Agricultural History Review, Volume 58 Part 2 (2010), p. 281

This book originated in a 2008 conference to mark the sixtieth anniversary of the study of deserted villages as a field of academic research. Bringing together a number of writers from a variety of academic backgrounds – archaeology, geography and history – the editors have sought to rejuvenate and reinstate the subject as an important and dynamic field of research and one that has much broader implications far beyond settlement studies. It is a timely contribution providing an opportunity for scholars to take stock of research to date and, in the light of recent theoretical and methodological developments, to question many of the assumptions and myths that have adhered to the subject over the intervening years.

The difficulties of dating and assigning a single cause to settlement desertion, and indeed the extent and nature of abandonment itself, are highlighted in interesting ways in this collection. In an early chapter, Richard Jones addresses the problems inherent in the vocabulary of settlement classification and periodization, which prioritizes ‘deserted medieval villages’ above other settlement types and phases of abandonment. More than a matter of linguistic nitpicking, inadequate terminology continues to frame, often without consistency, county archaeological databases and thus impacts upon the interpretation and understanding of regional and local patterns of settlement desertion. Thoughts on the problems and possibilities of field work and the interpretation of the remains of deserted sites are offered by Paul Everson and Graham Brown in an engaging account of their field visit to a number of village sites in Leicestershire, equipped with the earthwork plans originally published in an article by W.G.Hoskins in 1956. Their discussion reflects the dissatisfaction with ‘comfortable pigeonholing’, welcoming instead inconsistencies and the possibility of change over time. Reflecting upon his work at Wharram Percy, Stuart Wrathmell similarly urges a more sophisticated analysis of settlement histories beyond simple classifications. In his chapter on the material artefacts recovered from deserted medieval sites, archaeologist David Hinton questions the often-assumed correlation between poverty and abandonment. Finding little difference in the objects found in peasant and high-status households, and little in the way of distinctive regional characteristics of assemblages, he invites reflection upon our modern notions of economic worth tempered by a more sensitive consideration of the cultural and social meanings afforded to material goods.

The question of settlement size and socio-economic viability is a recurring theme. In an essay on upland settlements, Robert Silvester reconsiders the retreat from ‘marginal land’ hypothesis, prominent twenty years ago. He cautions against equating the cessation of cultivation with abandonment and argues, as do others, that abandonment is complex and unpredictable and cannot be pinned down to a single process. As several contributors point out, the extent and meaning of desertion needs to be carefully contextualized. Many deserted medieval settlement sites were not entirely abandoned, with some continuing to exist well into the eighteenth century. It has long been recognized that settlement size constituted an important factor in areas dominated by wealthy landowners and yet, as Williamson forcefully argues, the relationship between post-medieval designed landscapes and settlement desertion was complex and not necessarily concurrent. Whereas depopulation and shrinkage once signalled the terminal demise of a community, this volume shows the resilience of settlements, including hamlets, isolated farmsteads and, in Wales, seasonal dwellings.

An important investigative strand of the book deals with the experiences of individual communities and households. The most explicitly theoretical perspective is provided by the archaeologist Sally V. Smith, who offers a spatial reading of late medieval peasant households, highlighting the profound differences in dwelling across a compact geographical area. Christopher Dyer brings new documentary evidence to bear on debates concerning the dating and causes of desertion. Exploring the destabilizing impact of neighbourhood disputes and anti-social behaviour, Dyer moves away from economic and environmental determinants to consider instead the internal disruptions to village life caused by the breakdown of socio-economic relations. The activities of non-elites in bringing about settlement change are also examined by John Broad in his study of abandonment and the ‘metamorphosis’ of two Buckinghamshire villages in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. While acknowledging the role of landlords in bringing about village depopulation, he also highlights the incremental changes brought about by tenant farmers, often newcomers, following the enclosure of common land by agreement and the creation of ring-fenced farms. As well as recognizing the agency of non-elites in transforming settlement patterns, the essays demonstrate how micro-studies of spatial organization, socio-economic relations and underlying cultural shifts can offer valuable insights into patterns of survival, shrinkage and abandonment among broadly comparable economic and physical environments.

Unsurprisingly, important and fundamental shifts have taken place since the mid-twentieth century in the ways settlement sites are surveyed and interpreted yet, as each chapter in turn effectively demonstrates, we still do not fully understand the causes of settlement desertion. The lack of a coherent explanatory model, once accepted within ‘deserted medieval village’ studies, has been replaced by an inquisitive approach that celebrates complexity and diversity and problematizes the labels and assumptions that have long been attached to the subject. Though the editors set out to raise the profile of deserted settlement studies, the overall value of the volume is somewhat underplayed in their concluding comments. The issues and questions raised here do indeed resonate far beyond settlement studies, not least among social and environmental historians interested in issues of sustainability, household economies, meanings of place, belonging and the reformation of community identities in the face of change. For its chronological depth, interdisciplinarity, wide-ranging insights, and relentless questioning of prescribed knowledge, this collection is to be highly recommended.