Authors:Howard Williams Pages: 1 - 9 Abstract: Introducing the sixth volume of the Offa’s Dyke Journal (ODJ) for 2024, the introduction surveys the contents and recent related research published elsewhere as well as the main Offa’s Dyke Collaboratory’s activities during late 2023 and 2024. PubDate: 2025-05-30 DOI: 10.23914/odj.v6i0.14319 Issue No:Vol. 6 (2025)
Authors:Blaise Vyner Pages: 10 - 53 Abstract: This article revisits the interpretation of the distinctive cross-ridge boundaries of north-east Yorkshire and explains a regular association between these features and the far earlier Early Bronze Age burial mounds. Radiocarbon dating and palynological evidence now provides a chronology for the boundaries, while field survey and excavation evidence confirms a new and specific role for cross-ridge boundaries in protecting long established Early Bronze Age funerary areas and enabling their continued veneration in the changing landscape of the Late Bronze Age and Iron Age. PubDate: 2025-05-30 DOI: 10.23914/odj.v6i0.14320 Issue No:Vol. 6 (2025)
Authors:Richard Hankinson Pages: 54 - 72 Abstract: The article considers a group of short dykes which were examined as part of a study of this monument type, carried out by the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust on behalf of Cadw, between 2000 and 2006. Various interesting points came out of the study, particularly regarding how short dykes in general fitted into their local landscapes. Their poor defensibility if viewed as monuments designed to impede or block access was also noted and this gave rise to an unease with this conventional interpretation of their function. Five of the dykes examined during the project, about a quarter, were dated by organic material which had been sealed beneath their bank at the time of construction and dates covering the period from the mid-fourth to late eighth centuries AD were obtained. A group of six short dykes centred on the town of Llanfyllin in northern Powys were identified during the study, all of which lay close to the boundary of the medieval Welsh cantref of Mechain, as defined by Melville Richards. This implied that they might have been used to identify parts of this boundary and the acquisition of two radiocarbon dates collectively covering the period from the fifth to early eighth centuries AD from one of these dykes (Clawdd Mawr) was seen as being significant in perhaps showing that the cantref was based on an early medieval political entity. An analysis of the Mechain dykes will attempt to prove that they form a coherent group and have the potential to point further research of the site type in a more productive direction. PubDate: 2025-05-30 DOI: 10.23914/odj.v6i0.14321 Issue No:Vol. 6 (2025)
Authors:Michael Nevell Pages: 73 - 96 Abstract: Nico Ditch is an enigmatic curvilinear earthwork, the core of which runs for c. 8km across the southern part of the City of Manchester from Hough Moss to Ashton Moss. Although much of its length was built over during the later nineteenth and twentieth centuries, where it survives as an earthwork it comprises a U-shaped ditch 2m to 3m wide and 1.5m to 2m deep, with possibly a low bank on its northern side. This article reviews research into the origins, form, and function of Nico Ditch, drawing on over 140 years of study, as well as discussing grey literature archaeological fieldwork from the 1990s and 2000s. Using this material, it is argued that the line of Nico Ditch extended further west of Hough Moss into Stretford. This longer monument strengthens the argument that the ditch dates from the early medieval period. PubDate: 2025-05-30 DOI: 10.23914/odj.v6i0.14322 Issue No:Vol. 6 (2025)
Authors:Paul Belford, Ian Grant, Tim Malim Pages: 97 - 116 Abstract: In 2018 and 2019, the Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust undertook excavations on Offa’s Dyke at Chirk Castle, and on Wat’s Dyke at Erddig. The background, circumstances and stratigraphic narrative of these projects were presented in Volume 1 of this journal, but the scientific dating programme was not complete at the time of publication and the results were further delayed due to the COVID-19 pandemic. This paper describes the radiocarbon and OSL dates obtained by 2021 and discusses implications for future research. PubDate: 2025-05-30 DOI: 10.23914/odj.v6i0.14323 Issue No:Vol. 6 (2025)
Authors:Howard Williams Pages: 117 - 159 Abstract: How is Offa’s Dyke interpreted for visitors and locals in the contemporary landscape' The article considers the present-day heritage interpretation of Britain’s longest linear monument: the early medieval Mercian frontier work of Offa’s Dyke. I survey and evaluate panels, plaques and signs that follow the course of the surviving early medieval linear earthwork from Sedbury in Gloucestershire, north to Treuddyn in Flintshire, and along stretches away from the surviving earthwork and north to Prestatyn, Denbighshire, along the line of the Offa’s Dyke Path National Trail. Critiquing for the overarching narratives and envisionings of Offa’s Dyke the first time, I identify how anachronistic ethnonationalist narratives pervade its interpretation: pertaining to the origins of both England and the English, and Wales and the Welsh. As such, the article provides a baseline for further research into the contemporary archaeology and heritage of Offa’s Dyke and affords insights of application to other ancient linear monuments in today’s world. I conclude with reflections and recommendations for future heritage interpretation of the monument in relation to the national trail, the border and borderlands identities. PubDate: 2025-05-30 DOI: 10.23914/odj.v6i0.14324 Issue No:Vol. 6 (2025)
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