Village Formation in the Netherlands During the Middle Ages (AD 800 - 1600) an Assessment of Recent Excavations and a Path to Progress
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Nederlandse Archeologische Rapporten 056 Village Formation in the Netherlands during the Middle Ages (AD 800 - 1600) An assessment of recent excavations and a path to progress J.P.W. Verspay, A.M.J.H. Huijbers, H. van Londen, J. Renes and J. Symonds Village Formation in the Netherlands during the Middle Ages (AD 800 – 1600) An assessment of recent excavations and a path to progress J.P.W. Verspay, A.M.J.H. Huijbers, H. van Londen, J. Renes and J. Symonds Colophon Nederlandse Archeologische Rapporten 56 Village Formation in the Netherlands during the Middle Ages (AD 800 – 1600) An assessment of recent excavations and a path to progress Project management: H. van Londen (University of Amsterdam) Authors: J.P.W. Verspay (University of Amsterdam/University of West Bohemia), A.M.J.H. Huijbers (BAAC), J. Renes (Utrecht University), J. Symonds (University of Amsterdam), H. van Londen (University of Amsterdam) Authorisation: M. Groothedde & H.A.C. Fermin (Bureau Archeologie, gemeente Zutphen) Illustrations: J.P.W. Verspay (University of Amsterdam/University of West Bohemia), unless otherwise stated Cover: The old village square of Wassenaar with figures from Pieter Breughel the Elder (painted ca. 1560-1569) Editors: J. Symonds & H. van Londen (University of Amsterdam) Proofreading: Andrea Travaglia (University of Amsterdam) Layout & production: Xerox OBT, The Hague Print: Xerox OBT, The Hague ISBN/EAN: 9789057992940 © Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands, Amersfoort, 2018 Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands Postbus 1600 3800 BP Amersfoort www.cultureelerfgoed.nl 3 Table of Content — Foreword 5 Case I – Warnsveld (Gelderland) 111 Samenvating 9 Case II – Kerk-Avezaath and Kapel-Avezaath (Gelderland) 149 Summary 11 Case III – Someren (North Brabant) 181 1 Introduction 19 Case IV – Limmen (Noord-Holland) 203 2 Research framework 21 8 Comparison with the wider archaeological 3 Aims and questions 23 region 225 3.1 Problem 23 8.1 Testing the regional models 225 3.2 Aims 23 8.2 In search of the common ground 232 3.3 Research questions 24 8.3 Regional extrapolation 233 3.4 Limitations 24 8.4 Conclusion from regional extrapolation 279 4 Conceptual framework 27 9 Synthesis 283 4.1 Defnitions 27 9.1 Village formation in the Netherlands (ca. 800-1600): 4.2 Location of setlements 34 Integrating the perspective 283 4.3 Modelling Commensality (1): Anthropological 9.2 Answering our research questions 284 Perspectives on social processes and village 9.3 Closing remarks 288 formation 35 4.4 Modelling Commensality (2): Historical 10 Recommendations for further research 295 Perspectives on social processes and village 10.1 The consequences of the Dutch archaeology formation 39 system for synthesising studies 295 4.5 Village morphology: a brief historiography 44 10.2 A revaluation of the main theme: 4.6 Villages and village formation in the Netherlands: Village formation 297 some general remarks 51 10.3 The evaluation of the current questions for 4.7 Villages and village formation: a European synthesis 299 perspective 65 10.4 Proposed research questions and 4.8 Village Formation in the Netherlands (c.800-1600): operationalisation for feld research 300 Integrating Theoretical Perspectives 68 10.5 Data from historical village centres 306 10.6 Specifc research on village formation 306 5. Methods and operationalisation 71 5.1 Archaeological manifestations 71 11 Literature 309 5.2 Archaeological indicators 73 11.1 Report 309 5.3 Inventory of archaeological sites 75 11.2 Assessment 325 5.4 Inventory of medieval setlements and churches 78 5.5 Inventory of conceptual models 79 Appendices 339 5.6 Inventory of historical-geographical case studies 79 5.7 Analysis 80 6 Inventories 83 6.1 Inventory of archaeological sites 83 6.2 Inventory of medieval villages and churches 94 6.3 Inventory of regional models 96 6.4 Inventory of historical geographical case studies 101 6.5 Outcome of the joint inventories 101 7 The case studies 109 7.1 A historical-geographical perspective 109 7.2 An anthropological perspective 109 5 Foreword — It is an unfortunate truism that while all Village Formation in the Netherlands, c. 800 – 1600, archaeological feldwork generates new data, has temporal as well as spatial depth, and sets this does not always lead to new understandings out to survey the large number of unpublished of the past. The system of commercial client reports that have been produced by archaeology that currently exists in many parts of contracting organizations across the Western Europe is very good at accumulating Netherlands in the last decade. From the baseline data on the presence or absence of perspective of a British interloper, this is a archaeological features, along with their state of familiar exercise. preservation, and possible date, and rarity. Many similar resource assessments have been Unfortunately, it seldom has the