Corpus of Anglo-Saxon Stone Sculpture Vol VII, South West England

This volume contains the first coordinated record and analysis of the pre-Conquest stone sculpture of the pre-1974 counties of Devon, Dorset, Somerset and Wiltshire. All monuments are illustrated by high quality photographs some being well illustrated for the first time by new images. The detailed descriptions and assessment of the monuments includes specialist epigraphic and geological studies and the introductory chapters also include accounts of previous research the topography and history of this region of Western Wessex and the cultural context of the carvings

Isotopic evidence for residential mobility of farming communities during the transition to agriculture in Britain

Development of agriculture is often assumed to be accompanied by a decline in residential mobility, and sedentism is frequently proposed to provide the basis for economic intensification, population growth and increasing social complexity. In Britain, however, the nature of the agricultural transition (ca 4000 BC) and its effect on residence patterns has been intensely debated. Some authors attribute the transition to the arrival of populations who practised a system of sedentary intensive mixed farming similar to that of the very earliest agricultural regimes in central Europe, ca 5500 BC, with cultivation of crops in fixed plots and livestock keeping close to permanently occupied farmsteads. Others argue that local hunter–gatherers within Britain adopted selected elements of a farming economy and retained a mobile way of life. We use strontium and oxygen isotope analysis of tooth enamel from an Early Neolithic burial population in Gloucestershire, England, to evaluate the residence patterns of early farmers. Our results are consistent with the hypothesis that early farming communities in Britain were residentially mobile and were not fully sedentary. Results highlight the diverse nature of settlement strategies associated with early farming in Europe and are of wider significance to understanding the effect of the transition to agriculture on residence patterns