Forts and Fields: a Study of 'Monastic Towns' in Seventh and Eighth
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Forts and Fields: A Study of 'Monastic Towns' in Seventh and Eighth Century Ireland Author(s): Catherine Swift Reviewed work(s): Source: The Journal of Irish Archaeology, Vol. 9 (1998), pp. 105-125 Published by: Wordwell Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30001695 . Accessed: 25/02/2013 09:54 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Wordwell Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to The Journal of Irish Archaeology. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded on Mon, 25 Feb 2013 09:54:39 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions The Journal of Irish Archaeology, IX 1998 FORTS AND FIELDS: A STUDY OF 'MONASTIC TOWNS' IN SEVENTH AND EIGHTH CENTURY IRELAND' CATHERINE SWIFT Due to the work of CharlesDoherty, the phrase'monastic century 'monastic town' at Kildare is raised in his town' is now part of the common parlanceof medieval analysis of an extractfrom Cogitosus'sLife of Brigit" Irish archaeology and settlement studies. This was a phrase which had earlier been used by 0 Corrain2to And what words are capableof setting forththe characterisemajor eighth- and ninth-centurychurches. very greatbeauty of this churchand the Doherty popularised the expression in three articles countless wondersof that monasterywhich we written in the first half of the 1980s. In these, it was may call city (civitas) if it is possible to call city argued that, after ecclesiastical sites adopteda standard that which is enclosed by no circle of walls. format in the seventh and eighth centuries,they became However,since innumerablepeople come 'urban' from the tenth century. His model has been togetherwithin it and acquiringthe name city accepted by medieval archaeologistssuch as Bradley, because of its throngsthis is a very great Edwards and, to some extent, by Ryan.' In contrast, metropolitan city (civitas et metropolitana); in Mallory and McNeill have drawna distinctionbetween its suburbs(suburbana), the clear boundariesof early church sites as major centres of resources(which which holy Brigit markedout herself,no human they see as plausible)and the same sites as large centres foe or chargeof enemies is feared.But it is a city of population (with which they disagree). Grahamhas of refuge (civitas refugii),the safest amongthe pointedout thatthere is no knownparallel for a theoryof externalsurburbs (suburbana) with all their urbanisationfounded almost entirelyon monasticismand fugitives in all the lands of the Irish.' argues that the lack of a precise definition of the 'monastic town' compromises Doherty's concept. The specifically 'urban' language here is Elsewhere, Graham has suggested that such 'proto- supported in Doherty's model by analysis of eighth- towns' should be viewed in the contextof mixed secular century canons which he interpretsas referringto the and ecclesiastical settlementswhich he postulatesas the presence of a lay populationliving on the peripheryof norm in early medievalIreland from the seventhcentury.' major monasteries.'"The ceremonial complex at the More recently,Valante has queriedthe whole concept of centre of the settlement is left relatively free from an Irish monastic town on the groundsthat she sees no habitation while the suburbana, known as the ferann evidence for early ecclesiasticalsites being the 'hub of a fognama in Irish, were service lands, inhabited by redistributivesystem', nor for their 'urban' status. She monastictenants." Doherty leaves the questionof density defines urbanas 'distinct from a ruralsettlement where of populationon these settlementsopen; pointingout that the majority of denizens rely on agricultural 'in the courseof time' majormonasteries had a population production...'and suggests thatin a pre-industrialsociety, reflectingall gradesof society fromserf to noble and that commerce, manufacturingand provision of services are not all who lived within monastic settlements or on obvious possibilities for a non-farmingeconomic base.6 monastic property could be classed as 'religious'.' Up until recently, the concept of the Irish Despite the reference to service lands, the over-all monastictown was basedalmost entirely on documentary emphasisof Doherty'swork on the urbanassociations of material with relatively little archaeological evidence early ecclesiasticalsettlements has resultedin his model being deployed. Recently, however, Bradley has being interpretedby subsequentcommentators such as 6 publisheda definitionof an Irishmonastic town in which