Brochs and Iron Age society: a reappraisal

Abstract

The brochs, great stone towers of Iron Age Scotland, are famously puzzling. Who inhabited these strongholds (if habitations they were)? New fieldwork at the broch of Dun Vulan, on South Uist in the Western Isles, prompts reappraisal of the geographical and social context of the brochs, by developing untapped sources of social evidence.

Medieval History and Anarchist Studies

“…the other we have the nomadic empires of the Eurasian steppes and the North American plains which relied largely upon tents, which leave far less of an archaeological trace than permanent dwellings. 29 In addition to problems of evidence the Zomia thesis also raises questions of interpretation, and these are of two kinds. First, claims for the existence of egalitarian social relations and state flight can always be challenged on empirical grounds: scholars may suggest alternative evidence and alternative interpretations of the evidence.…”

“…Since these denunciations are sometimes accompanied by tart remarks about material gain and personal enrichment we might in fact interpret them as one means of preventing the emergence of damaging wealth hierarchies. 30 Inequality may have been managed in this way because, as the sociologist Richard Sosis has suggested, religious behaviours If you wish to cite this pre-publication paper, please use the following format: Ian Forrest, 'Medieval History and Anarchist Studies', forthcoming in Anarchist Studies, 29 are 'cheaper to monitor than other activities' taking place in bounded spaces at particular times. 31 A degree of prior familiarity, or at least family resemblance, might well dispose medievalists to work with Scott's Zomia thesis.…”

“…If you wish to cite this pre-publication paper, please use the following format: Ian Forrest, 'Medieval History and Anarchist Studies', forthcoming in Anarchist Studies, 29 In addition to the history of non-state spaces, anarchism also offers a great deal to historians of inequality in the Middle Ages. The study of medieval European non-elites has for the most part been conducted by social and economic historians, and while this has produced some amazing insights into local ways of life and thought, including the widespread practices of reciprocity, the workings of power and subordination have not received as much detailed attention as they deserve.…”

“…If you wish to cite this pre-publication paper, please use the following format: Ian Forrest, 'Medieval History and Anarchist Studies', forthcoming in Anarchist Studies, 29 An anarchist approach to medieval domination and inequality offers the prospect of recalibrating the measure of significance on a wide scale. Again taking a cue from feminism, anarchist medievalists would do well to tread a humane and informed line between recognising the multiplicity of values by which women and men have lived in past societies, and taking for granted that certain conditions -like poverty, slavery, subordinated agency, sexual abuse, violence and so on -are a priori undesirable states of being that are in need of historical explanation.…”

“…What if the means by which populations were dominated, and the effects of domination upon them, were the salient questions? We would not frame our analysis of Edward I of England around how he built a judicial state, raised taxes, and made war on Scotland (although these traditional questions If you wish to cite this pre-publication paper, please use the following format: Ian Forrest, 'Medieval History and Anarchist Studies', forthcoming in Anarchist Studies, 29 would still be answered, albeit in a more interesting way), but how the experiences of people using the courts, paying taxes, and finding themselves caught up in warfare changed during his reign, besides explaining the ability of some regions to resist one or more components of his state building. We would do so because these are the most significant questions about his strengthening of royal power, and because not placing them at the centre of our analysis means failing to ask the right questions about those mechanisms of power.…”