An early medieval cemetery excavated under student housing at the University of Cambridge is described as ‘one of the most exciting finds of Anglo – Saxon archeology since the 19th century’.
King’s College discovers the ‘expanded’ cemetery, which contains more than 60 graves, after a group of 1930s buildings demolished that had just housed graduates and staff in the west of the city, to make way for more modern halls.
About 200 objects in the tombs, including bronze brooches, beaded chains, swords, short blades, pottery and glass bottles, were systematically uncovered. Most date from the early Anglo-Saxon period (c400-650 CE), although evidence of Iron Age structures and Roman earthworks has also been found.
Dr Caroline Goodson, who teaches early medieval history at King’s, said the human remains they found were remarkably ‘well preserved’. “The basic soil, which is typical here, did not decompose the bones.”
This is important because it will enable archaeologists to apply many modern scientific techniques to reveal the diet and DNA of the dead, enabling migration and family relationships.
Goodson said excavators were “surprised” to find so many tombs and such an extensive early medieval cemetery, surrounded by Roman ditches and so close to the remains of Roman Cambridge. According to Bede’s Church History, written in the eighth century, Cambridge, like many other Roman towns, was abandoned when the Romans withdrew their military forces from England during the 5th century. “We already know that Cambridge has not been completely abandoned. But what we see now is a larger and clearer picture of life in the post-Roman settlements. ”
Goodson speculates that people living in Cambridgeshire were a mixture of descendants of former Roman populations and recent migrants to Britain from the mainland, who lived in a post-imperial world.
Excavation site
‘They no longer live as the Romans did, they eat differently, dress differently and find different ways to utilize the land. They change the way of life during a period of considerable fluidity. ‘
Some of the finds raise questions about the emotional connection people had during the funerals with the Romans who lived in Cambridge before them. In one grave, archaeologists have found a body buried with what appears to be a late Roman piece of glass like a small barrel to store wine.
“It seems that a classical Roman object was reused as a tombstone in a post-Roman context.” Another tomb looks like a typical late-Roman burial from the fifth century, suggesting that there may have been continuity of the use of the tomb from the Roman period. “It’s going to be really interesting,” Goodson said.
So far, archaeologists have not found ‘strong evidence’ that people in the sixth century still chose to bury their dead near late Roman tombs, but there are still few cemeteries of this size scientifically excavated using modern methods and technologies, such as advanced radiocarbon. dating techniques and isotopic analysis.
“It would be great to say very clearly – and we need a wide range of carbon-14 dates to do so – that we are using people from the fifth to the seventh centuries to use this site,” Goodson says. “We can see that the burial of the dead and the treatment of their bodies is of particular importance to the living in a different way than elsewhere in the post-Roman world.” It points to a different worldview and a different ‘cosmology’: ‘This is a new form of commemoration.’
She hopes to find out if anyone in the cemetery died from the Justinian plague, a pandemic that raged across Europe in the 540s.
“I’m really interested in finding out if it was in Cambridge too and how much it has to do with what’s going on.”