Burial in Early Anglo-Saxon England refers to the grave and burial customs followed by the Anglo-Saxons between the mid 5th and 7th centuries CE in Early Mediaeval England. There was "an immense range of variation" of burial practice performed by the Anglo-Saxon peoples during this period,[1] with them making use of both cremation and inhumation. In most cases, the "two modes of burial were given to both wealthy and ordinary individuals", and in many cases were found alongside one another in the same cemetery.[1] Both of these forms of burial were typically accompanied by grave goods, which included food, jewellery and weaponry. The actual burials themselves, whether of cremated or inhumated remains, were placed in a variety of sites, including in cemeteries, burial mounds or more rarely, in ship burials.
Within the areas of Anglo-Saxon settlement, there was both regional and temporal variation amongst burial practices.[2] The early Anglo-Saxons were followers of a pagan religion, which is reflected in their burials from this time, whilst they later converted to Christianity in the seventh and eighth centuries CE, something which was again reflected in their burial practices, when cremation ceased to be practiced and inhumation became the sole form of burial, typically being concentrated in Christian cemeteries located adjacent to churches.
In the eighteenth century, antiquarians took an interest in these burials, and began excavating them, although more scientific excavation only began in the twentieth century with the development of archaeology. Prominent Anglo-Saxon burials that have since been discovered and excavated include the early cemetery of Spong Hill in Norfolk and the great sixth-seventh century ship burial of Sutton Hoo in Suffolk.
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Throughout the Anglo-Saxon period, which lasted from the fifth through to the eleventh centuries in the area that became England, burial was the common custom for dealing with the dead. The archaeologist Sam Lucy, a specialist in Anglo-Saxon burial customs, noted that "Treatment of the dead was important to the living of this period: if it was not, we would not have the rich variation in burial rites that we reveal through excavation."[3]
During the preceding period of Roman Britain, it had been the common practice amongst the peoples living in Britain to bury their dead straight into the ground, through inhumation, although a few, rare cremations had taken place.[4] This changed following the Anglo-Saxon migration, which began in the fifth century CE, as Germanic-speaking tribes from continental northern Europe, such as the Angles, Jutes and Saxons, arrived on the island, where their own culture - with its accompanying language and pagan religion - became dominant across much of eastern Britain. Those Romano-British peoples still residing in these areas either adopted this incoming culture and integrated with it or migrated westward.
The Anglo-Saxons brought with them their own heterogenous forms of burial practice, which were distinct from those of the British peoples living in western and northern Britain during the Early Mediaeval.[5] Indeed, these new forms of burial had far more in common with other pagan continental burial practices than those of the largely Christian Romano-British people; as archaeologist Sam Lucy noted, the Anglo-Saxons' burial "rites do indeed imply links with continental Europe in this period."[6] However, not all of those whom were given an Anglo-Saxon burial at this time were necessarily migrants or the descendents of migrants from continental Europe. Some may have been ethnically descended from the earlier Romano-British people, but who had simply adopted the incoming Anglo-Saxon culture as it had become dominant across southern and eastern Britain.[6]
Whilst cremations were common practice for the Anglo-Saxons in the fifth and sixth centuries, they largely died out after this, with only a few later examples having been discovered.[4] During the seventh and eighth centuries, the inclusion of furnished grave goods in inhumations ceased in England, and "While this has been linked to the strengthening of Christian ideology and belief, it is clear from looking at the Frankish burial rites of the sixth century that there was no immediate contradiction between Christianity and the use of grave-goods."[7]
One of the most common ways for Anglo-Saxon peoples to deal with their dead was through inhumation, the burial of the corpse straight into the ground. In many cases, alkaline soils have led to the good preservation of the skeletal remains, enabling archaeologists to excavate inhumated corpses and gain "a great deal of information" from them. Data that can be gathered or inferred from Anglo-Saxon inhumations includes the biological sex or age of the individual, as well as information about their health or lifestyle.[3]
Graves for Anglo-Saxon inhumations varied widely in size, from "a shallow scoop in the ground to a large pit with regular sides over 2 m[etres] long and over 1 m[etre] deep."[8] Although most Anglo-Saxon inhumation burials were of individuals, it is "reasonably common" to find multiple burials from the period. These multiple burials most often contain a couple, quite commonly an adult and a child. In some rarer cases there were actually three or more individuals buried within a grave.[9]
