{"id":751,"date":"2026-03-11T08:36:56","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T08:36:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/?p=751"},"modified":"2026-03-11T08:40:24","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T08:40:24","slug":"march-5th-2026-meeting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/?p=751","title":{"rendered":"March 5th 2026 meeting"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><span style=\"color: #ffcc00;\"><u>Topic 1 \u2013 \u2018Purposeful Place-Names\u2019 (2025)<\/u><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #ffcc00;\">Rannoch Daly presented findings from this book by John Blair and Ann Cole which suggests that, particularly in Mercia (West Midlands), groups of settlement names often appear near to one another in complementary, functional clusters. For example, a group of four nearby settlements in a small area SE of Leicester:<\/span><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><span style=\"color: #ffcc00;\">Burton Overy, the \u2018<em>-tun<\/em>\u2019 of the \u2018<em>burh\u2019<\/em>, a central place;<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #ffcc00;\">Stratton, the \u2018-<em>tun\u2019<\/em> on the strait (Roman) road;<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #ffcc00;\">Carlton Curlieu, the \u2018<em>-tun<\/em>\u2019 of the ceorls (farmers);<\/span><\/li>\n<li><span style=\"color: #ffcc00;\">Newton Harcourt, the new <em>\u2018-tun\u2019<\/em>.<\/span><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:18px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-medium\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"300\" height=\"178\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters-300x178.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-752\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters-300x178.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters-1024x606.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters-768x455.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters-1536x909.jpg 1536w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Blair-clusters.jpg 2000w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:17px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-luminous-vivid-amber-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-8f276be120eb2d09672e50fa460adade wp-block-paragraph\">Blair\/Cole list over 40 of these names (1600 examples) and identify several apparently similar clusters in various counties. They include a statistical appendix by Giacomo Zanella which suggests that these individual examples may not be widespread across the country. The contrasting findings produced a lively discussion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-pale-cyan-blue-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-7b010f4e6f0e2292f32e1a199a50b832 wp-block-paragraph\">Topic 2 \u2013 West African DNA in 7<sup>th<\/sup> century English graves<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><span style=\"color: #33cccc;\">Dorothy Cowans presented a report by Foody et al (2025) on 18 human skeletons excavated from a cemetery in Worth Matravers, Dorset. New methods of DNA analysis enable much more detailed findings than in the past. Among the skeletons were siblings, cousins and second cousins and an individual whose DNA revealed his origins in sub-Saharan West Africa.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Maltravers-bodies.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"641\" src=\"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Maltravers-bodies-1024x641.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-753\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Maltravers-bodies-1024x641.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Maltravers-bodies-300x188.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Maltravers-bodies-768x481.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Maltravers-bodies.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-pale-cyan-blue-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-d193c4e3d97c64822fd1306db65f47e9 wp-block-paragraph\">Colm O\u2019Brien reported similar findings by Sayer et al (2025) from a cemetery in Updown, Kent which enabled identification of four generations of a single family including another sub-Saharan West African.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div style=\"height:37px\" aria-hidden=\"true\" class=\"wp-block-spacer\"><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-vivid-green-cyan-color has-text-color has-link-color wp-elements-b298888b3fa2fcca9d9d4c5086242c97 wp-block-paragraph\">Next meeting: 19th March 2026, Tyneside Irish Centre<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><span style=\"color: #ffff00;\">Max Adams will be introducing a session on the identification and description of field monuments.\u00a0 Using LiDAR, aerial photography and earthwork survey, we look at the basics of field monument forms &#8211; how we classify and interpret them in the light of excavated and circumstantial spatial evidence.\u00a0 From unenclosed Bronze Age settlements to linear earthworks, Roman forts and Early Medieval Grubenhauser, we aim to gain confidence in knowing what we&#8217;re looking at.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Topic 1 \u2013 \u2018Purposeful Place-Names\u2019 (2025) Rannoch Daly presented findings from this book by John Blair and Ann Cole which suggests that, particularly in Mercia (West Midlands), groups of settlement names often appear near to one another in complementary, functional clusters. For example, a group of four nearby settlements in a small area SE of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-751","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bernicesblog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=751"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":756,"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/751\/revisions\/756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=751"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=751"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bernicianstudies.eu\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=751"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}