to south-east. The few examples on houses and castles are on the same belt. Thus once again, the building ability and the craftsmanship which goes with it are found along the Marches and down into Wiltshire and Dorset. When one

Archaeology · Archaeology and ancient environmental studies · Archaeology and Historical Studies · History · Maritime and Coastal Archaeology

• Cruck Distributions

  J T Smith•Vernacular Architecture•1975

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• Planned Hillfort Interiors

  Open Access•Graeme Guilbert, G C GUILBERT•Proceedings of the Prehistoric…•1975

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