Cadbury Castle, Somerset

Template:Short description Template:About Template:Good article Template:Use dmy dates Template:Infobox ancient site Cadbury Castle is a Bronze and Iron Age hillfort in the civil parish of South Cadbury in the English county of Somerset. It is a scheduled monument<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and has been associated with King Arthur's legendary court at Camelot.

The hillfort is formed by a Template:Convert plateau surrounded by ramparts on the surrounding slopes of the limestone Cadbury Hill. The site has been excavated in the late 19th and early 20th century by James Bennett and Harold St George Gray. More recent examination of the site was conducted in the 1960s by Leslie Alcock and since 1992 by the South Cadbury Environs Project. These have revealed artifacts from human occupation and use from the Neolithic through the Bronze and Iron Ages. The site was reused by the Roman forces and again from c. 470 until some time after 580. In the 11th century, it temporarily housed a Saxon mint. Evidence of various buildings at the site has been unearthed, including a "Great Hall", round and rectangular house foundations, metalworking, and a possible sequence of small rectangular temples or shrines.

Etymology

The suffix -bury (from byrig, an Anglo-Saxon word meaning "fort" or "town") is frequently, but not exclusively, used to refer to hill-forts. The first part of the name may come from the River Cam, as with the nearby villages of West Camel and Queen Camel.<ref name=ntironage>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Sfn Other scholars suggest a derivation from some figure named "Cador" or "Cada".Template:Sfn It is one of three sites in Somerset to include the Cadbury name, the others being Cadbury Camp, near Tickenham, and Cadbury Hill, which is also known as Cadbury-Congresbury to distinguish it from the other sites.

Background

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Hillforts developed in the Late Bronze and Early Iron ages, around the start of the 1st millennium BC.Template:Sfn The reason for their emergence in prehistoric Britain and their purpose has been a subject of debate. It has been argued that they could have been military sites constructed in response to invasion from continental Europe, sites built by invaders, or a military reaction to social tensions caused by an increasing population and consequent pressure on agriculture. The dominant view since the 1960s has been that the increasing use of iron led to social changes in Britain. Deposits of iron ore were located in different places from the tin and copper ore necessary to make bronze and, as a result, trading patterns shifted. The old elites lost their economic and social status and power passed into the hands of a new group of people.Template:Sfn

Archaeologist Barry Cunliffe believes that population increase still played a role and has stated that Template:Blockquote

Location

Cadbury Castle is located Template:Convert north east of Yeovil. It stands on the summit of Cadbury Hill, a limestone hill situated on the southern edge of the Somerset Levels, with flat lowland to the north. The summit is Template:Cvt above sea-level on lias stone.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn

The hill is surrounded by terraced earthwork banks and ditches and a stand of trees. On the north west and south sides there are four ramparts, with two remaining on the east. The summit plateau covers Template:Convert,<ref name="nhle">Template:National Heritage List for England</ref><ref name="sher54552" /> and is surrounded by the inner bank which is Template:Convert long.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The hill fort is overlooked by Sigwells, a rural plateau rich in archaeological remains. Due to scrub and tree growth the site has been added to the Heritage at Risk Register.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Further information on the dig and hill fort can be found a short walk down the road on Somerset Heritage Panels which have been erected in the local pub The Camelot Inn.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

History

Early occupation of the site

The earliest settlement on the site is represented by pits and post holes dated with Neolithic pottery and flints.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> These are the remains of a small agricultural settlement which was unenclosed.Template:Sfn Bones recovered from the site have been radiocarbon dated to 3500 and 3300 BC.<ref name="nhle"/> A bank under the later Iron Age defences is likely to be a lynchet or terrace derived from early ploughing of the hilltop. The site was also occupied in the Late Bronze Age, from which ovens have been identified.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Radical revisions of the Bronze Age archaeology on the lower slopesTemplate:Sfn resulted from discoveries during excavations and survey work by the South Cadbury Environs Project.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> Finds include the first Bronze Age shield from an excavation in northwest Europe, an example of the distinctive Yetholm-type. The shield dates from the period 1350–1150 BC.<ref name=museumofsomerset/><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> A metal-working building and associated enclosure were discovered Template:Cvt south east of the hillfort, roughly contemporary with the period of manufacture.Template:Sfn Some of the diagnostic pottery for the early phases of the site were discovered by Mary Harfield.<ref name=":1">Template:Cite web</ref><ref name=":2">Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Human occupation continued throughout the Iron Age.<ref name=sher54552>Template:Cite web</ref> A stone enclosure was constructed around 300 BC with timber revetting, and ploughing ceased within the hilltop site. Excavations have shown the signs of four and six post rectangular buildings which were gradually replaced with roundhouses.Template:Sfn Large ramparts and elaborate timber defences were constructed and refortified over the following centuries. Excavation revealed round and rectangular house foundations, metalworking, and a possible sequence of small rectangular temples or shrines,Template:Sfn Template:Sfn indicating permanent oppidum-like occupation.Template:Sfn Excavations were undertaken by local clergyman James Bennett in 1890 and Harold St George Gray in 1913, followed by major work led by archaeologist Leslie Alcock from 1966 to 1970.<ref name="nhle"/><ref>Template:Cite web</ref> He identified a long sequence of occupation on the site and many of the finds are displayed in the Museum of Somerset in Taunton.<ref name=museumofsomerset>Template:Cite web</ref> The finds from the Late Bronze Age to the Early Iron Age, exploring the ramparts and southwestern gate structure, represent one of the deepest and most complex Iron Age stratigraphic sequences excavated in southern Britain.Template:Sfn