As archaeologist Sam Lucy noted, the bodies in Anglo-Saxon inhumations "are found in a variety of positions. The body can be placed on the back (supine), front (prone), or on one side. The legs can be arranged straight out, be crossed at the lower leg or ankle, be slightly bent (flexed), or even pulled right up to the chest in a foetal position (crouched or contracted)."[10] According to archaeologist David Wilson, "the usual orientation for an inhumation in a pagan Anglo-Saxon cemetery was west-east, with the head to the west, although there were often deviations from this."[11]
Those inhumations that contain the corpse lying on their side may have been laid out such for various reasons. In some cases, such as at Horton Kirby in Kent, it appears that the corpses were bent into such a position in order to fit them into their small graves,[12] however in others they are "in graves which are of ample size and sometimes of quite large dimensions."[13] Those Anglo-Saxon corpses that have been found prone, or face down in their grave, have been interpreted by some archaeologists as having been 'live burials', where the individual was thrown into the grave and buried alive.[10] Other archaeologists have however interpreted such sites in different ways, leading Lucy to note that "There is probably no single explanation for the use of prone burial" amongst the Anglo-Saxons. "In some cases it may be accidental, especially if the burial was in a coffin which had been clumsily handled. In other cases it might have specific significance attached to it".[13]
In some cases, the body was mutilated prior to burial, primarily through decapitation, and there are examples of entire cemeteries being filled with these decapitated corpses, leading archaeologists to conclude that these were sites specifically for the burial of executed individuals.[14] There are few examples of these possible execution cemeteries from the early Anglo-Saxon period, with one exception being the barrow cemetery at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk.[14] Here, several burials containing the corpses of individuals who had been hanged, beheaded or in other way mutilated were placed around Mound 5 on the eastern side of the cemetery. Using radiocarbon dating, archaeologists have determined that the earliest of these may well date from the seventh century CE, and that they continued to be deposited at the site into the ninth and tenth centuries.[15] Later examples of probable Anglo-Saxon execution cemeteries that date from the tenth or eleventh centuries have been found at Five Knolls in Dunstable[16] and Bran Ditch in Fowlmere.[17][18]
There are also examples of decapitated corpses who have been buried in ordinary Anglo-Saxon cemeteries. One unusual example has been found at Loveden Hill in Lincolnshire, where one of the corpses had their head placed on their stomach, and an urn was placed where the head would have been.[19] At Great Addington in Northamptonshire, three decapitated skeletons had been found with stones in place of their heads,[20] whilst at Chadlington in Oxfordshire two corpses had their decapitated heads placed between their legs.[21] At Mitcham in Surrey several inhumations contained extra heads, whilst other graves instead had none or had them placed at the corpses' feet.[22] In some rare cases, at sites in Bideford-on-Avon in Warwickshire and Portway in Hampshire, skulls had been buried on their own by the Anglo-Saxons, without their accompanying bodies.[23]
Certain Anglo-Saxon burials appeared to have ritualistic elements to them, implying that a pagan religious rite was performed over them during the funeral. Whilst there are many multiple burials, where more than one corpse was found in a single grave, that date from the Anglo-Saxon period, there is "a small group of such burials where an interpretation involving ritual practices may be possible". For instance, at Welbeck Hill in Lincolnshire, the corpse of a decapitated woman was placed in reverse on top of the body of an old man, whilst in a number of other similar examples, female bodies were again placed above those of men. This has led some archaeologists to suspect a form of suttee, where the female was the spouse of the male, and was killed to accompany him upon death. Other theories hold that the females were slaves who were viewed as the property of the men, and who were again killed to accompany their master.[24] Similarly, four Anglo-Saxon burials have been excavated where it appears that the individual was buried whilst still alive, which could imply that this was a part of either a religious rite or as a form of punishment.[25]
Alongside inhumation, it was also common for the early Anglo-Saxons to cremate their dead by burning the corpses and then burying the cremated remains within an urn. It is still not definitively known how the Anglo-Saxon peoples cremated their dead. Based upon his examination of cremation practices at Illington, Calvin Wells (1960) speculated that at that site, the bodies had been laid out on the ground, with a pyre then built on top of them before being set alight. Wells believed that this would explain why the shoulder tips of corpses at the site were not always properly cremated.[26] This idea was criticised by Jacqueline McKinley (1994), who argued that such a process would have not properly cremated much of the body due to a lack of oxygen reaching it, and that instead Anglo-Saxon cremation pyres were most likely a criss-cross of timbers filled with brushwood, and that the corpse was laid on top.[27]