resources or the commissioned by government heritage agencies wherewithal to address higher level in the UK, and these assessments have ofen led archaeological questions. Put simply, a lot of to the formulation of new research agendas, and archaeological efort is expended answering research frameworks, to use the jargon of Historic ‘what’ and ‘where’ questions in relation to the England.1 foot print of specifc development proposals, and rather less time is spent considering ‘why’ and Some of the most useful period overviews in the ‘how’ such archaeologically observable paterns UK have been undertaken by academics and came into being and changed over time. university-based teams.2 This reinforces my belief that a healthy national cultural heritage Few would disagree that commercial and archaeology system needs three pillars: archaeology has sent a lot of soil fying from a strong and competent body of contracting feld shovels, or that the serried ranks of comb-bound archaeologists; a skilled and well-resourced body client reports that fll the shelves of municipal of curatorial archaeologists, to oversee work and archaeology ofces across the Netherlands have set standards at local, regional, and national not enhanced local knowledge in some way. levels; and a vibrant community of university All localities, afer all, are historical researchers to synthesize data, question the constructions. Hence, the chance discovery of results, and to generate new directions for a medieval building in a public utilities trench, research in partnership with contractors and or the shadow of a long lost feld system seen on curators. As with all other atempts to assess an air photograph, can mean a great deal to a a large body of grey literature, this review has local historian, or to inquisitive school children, uncovered signifcant diferences in quantity, whose school projects implore them to fnd as the numbers of reports have varied between historical signifcance, and a sense of place, in the regions, as well as the quality of reports. place where they live. But all too ofen the The reports that we have scrutinised have ranged results of contract work languish in the from the good, to the bad, to the down-right dungeons of grey literature and are only ugly. This brings me back to the point that simply accessible to and read by a handful of doing archaeology is not enough; every contractor individuals: the project architect, the developer’s should follow a fexible but pre-determined agent, the municipal archaeologist, and the project research design, and the standard of feld development control ofcer in the planning work and reporting should be closely monitored department at the local council. Make no by curatorial archaeologists. mistake, these positions are invariably held by highly motivated and skilled individuals, but It is of course a particular strength of anyone who has atended a local planning archaeology in the Netherlands that well-run inquiry will tell you that such individuals city and regional archaeology services are able to represent only a narrow spectrum of humanity. provide a one-stop service to commercial clients by ofering both curatorial advice and It was therefore a privilege to be invited by the contracting services. In the UK, and other Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands countries, these two activities have been (RCE) to assess the kinds of archaeological separated by local government authorities in an knowledge that have been generated by a efort to avoid any potential confict of interest. 1 Olivier 1996; Miles 2015. decade of commercial archaeology as part of This has opened up a free-market for 2 Bradley 2006; 2007; Fulford & Holbrook 2015; Haselgrove et al. 2012; Smith et al. the Valleta Harvest project. Our topic, archaeological services, but has arguably led to 2016. 6 — a loss of local knowledge and an inconsistent evidence and came to characterize more than approach being taken towards medieval and half a century of research at Wharram Percy, other archaeological sites, as out-of-region in Yorkshire.4 Interdisciplinarity, then, has been contracting organisations win contracts and central to research into medieval setlements move in on the basis of the lowest priced tender. and landscapes in the Anglo-Saxon world, and is a key feature of this report. Without wishing to pre-empt the fndings of this review, it is possible to make a few general A fnal word should be said about the framing of points about the importance of studying the research question, or rather how we might medieval rural landscapes. First, this new best approach the study of medieval village assessment of village formation is in my view formation on the Netherlands? From the potentially signifcant, as it addresses the gap in evidence contained within this report, along knowledge that exists between medieval towns, with medieval setlement studies that have been which are archaeologically far beter understood conducted in other parts of Europe, two things than dispersed medieval rural setlements in the are clear.