The excavations led by Margaret and Tom Jones on the Thames gravel terraces at Mucking, Essex, undertaken between 1965 and 1978 are legendary. The largest area excavation ever undertaken in the British Isles, involving around 5000 participants, recorded around 44,000 archaeological features dating from the Beaker to Anglo-Saxon periods and recovered something in the region of 1.7 million finds of Mesolithic to post-medieval date. While various publications have emerged over the intervening years, the death of both directors, insufficient funding, many organisational complications and the sheer volume of material evidence have severely delayed full publication of this extraordinary palimpsest landscape.
Lives in Land is the first of two major volumes which bring together all the evidence from Mucking, presenting both the detail of many important structures and assemblages and a comprehensive synthesis of landscape development through the ages: settlement histories, changing land-use, death and burial, industry and craft activities. The long time-gap since completion of the excavations has allowed the authors the unprecedented opportunity to stand back from the density of site data and place the vast sum of Mucking evidence in the wider context of the archaeology of southern England throughout the major periods of occupation and activity.
Lives in Land begins with a thorough evaluation of the methods, philosophy and archival status of the Mucking project against the organisational and funding background of its time, and discusses its fascinating and complex history through a period of fundamental change in archaeological practice, legislation, finance, research priorities and theoretical paradigms in British Archaeology. Subsequent chapters deal with the prehistoric landscape, each focusing on the major themes that emerge by major period from analysis and synthesis of the data. The authors draw on archival material including site notebooks and personal accounts from key participants to provide a detailed but lively account of this iconic landscape investigation.
Chapter One: Introduction - Landscape and Archival Palimpsests
Total Archaeology
Framing Context
Notebook Archaeology
Inset: Project Framing (I) - Thinking Graphically (Mucking’s ‘Phase-wall’)
Archive as Palimpsest
Chapter Two: Scattered Usage and First Allotment - Mesolithic to Middle Bronze Age
Mucking and the Palaeogeography of the Thames Estuary, by Peter Murphy
Tracings - Mesolithic to Early Bronze Age Activity, with a contribution by Elizabeth Healey
Mesolithic/Earlier Neolithic, with contributions by Ian Kinnes and Mark Birley
Grooved Ware, with contributions by Mark Birley, Mark Knight and Elizabeth Healey
Beaker, with contributions by Alex Gibson and Elizabeth Healey
Earlier/Middle Bronze Age with a contribution by Nigel Brown
Inset: Recollections (I) - Fieldwork
Discussion
Chapter Three: The Rings - Late Bronze Age
Late Bronze Age Pottery Groups, by Matt Brudenell
The North Field Settlement
The South Rings, with John Etté
Material Culture, with contributions by Elizabeth Healey, Matt Brudenell, Ben Roberts, Margaret Jones, Hilary Howard, Paul Barford David Buckley and Hilary Major
Economic and other data, with contributions by Geraldene Done, Paul Barford and Ailsa Mainman
Inset: Appreciation: Margaret Jones - A Legacy of Formidable Field Women, by Anwen Cooper and Julia Roberts
Discussion
Chapter Four: Compounding Spaces and Connected Communities - Iron Age (I)
Early Iron Age, with a contribution by Matthew Brudenell
The Structures
Roundhouses
Rectangular Post-hole Structures
Rectangular Post-Hole Settings, by Margaret Jones, with a contribution by Paul Barford
‘Posters’ and Others
Enclosures
The ABC Enclosures
RBI and Adjacent Settlement
The North Enclosure and Northern Boundary System
The 1100 Enclosure (Prehistoric Cemetery II and other Western-margin Interments)
The Belgic Banjo Complex (and Prehistoric Cemetery III)
Inset: Recollections (II) - Post-Excavation and Aftermath
The Plaza, Other Parts and Landscape Development
The Plaza (and Prehistoric Cemetery IV)
Other Components
Cemetery V
The Conquest Period and Early Roman Landscape
Chapter Five: Specialist Studies and Summation of Parts - Iron Age (II)
Material Culture
Middle Iron Age Pottery, by Matt Brudenell
Late Iron Age Pottery - An Overview, by Isobel Thompson
Iron Age Coins, by Colin Haselgrove
Brooches, by Colin Haselgrove
Other M etalwork, by Grahame Appleby and Quita Mould
Metalworking Evidence, by David Dungworth, Justine Bayley and Hilary Howard
Quernstones, Loomweights and Spindlewhorls with a contribution by Paul Barford
Other Fired Clay with a contribution by Paul Barford
Economic and Environmental Data
Fauna Remains Vida Rajkovača
Pollen James Greig
Inset: Project Framing (II) - Charting Influence (and Difference)
‘Style in Landscape’ - Distributional Case-studies
Discussion - Connected Communities
Chapter Six: Patterned Ground/Interim Knowledges - Sequence Revisited and Retrospect
The Recommendation of Land
Sequence Revisited and Settlement ‘Scaling’
Mucking and the Prehistory of the Lower Thames Timothy Champion
Romano-British
Anglo-Saxon
Medieval and Post-Medieval/Modern
The South Essex Marshes in the Medieval and post-Medieval Periods (Stephen Rippon)
Gauging Settlement - Comparative Context
Different Lives - Continuities, Territories and Power
Inset: Project Framing (III) - Thinking Archives
Hindsights - Marking Time
Having worked in British archaeology for over thirty-five years, Evans co-founded The Cambridge Archaeological Unit, together with Ian Hodder, in 1990. He has directed a wide variety of major fieldwork projects, both abroad (Nepal, China & Cape Verde) and in UK, most recently publishing the results of the Haddenham Project in 2006, the South Cambridge/Addenbrooke’s Environs (2008), Fengate Revisited (2010) and the Colne Fen Project’s Process and History volumes (2013). Elected a fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London in 2000, he is a member of editorial board of The Bulletin of the History of Archaeology and, together with Tim Murray, edited Histories of Archaeology: A Reader in the History of Archaeology for Oxford University Press (2008).
Grahame Appleby is a Senior Research Officer at the Cambridge Archaeological Unit with special responsibilities for post-excavation analysis and publication. His research specialisation is in prehistoric and Roman metalwork.
Sam Lucy is in charge of post-excavation and publication at the Cambridge Archaeological Unit. Her research interests are mainly in Anglo-Saxon material culture and funerary archaeology.