Corrniin,Mytum, Bitel, Stoutand, by inference,Bradley" the criteria for inclusion are as much archaeologicalas as indicatingthe existence of largenucleated and 'urban' historical, namely settlementcomplexity with a central or 'proto-urban'settlements from the seventh or eighth core where majorchurch buildings are located,domestic century. houses and workshops,streets, fairs and trade,enclosure My purposein this paperis to examine a number and defence and an importantpolitical role for the site.' of the words and phrasesused to describe ecclesiastical On the otherhand, the case studyof Clonmacnoisewhich settlementin the eighth-centurycollection of Irish canon he provides is still largely dependenton documentary law, the Collectio Canonum Hibernensis.'" I believe that referencesand for the most partrefers to the eleventhand since our currentarchaeological interpretation of larger twelfth centuries.Archaeological investigation by King ecclesiasticalsites is so heavily influencedby Doherty's and others at Clonmacnoise has producedevidence of model, it is importantfor archaeologiststo discuss these settlement at that ecclesiastical centre but evidence of documentarysources in detail.A detailed investigationof density and date have yet to be publishedin detail. the words in the Hibernensis, with due regardfor their In Doherty'swork, the possibilityof a seventh- biblical and vernacularcounterparts, has led me to three 105 This content downloaded on Mon, 25 Feb 2013 09:54:39 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions general conclusions which I would like to contributeto a great advantage in the huge number and variety of the debate.Firstly, I do not believe thatthe textualsources surviving texts in the vernacular. To an extent supportthe suggestionthat Irishecclesiastical settlements unparalleledin other northerncultures, it is possible to were 'urban' in the sense that they housed large test the meaning of Latin words and phrases used by concentratedpopulations in the late seventh or eighth medieval Irishwriters by looking at theirOld and Middle centuries. Rather, they appear to reflect a dispersed Irishcounterparts. This is a vitally importantresource for pattern with little or no evidence for nucleation. The Irisharchaeologists, eager to identifythe monumentsand churchbuildings are surroundedby fields andpasture and settlementtypes describedin our documents.On the other the people associated with the settlement lived in hand,it is importantthat we acknowledgecertain features dwellings spread across the local landscape. Secondly, in this data base, as presently constituted,which limits there is no single precise translationfor the many Latin any attemptto use Irishlanguage sources in this way. words used to describechurch-settlements and these were The numberof scholars working in the field of frequently viewed as synonyms by the Hiberno-Latin Old Irish is historicallyvery small and the productionof writers.Thirdly, I would argue that the languageused to the Dictionary of the Irish Language has involved the describeecclesiastical settlement does not differfrom that energies of many of the key figures working in the field pertaining to secular sites and that, in over-all between 1913 and 1976. Such men and women were organisation, the layout of both were probably linguists, interested in the grammaticalcomplexities of comparable. the Irish language and, for the most part, particularly concernedto elucidatethe connectionsbetween Irishand WORDS AS ARCHAEOLOGICALEVIDENCE its ancestor Common Celtic and, further back, Indo- A major problem in any such enquiry concerns the European.As archaeologists,we tend to imagine that the difficulties imposed by the various languagesinvolved. primaryfocus of a dictionaryis translation,but as least as The Hibernensis was written in Latin, a language in important to the Dictionary compilers was the common use throughoutWestern Europe during the early identificationof specific stem classes (for nouns) and the MiddleAges as a sacredor cult language.'"It presentedan ancestralpre-verbs which made up the verbal complexes amalgamof Christianand indeed of Romantradition to in Old Irish. English translationswere often not their its medieval Irish audience and as such, it does not and primaryinterest and they tended to be taken verbatim cannotreflect a single materialculture. The realitywhich from editions extantat the time the particularsection was lies behind the use of specific words in such a 'cultic' being compiled. Many of the translationsfor material language thus becomes difficult, if not impossible to objects, for example,