The origins of England's regional cultures are here shown to be strongly
influenced by the natural environment and geographical features.
The Anglo-Saxon period was crucial in the development of England's
character: its language, and much of its landscape and culture, were
forged in the period between the fifth and the eleventh centuries.
Historians and archaeologists have long been fascinated by its regional
variations, by the way in which different parts of the country displayed
marked differences in social structures, settlement patterns, and field
systems. In this controversial and wide-ranging study, the author argues
that such differences were largely a consequence of environmental
factors: of the influence of climate, soils and hydrology, and of the
patterns of contact and communication engendered by natural topography.
He also suggests that such environmental influences have been neglected
over recent decades by generations of scholars who are embedded in an
urban culture and largely divorced from the natural world; and that an
appreciation of the fundamental role of physical geography in shaping
human affairs can throw much new light on a number of important debates
about early medieval society.
The book will be essential reading for all those interestedin the
character of the Anglo-Saxon and Scandinavian settlements, in early
medieval social and territorial organization, and in the origins of the
England's medieval landscapes.
Tom Williamson is Professor of LandscapeHistory, University of East
Anglia; he has written widely on landscape archaeology, agricultural
history, and the history of landscape design.
