Long before the Norman Conquest of 1066, England saw periods of profound change that transformed the landscape and the identities of those who occupied it. The Bronze and Iron Ages saw the introduction of now-familiar animals and plants, such as sheep, horses, wheat, and oats, as well as new forms of production and exchange and the first laying out of substantial fields and trackways, which continued into the earliest Romano-British landscapes. The Anglo-Saxon period saw the creation of new villages based around church and manor, with ridge and furrow cultivation strips still preserved today. The basis for this volume is The English Landscapes and Identities project, which synthesised all the major available sources of information on English archaeology to examine this crucial period of landscape history from the middle Bronze Age (c. 1500 BC) to the Domesday survey (c. 1086 AD). It looks at the nature of archaeological work undertaken across England to assess its strengths and weaknesses when writing long-term histories. Among many other topics it examines the interaction of ecology and human action in shaping the landscape; issues of movement across the landscape in various periods; changing forms of food over time; an understanding of spatial scale; and questions of enclosing and naming the landscape, culminating in a discussion of the links between landscape and identity. The result is the first comprehensive account of the English landscape over a crucial 2500-year period. It also offers a celebration of many centuries of archaeological work, especially the intensive large-scale investigations that have taken place since the 1960s and transformed our understanding of England's past.

The Shaping of the English Landscape is an atlas of English archaeology covering the period from the middle Bronze Age (c. 1500 BC) to Domesday Book (AD 1086), encompassing the Bronze and Iron Ages, the Roman period, and the early medieval (Anglo-Saxon) age. It was produced as part of the English Landscape and Identities (EngLaId) project at the University of Oxford, which took place from 2011 to 2016, funded by the European Research Council. In this book, you will find maps (produced by Chris Green) and discussion of themes including landscape agency, settlement, foodways and field systems, belief and the treatment of the dead, mobility and defence, making things, and material culture. Alongside are artworks (produced by Miranda Creswell) dealing with similar themes and depicting archaeological sites from across England. The authors hope to inspire and encourage debate into the past history of the English landscape. Includes contributions from Anwen Cooper, Victoria Donnelly, Tyler Franconi, Roger Glyde, Chris Gosden, Zena Kamash, Janice Kinory, Sarah Mallet, Dan Stansbie, John Talbot, and Letty Ten Harkel.