The cremated remains were gathered and placed in pottery urns, which were then buried in the ground, most often upright, although in a few rare examples they were instead inverted.[28] At times they were buried individually, each in their own pit, although in other cases, several urns were clustered together in a burial pit.[29]
Like inhumations, cremated remains were sometimes deposited along with grave goods by the Anglo-Saxons, however such sites containing grave goods constitute only "about half of the known cremations".[30] At times, these items were placed on the cremation pyre along with the corpse, and were therefore damaged by the fire. They were then placed, along with the skeletal remains, within an urn for burial. At other times, these grave goods were instead added to the urn unburnt, meaning that they remained intact and undamaged.[31]
Anglo-Saxon burial urns were typically hand-made out of pottery which had in many cases been decorated with various motifs. These have included bosses, stamps and linear incised marks, as well as freehand designs.[32] In the case of many apparently pagan cremation burials, motifs and specific designs were inscribed on the urns. Most notable amongst these was the swastika, which was widely inscribed not only on crematory urns but also on various brooches and other forms of (often female) jewellery as well as on certain pieces of ceremonial weaponry. The archaeologist David Wilson remarked that this "undoubtedly had special importance for the Anglo-Saxons, either magical or religious, or both. It seems very likely that it was the symbol of the thunder god Thunor, and when found on weapons or military gear its purpose would be to provide protection and success in battle." He also noted however that its widespread usage might have led to it becoming "a purely decorative device with no real symbolic importance."[33] Another symbol that has appeared on several pagan artefacts from this period, including burial urns, was the rune ᛏ, which represented the letter T and which has been associated with the god Tiw.[34]
In some rare cases, such as at Baston in Lincolnshire[35] and Drayton in Norfolk,[36] lids were made for these urns, the most elaborate known example of which comes from Spong Hill in Norfolk, where the lid designated C3324 by archaeologists displayed a seated human figure with its head in its hands.[37] In a number of other cases, stones were laid on top of the urns, acting as lids.[38] There are also a number of cases where "window urns" have been uncovered, containing pieces of glass inserted into the fabric of the pottery.[39] Examples of this have been found at such sites as Castle Acre in Norfolk,[40] Helpston in Nottinghamshire,[41] and Haslington in Cambridgeshire.[42]
There are also a few rare cases, such as at Cleatham in Lincolnshire,[43] where instead of making a new pot to bury cremated remains in, Anglo-Saxon peoples re-used older Late Romano-British period urns or pots in their funerary rites.[39] In some other cases, pottery urns were substituted by bronze bowls, with examples being found at Sutton Hoo in Suffolk,[39] at Coombe in Kent,[44] at Illington in Norfolk[45] and at Snape in Suffolk.[46]
Archaeologists know of the existence of around 1,200 Anglo-Saxon cemeteries across England.[47]
Archaeological investigation has displayed that structures or buildings were built inside a number of pagan cemeteries, and as David Wilson noted, "The evidence, then, from cemetery excavations is suggestive of small structures and features, some of which may perhaps be interpreted as shrines or sacred areas".[48] In some cases, there is evidence of far smaller structures being built around or alongside individual graves, implying possible small shrines to the dead individual or individuals buried there.[49] At the cemetery of Apple Down in Sussex, four-post structures were discovered, mostly situated over cremations, and the excavators Down and Welch theorised that these were the remains of small, roofed huts that contained the cremated deposits of a single family.[50]
In the late sixth century, well over a century after the Anglo-Saxon peoples had become dominant in eastern Britain, they adopted a new burial practice for the deceased members of the wealthy social elite: their burial in tumuli, which are also known as barrows or burial mounds.
This practice had been adopted by the members of the Merovingian dynasty who ruled the Franks in Francia (modern France) during the fifth century. During the sixth century, they had gained increasing influence over the Anglo-Saxon Kingdom of Kent, eventually leading to a marriage alliance between the two. The Kentish elites subsequently adopted the practice of tumuli burial, and from here it spread north of the Thames, being adopted by the elites in other Anglo-Saxon kingdoms.[51] It has also been suggested that some of the Anglo-Saxons may have adopted the practice from native Britons.[52]
Indeed, barrows had been constructed for burial in Britain during the Neolithic, Bronze Age, Iron Age and Romano-British periods prior to the Anglo-Saxon arrival. In many cases, Anglo-Saxons reused these earlier monuments rather than constructing their own.[52] Barrow burials continued to be practiced by the Anglo-Saxons throughout the seventh century, but had effectively died out by the eighth.
