All of our lectures are live streamed and are open to anyone to join us online, Fellows and Non-Fellows.
To view any of our past lectures please visit our YouTube channel.
To view any of our past lectures please visit our YouTube channel.
Warhorse: The Archaeology of a Medieval Revolution?
by Professor Oliver Creighton FSA
The lecture presents headline results from an AHRC-funded research project ‘Warhorse: Archaeology of a Medieval Revolution’.
Running between 2019–23, the project succeeded in carrying out the first ever systematic and integrated study of the full range of archaeological evidence for warhorses and horses in medieval England — from scientific samples extracted from teeth through to analysis of bones, equestrian artefacts and armour, and the sites and landscapes associated with horse breeding and training.
The work contributed to research and created new knowledge on three main fronts:
In the field of zooarchaeology the project applied cutting-edge scientific methodologies including isotopic and genetic sampling to medieval horses for the first time. This has enabled the skeletal signatures of breeding and training regimes to be ascertained and for the biographies of individual horses to be revealed, and highlighted Europe-wide movements of breeding stock in a case study site in London. A headline finding about horse stature from a project database of 8500+ bones is that most medieval horses were below the size of modern ponies (1.48m to the withers, or shoulder), and detailed measurement of over 130 items of horse armour confirms the findings suggested from bone evidence. While popular perceptions of medieval warhorses picture large beasts, not a single bone from the entire project indicated a medieval horse that would have met the size criteria for a modern police horse (1.68m).
In the field of landscape history, the work generated entirely new information about an aspect of the medieval countryside (the horse stud) that had been neglected. Over 800 medieval documents have been examined to provide information on the nature and organisation of studs. The project produced the first ever mapping of the English royal stud network, clarified the number and location of stud sites (within parks), characterised their landscape contexts, and reconstructed their hinterlands. The work highlighted that while studs can be located to places, physical traces of their buildings and infrastructure are exceptionally ephemeral.
Third, in terms of debates within medieval archaeology and history the project provided new evidence for continuity and/or change across the Saxo-Norman divide by highlighting that in terms of equestrian material culture the Norman Conquest had a minimal signature, with the introduction of the curb bit the principal indicator of change. Mapping of equestrian material culture from a project database of 14,000+ separate artefacts shows great potential, previously unrecognised, to map the footprints of medieval tournament sites and (through harness pendants decorated with arms and symbols) noble families.
As an overall methodological achievement, the project’s integrated approach has made a powerful statement about how barriers between traditionally discrete research fields can be broken down to produce new understandings.
This event will be both in person at Burlington House and online. Please select the appropriate ticket below.
If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected].
