A Morphological Analysis of Late Prehistoric and Romano-British Settlements in North West Wales

Abstract

SummaryThe morphology of a group of settlement sites in North West Wales is used to demonstrate an application of Numerical Taxonomy. Using average link cluster analysis 83 out of a total of 285 known sites are grouped into seven morphological classes which provide a basis for further analysis and interpretation.

Roman Rural Settlement in Wales and the Marches

“…The settlement remains of north-west Wales have been the focus of numerous attempts at survey and classification due to the stone construction which ensured their survival: around 1000 hut-circles are extant (Smith 1999a, 22). Research has largely focused on categorising the settlements based on morphology (Hemp et al 1953;Smith 1974Smith , 2018Waddington 2013).…”

“…The exception which nonetheless proves the rule is the settlement pattern of north-west Wales, characterised by stone-built hut circle groups which survive well and have been extensively researched though little-excavated, and the research has largely been conducted on morphological grounds (e.g. Smith 1974;Smith 1999;.…”

Copper mining and the transformation of environmental knowledge in Bronze Age Britain

“…In her thorough study of the Great Orme, Wager presented an argument for seasonal mining that was 'more unsystematic, variable and haphazard than prevailing models allow ' (2002: 424). However cogently made, her case was weakened by the very limited settlement and environmental data that is currently available for the second millennium BC in north Wales (Smith, 1999). If the proposition presented above, in which the spatial extent of the impact of copper mining on depositional practices at caves roughly corresponded with the geographical scale of the communities who mined at the Great Orme, is accepted, then arguably it is possible to test Wager's argument independently from the evidence for settlement practices.…”