Another form of burial was that of ship burials, which were practiced by many of the Germanic peoples across northern Europe. In many cases it seems that the corpse was placed within a ship which was then either sent out to sea or left on land, but in both cases then set alight. In Suffolk however, ships were not burned, but buried, as is the case at Sutton Hoo, which it is believed, was the resting place of the king of the East Angles, Raedwald.[52] Both ship and tumulus burials were described in the Beowulf poem, through the funerals of Scyld Scefing and Beowulf respectively.
Both pagan and Christian Anglo-Saxons buried their dead with grave goods. Amongst the earlier Anglo-Saxons who adhered to pagan beliefs, such goods accompanied both inhumated and cremated remains.
In some cases, animal skulls, particularly oxen but also pig, were buried in human graves, a practice that was also found in earlier Roman Britain.[53]
The earliest record of post-Anglo-Saxon peoples excavating an Anglo-Saxon burial comes from the twelfth century, when Roger of Wendover described how several monks dug up the burial mounds at Redbourne, Hertfordshire in search of the bones of Saint Amphibalus, a Roman period priest.[54] A later documented case occurred in the seventeenth century, when Sir Thomas Browne published a pamphlet entitled Hydrotaphia, Urn Buriall (1658), in which he described some cremation urns found in Norfolk, and which whilst being Anglo-Saxon, he mistakenly assumed were from the Romano-British period instead. Describing these finds, Browne related that "In a Field of old Walsingham not many months past were digged up between forty and fifty urns, deposited in a dry and sandy soil, not a yard deep, not far from one another... some containing two pounds of bones, distinguishable in skulls, ribs, jaws, thigh-bones, and teeth, with fresh impressions of their combustion".[55]
Despite these earlier excavations, the archaeologist Sam Lucy remarked that "the accolade of being the first excavators of Anglo-Saxon cemeteries should really go to two Kentish gentlemen clerics".[56] The first of these was the antiquarian Reverend Bryan Faussett, who excavated at several Kentish sites, such as Gilton, Kingstone Down, Chartham Down and Sibertswold, between 1759 and 1773. In all, he uncovered about 750 graves during this period, all of which he recorded in his field notebooks, in which he noted anatomical details, but like Browne before him, he mistakenly attributed them to the Romano-British period. Following his death in 1776, Faussett's notes were written up and published in 1856 as the Inventorium Sepulchrale by Charles Roach Smith, who added his own commentary to the work.[56]
The second of these antiquarian Kentish clerics was the Captain, and later Reverend, James Douglas, who excavated at such sites as Chatham Lines and Greenwich Park from 1779 to 1793. He published his findings in a book entitled Nenia Brittanica (1793). Douglas was the first to identify burials of this type as being Anglo-Saxon rather than Romano-British in nature, coming to this conclusion because of "Their situation near villages of [Anglo-]Saxon names" and the fact that "They are scattered all over Britain in places which the [Anglo-]Saxons occupied, and are not discovered in the parts of Wales which they had not subdued."[57]
Although some antiquarians had made attempts to excavate and catalogue the Anglo-Saxon grave-sites, on the whole, such sites were commonly damaged and destroyed in eighteenth and early nineteenth century England, with little attempt being made to properly study them. Due to the Society of Antiquaries' inability to act on the situation, in 1843, Charles Roach Smith and Thomas Wright, both of whom had a great interest in the Anglo-Saxons, founded the British Archaeological Association (BAA), which held its first conference the following year in Canterbury.[58] The leadership of the BAA began campaigning for better rights for native British archaeology, asking for it to be protected legally and to be recognised by major institutions. When the British Museum refused to purchase Faussett's collection of Anglo-Saxon artefacts following his grandson's death in 1853, Roach Smith complained that "not only does the Government begin with gathering the monuments, ancient and modern, of all foreign countries, but it ends there also. Our national antiquities are not even made subservient and placed in the lowest grade; they are altogether unrecognised and ignored."[59]