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For this programme, Tony and the Team descended on the orchards of Kent to search for the site of the lost Anglo-Saxon palace of Eastry – and investigated not one but two likely contenders.
One site seemed to have it all: lots of Saxon brooches discovered by metal detectorists, a prominent position on a hilltop, and what looks like the remains of three defensive ditches on aerial photographs.
But a mile away the owner of Eastry Court, one of the oldest houses in England, believes that his gardens hold the remains of the palace.
It was up to the archaeologists to try to find out what's really going on. But their quest turned out to be anything but straightforward and the definitive evidence for anything like a palace was to prove difficult to pin down.
Watched the programme, browsed the web pages? Now try our quick quiz to see how you get on.
What was the name of the people who were the main group of Anglo-Saxon incomers to Kent?
The Angles
The Jades
The Jutes
Which other area, as well as Kent, is supposed to have been a centre of settlement by the Jutes, according to ancient accounts?
Middlesex
Isle of Wight
East Anglia
One suggestion made during this programme was that the hill at Eastry might have been used as an Anglo-Saxon meeting place. What is the name for such a place?
Moot
Mart
Market
According to the earliest surviving accounts, about two centuries later, who were the first Anglo-Saxons in Kent?
Settlers
Mercenaries
Invaders
In which century was the Anglo Saxon Chronicle compiled?
Fifth
Seventh
Ninth
Why was it initially difficult for Time Team's experts to tell whether a brooch found at Eastry was Victorian or Anglo-Saxon?
Victorians copied Saxon designs
Saxons copied Victorian designs
Both copied classical designs
Answers here.
'Yet again, Time Team has failed to find an Anglo-Saxon palace.' Tony Robinson's tongue-in-cheek comment at the end of this Time Team investigation was only partly tinged with disappointment. Because while there may have been no palace for the diggers to get their trowels into, Time Team's archaeologists and historians did find out enough about Anglo-Saxon Eastry to hazard a reasonable guess at where any Saxon palace would have been.
In the 7th century AD, two centuries after the first Saxons made their homes in the area, an Anglo-Saxon community would have thrived at Eastry. Near to a Roman road and the coast, it would have been an important and powerful centre for east Kent. It was known that a Saxon palace had once stood somewhere in this area, and high status finds on nearby Highborough Hill led the Team to think that it might have been located there. Excavations found no evidence of Anglo-Saxon structures or settlement on the site, however, and only limited finds. A ditch discovered towards the end of the dig, pursuing geophysics survey results, may have been Anglo-Saxon but could be dated only uncertainly by one piece of Saxon pottery.
The hill is 'a mystery wrapped in an enigma', Time Team's Helen Geake concluded at the end of the dig. The Team's experts felt that the site was most likely an Anglo-Saxon ritual centre, where valuable offerings were made. This would explain the piece of Anglo-Saxon brooch and other valuable finds made on the site by metal detectorists. A large number of detectorists were also called in for Time Team's investigation. One found a pretty red garnet brooch that had the experts hopeful for a while, but it turned out to be Victorian. Otherwise, finds on the hill were limited and inconclusive about possible Saxon uses of the site. Most of the discoveries were medieval.
Stewart Ainsworth's investigations of the local landscape, using old maps and other records, suggested another site for any Anglo-Saxon palace at Eastry. He was able to reveal that the hill at Eastry was on a network of ancient roads, linking it with an Anglo-Saxon centre at Eastry itself. At the heart of this centre was a rectangular enclosure that can still be identified in the landscape today, and which contains the modern-day village church, recreation ground and Eastry Court, whose owner was keen for Time Team to prove that any former palace once stood where he lives today.
The Team put in trenches at both Eastry Court and the recreation ground but found no signs of Anglo-Saxon settlement. That still left most of the rectangular enclosure at Eastry unexplored, however. Any palace could have stood under existing buildings on the site, as well as on land that the Team was unable to survey – which included the two thirds of the enclosure to which the owner would not grant access.
Silversmith Ray Walton worked on this week's programme making a replica Saxon brooch. Unfortunately the reconstruction cameo didn't make the final cut of the programme, but you can still find out about the cameo here.
You had to make a copy of a brooch found at Eastry. How did you do it?
What a challenge! The section of the brooch found near Eastry is a fine example of the incredible craftsmanship of the Anglo-Saxon jewellers. I realised that in the time permitted the real quality of the original could not be achieved, so it was decided to concentrate on the basic principles behind the manufacture.
What was the process?