Castle

During the first century BC, additional lines of bank and ditch were constructed, turning it into a hill fort which is now known as the castle.Template:Sfn There is evidence that the fort was violently taken around AD 43 and that the defences were further slighted later in the first century after the construction of a Roman army barracks on the hilltop.Template:Sfn Excavations of the southwest gate in 1968 and 1969 revealed evidence for one or more severe violent episodes associated with weaponry and destruction by fire.Template:Sfn Leslie Alcock believed this to have been dated to around AD 70,Template:Sfn whereas Richard Tabor argues for a date associated with the initial invasion around AD 43 or 44.Template:Sfn Michael Havinden states that it was the site of vigorous resistance by the Durotriges and Dobunni to the second Augusta Legion under the command of Vespasian.Template:Sfn There was significant activity at the site during the late third and fourth centuries, which may have included the construction of a Romano-British temple.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Post-Roman occupation

Following the withdrawal of the Roman administration, the site is thought to have been in use from Template:Circa until some time after 580.<ref name=nhle/> Alcock revealed a substantial "Great Hall" Template:Convert and showed that the innermost Iron Age defences had been refortified, providing a defended site double the size of any other known fort of the period. Shards of pottery from the eastern Mediterranean were also found from this period, indicating wide trade links.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn It therefore seems probable that it was the chief fort of a major Brythonic ruler, with his family, his warband, servants, and horses.Template:Sfn Between 1010 and 1020, the hill was reoccupied for use as a temporary Saxon mint, standing in for that at Ilchester.<ref name=nhle/>Template:Sfn<ref>Template:Cite web</ref><ref>Template:Cite web</ref>Template:Sfn

Medieval period

According to the Domesday Book, Cadbury Castle appears to have been part of the feudal barony of North Cadbury held by Turstin FitzRolf in 1086.<ref name=domesday>Template:Cite web</ref> Some small-scale fortification of the site may also have occurred in the 13th century.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

Arthurian interpretation

Local tradition, first written down by John Leland in 1542, holds that Cadbury Castle was King Arthur's Camelot.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref><ref name=rev>W. Phelps. The History and Antiquities of Somersetshire; Being a General and Parochial Survey of That Interesting County, to which is Prefixed an Historical Introduction, with a Brief View of Ecclesiastical History; and an Account of the Druidical, Belgic-British, Roman, Saxon, Danish, and Norman Antiquities, Now Extant, Vol. II, Ch. VI, §1: "Camalet or Cadbury", p. 118. J. B. Nichols & Son (London), 1839.</ref> The site and the Great Hall are extensive, and the writer Geoffrey Ashe argued that it was the base for the Arthur of history.<ref>Template:Cite journal</ref> His opinion has not been widely accepted by students of the period.Template:Sfn

Militarily, the location makes sense as a place where refugees and the southwestern Brythons of Dumnonia could have defended themselves against attacks from the east. If Arthur was indeed conceived at Tintagel, as tradition asserts,<ref>Geoffrey of Monmouth, Historia Regum Britanniae Book 8.19–24, Book 9, Book 10, Book 11.1–2</ref> he may have been a prince of Dumnonia and used Cadbury as a stronghold on his eastern frontier.Template:Sfn

South Cadbury Environs Project

Recent work on the archaeology of the site and the surrounding area has been carried out by the South Cadbury Environs Project. Since 1992 the project team, which included local volunteers South East Somerset Archaeological and Historical Society and the Yeovil Archaeology and Local History Society, have carried out geophysical surveys including gradiometry and electrical resistivity tomography,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> ploughzone (disturbed topsoil) sampling,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> test pits,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> deeper excavations<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> and geographic information system (GIS) approaches.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The project had input from academics and archaeologists from the universities of Bristol, Glasgow, Birmingham and Oxford, funded by the Leverhulme Trust and Arts and Humanities Research Council.<ref>Template:Cite web</ref> The project studies the castle and surrounding area up to Template:Convert away, using landscape sampling,<ref>Template:Cite web</ref>

View from Cadbury Castle hill fort
Westerly earthworks and rampart defences Cadbury Castle hill fort

References

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Bibliography

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Cadbury Castle, Somerset

Contents

Etymology

Background

Location