Cliffs End Farm Isle of Thanet, Kent

A mortuary and ritual site of the Bronze Age, Iron Age and Anglo-Saxon period with evidence for long-distance maritime mobility

Jacqueline I. McKinley, Matt Leivers, Jörn Schuster, Peter Marshall, Alistair Barclay, Nick Stoodley

• Publisher: Wessex Archaeology
• Year: 2015
• Topic: History
• eBook ISBN:
  9781874350712
• Subtopic: British History
• Index: History

Excavations at Cliffs End Farm, Thanet, Kent, undertaken in 2004/5 uncovered a dense area of archaeological remains including Bronze Age barrows and enclosures, and a large prehistoric mortuary feature, as well as a small early 6th to late 7th century Anglo-Saxon inhumation cemetery. An extraordinary series of human and animal remains were recovered from the Late Bronze Age–Middle Iron Age mortuary feature, revealing a wealth of evidence for mortuary rites including exposure, excarnation and curation. The site seems to have been largely abandoned in the later Iron Age and very little Romano-British activity was identified. In the early 6th century a small inhumation cemetery was established. Very little human bone survived within the 21 graves, where the burial environment differed from that within the prehistoric mortuary feature, but grave goods indicate 'females' and 'males' were buried here. Richly furnished graves included that of a 'female' buried with a necklace, a pair of brooches and a purse, as well as a 'male' with a shield covering his face, a knife and spearhead. In the Middle Saxon period lines of pits, possibly delineating boundaries, were dug, some of which contained large deposits of marine shells. English Heritage funded an extensive programme of radiocarbon and isotope analyses, which have produced some surprising results that shed new light on long distance contacts, mobility and mortuary rites during later prehistory. This volume presents the results of the investigations together with the scientific analyses, human bone, artefact and environmental reports.

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Plates
• List of Tables
• List of Contributors
• Acknowledgments
• Foreword
• Summary
• Foreign language summaries
• Chapter 1: Introduction by Jörn Schuster
• Chapter 2: Prehistoric Evidence by Matt Leivers and Jacqueline I. McKinley
• Chapter 3: Chronology and the Radiocarbon Dating Programme by Peter Marshall, Alistair J. Barclay, Alex Bayliss, Christopher Bronk Ramsey, Gordon Cook, Pieter M. Grootes, John Meadows, and Johannes van der Plicht
• Chapter 4: Human Bone and Mortuary Deposits by Jacqueline I. McKinley
• Chapter 5: Prehistoric Finds and Environmental Evidence
• Chapter 6: Discussion and Concluding Remarks by Stuart Needham, Jacqueline I. McKinley and Matt Leivers
• Chapter 7: The Anglo-Saxon Cemetery and Settlement by Jacqueline I. McKinley and Nick Stoodley
• Epilogue
• Appendices
• Bibliography
• Index