These disc brooches were made in two parts. Two circular discs of gold are cut. The disc for the front of the brooch is then carefully marked out, and by using the techniques of chasing and repousse the design is formed. This process requires the metal to be annealed (heated) fairly frequently. To achieve the same quality of the original, three to four days would be needed. The small size of the intricately interwoven knots is the most challenging part.
Were there any jewels in the piece you made?
Next comes the fitting of the stones. This element of these brooches is perhaps the most difficult and fascinating part. For the original, a garnet – a beautiful red semi-precious stone – was cut. With the utmost precision this was set into the brooch with a very thin gold foil underneath. This is geometrically patterned to reflect the light back through the stones. The time and cost of this part of the piece meant that we had to use glass and hopefully achieve a fair representation. When the glass had been cut and fitted, the back plate with the brooch fittings (pin and catch) had to be soldered on. The brooch was then assembled and the edges of the back plate hammered up and around to trap the front and stones within it.
It sounds a fascinating piece of work. Did you enjoy it?
I found this project extremely interesting and such a contrast to my previous Time Team experience on Time Team Live 2001, where I spent three days hammering up a replica Byzantine bucket at a site in Hampshire. Both were great fun!
The Anglo-Saxons edited by James Campbell, Eric John and Patrick Wormald (Penguin, 1991) paperback £16
Three experts have collaborated to produce this complete, illustrated guide to the Anglo-Saxons, from their arrival in England to their conversion to Christianity and defence of Britain against Viking attacks.
An Archaeology of the Early Anglo-Saxon Kingdoms by C J Arnold (Routledge, new edition 1997) paperback £17.99
The key introduction to Anglo-Saxon studies and the polemics spurring research in this field. The book deals with the major questions concerning how Christian medieval England emerged from the chaotic and pagan Dark Ages.
Anglo-Saxon England and the Norman Conquest by H R Loyn (Addison Wesley Longman Higher Education, 1991) paperback £20.99
More than 30 years since its first edition, this book still remains a standard text on the social and economic development of Anglo-Saxon England from the first settlements in the fifth and sixth centuries AD to the immediate aftermath of the Norman Conquest. It draws on surviving legal and literary sources, as well as the latest findings of archaeologists, numismatists and art historians.
The Archaeology of Anglo-Saxon England edited by Catherine E Karkoy (Garland Publishing, 1999) hardback £50
This volume offers comprehensive coverage of the archaeology of Anglo-Saxon England, bringing together essays on specific fields, sites and objects, and offering the reader a representative range of both traditional and modern methodologies and interdisciplinary approaches to the subject. Individual sections deal with settlement archaeology, the archaeology of church and monastery, death and burial and women and the material record.
The Anglo-Saxon World by Kevin Crossley-Holland (Oxford University Press, 1999) paperback £6.99
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle translated and edited by Michael Swanton (Dent, 1996) paperback £12.99
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle is the first continuous national history of any Western people in their own language. This translation is the most complete and faithful yet published, with extensive notes referring the entries to current knowledge as well as to maps and genealogical tables.
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle translated and edited by Michael Swanton (Exeter University Press, 1999) £5.99
A basic translation without the notes, maps and tables that accompany the above.
Kings and Kingdoms of Anglo-Saxon England by Barbara Yorke (Routledge, 1990, new edition 1997) £18.99 ISBN: 041516639X
Wessex in the Early Middle Ages by Barbara Yorke (Leicester University Press, 1995) £25 ISBN: 071851856X
The Anglo-Saxons by Barbara Yorke (Sutton Publishing, 1999) £5.99 ISBN: 0750922206
Barbara Yorke's work in assembling the evidence for a Jutish kingdom in south Hampshire featured in a debate between Time Team's Robin Bush and Helen Geake during the Time Team Live 2001. The first two of Barbara Yorke's books listed here cover this subject in depth, while The Anglo-Saxons reviews the main events of the period 400 to 1066 and the legacy left by the Anglo-Saxons.
Channel 4 is not responsible for the content of third-party sites.
Other websites.
What was the name of the people who were the main group of Anglo-Saxon incomers to Kent?
The Jutes
Which other area, as well as Kent, is supposed to have been a centre of settlement by the Jutes, according to ancient accounts?
Isle of Wight
One suggestion made during this programme was that the hill at Eastry might have been used as an Anglo-Saxon meeting place. What is the name for such a place?
Moot
According to the earliest surviving accounts, about two centuries later, who were the first Anglo-Saxons in Kent?
Mercenaries
In which century was the Anglo Saxon Chronicle compiled?
Ninth
Why was it initially difficult for Time Team's experts to tell whether a brooch found at Eastry was Victorian or Anglo-Saxon?
Both copied classical designs