The impact of towns on human society and the broader environment is central to our understanding of past and present; research efforts, however, have been more successful in mapping and cataloguing the material remains of 'urban' settlements than in understanding towns in ways which offer broader analytical potential. It is widely appreciated that the results of archaeological interventions (especially those generated by PPG-16) have a wider application beyond site-specific reports, but it is harder to find agreement on the strategic direction such work should take, or the appropriate analytical tools necessary. A new survey of the current state of our understanding of the relationships between town and country was commissioned in 1997, managed by AOC Archaeology in partnership with the Universities of Leicester and York.
This project aims to take a broader view of the available research frameworks and methodological opportunities in order to inform this important debate; its overall objectives are to develop national and regional research frameworks for hinterland studies (to inform and promote the positive management of the archaeological resource), to improve methods of data recovery and analysis (to enable better models), to promote dialogue between academic and field archaeologists and researchers from related disciplines, to integrate archaeological data obtained from rural survey and urban excavation (to enhance our understanding of pre-modern relationships between town and country), and to disseminate the results of the research promptly and widely.
The first phase of work, which is now drawing to a close, involved a rapid overview of current research and available archives. This will enable us to build on current research to propose a range of contrasting models of the relationship between town and country. In particular, this will allow the development of rigorous and consistent classification of sites that can be further developed in ensuing detailed case studies, and will provide an academic basis from which the overall aims of the project can be addressed. It is also important not to duplicate the results of other cognate research. In addition, it should now be possible to identify those variables within finds assemblages that have the greatest potential to contribute to detailed case studies, so that we can establish archaeological measures of diversity and specialisation, and chart any significant variation in the access of different classes of site to contemporary supply systems. The results of this work will allow us to propose a variety of models for the spatial and temporal distribution of items within settlement hierarchies, and identify case studies where these models can be tested
It soon became apparent that both town and territory defy ready definition, and the focus of the project must be the network of social and economic relationships that gave rise to the complex hierarchies of settlement, and the study of the socio-economic systems and strategies reflected in settlement hierarchies, as indicated by patterns of consumption and discard. The ways in which power was exercised, and its impact on both society and landscape is necessarily a central theme of the project, and it is clear that explanatory models derived from historical geography (such as Central Place Theory) are probably of comparatively limited relevance, although they have been influential in establishing current research paradigms. Other issues (such as the presence of urban fields and sustainability) have, in contrast, been little explored in the archaeological literature, but are likely to be of particular relevance.
Then development of individual case studies will concentrate attention on a series of key periods of change when urban strategies were more actively promoted (such as the late pre-Roman Iron Age to early Roman period; the seventh to the -ninth centuries; and in the later medieval period, the spread of urbanism), and when modes of production and exploitation may have changed most radically. A comprehensive review of the potential of artefact and ecofact studies provides a range of analytical tools (not surprisingly animal-bone and coins are have particular potential) and a rapid survey of extant databases has defined regions and settlements that are best placed to provide sufficient data for further studies that address these themes.
Although the study is confined to England and stops short of the early modern period, its scope is still very wide. The reports currently in preparation will inevitably understate the importance of some themes and overstate the potential of other areas of research. The recommendations, which will be ready for public consultation early in 1998, will therefore be neither prescriptive nor comprehensive, but will define a series of case studies and research themes which appear to have the best prospect of advancing research into town-country relationships (in particular where new methodologies and approaches can be pioneered). A series of possible research themes and target landscapes (such as a study of contrasts in the patterns of livestock supply between high and low status sites in the transition from late pre-Roman Iron Age to Roman military then civil administration in Essex) is being developed. The main purpose of these proposals will be to inform future management policy and establish an agenda for research. How such research might be promoted has yet to be considered, although the project is already promoting important links and research partnerships between local authority archaeologists, field workers, and university based researchers with relevant specialist interests.
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