Dark Age Dorset #4: The White Hill of Badbury

 

Photo credit: Jim Cuthbert of visit-dorset.com

The hillfort of Badbury Rings is among the most iconic of British hillforts, and archaeological evidence indicates that it was inhabited since the Mesolithic period, with use both as a centre of settlement and a centre of ritual activity. Only two miles from the river Stour (to the Durotriges, the Sturr), it was at the heart of a nexus of trade that continued into the Roman period; coins of the Veneti, Baiocassi and Dobunii have all been found near Badbury, the former two being continental Celtic tribes.

Either immediately preceding or during the Roman invasion of 43 C.E., the outermost ring of earthworks were constructed, but it was too late, and within the year the Romans had depopulated the hillfort, resettling the survivors, along with their own veterans, in the nearby village of *Windosklādiyos (White Hill), which they rebuilt as the settlement of Vindocladia. It was only later, beyond the 3rd century C.E., that this settlement was fortified, with an imperial mansio, or inn, built in the same period, by which time it gained an economic and political status equal to Duronovaria and Lindinis.  Nearby enclosures, such as Crab Farm, Lake Farm, and High Wood, were all reoccupied and redeveloped after the Roman invasion. 

Badbury might have briefly been reoccupied, as Maiden Castle (Duronovaria) likely did, during Boudicca's revolt in 60-61 C.E., as tribe after tribe rose in revolt against the crimes of the Roman army, but for centuries afterwards it was securely a monument of the past. The twilight years of Roman rule, as shown with the rebuilding of the Bokerley Dyke and of the smaller dykes in the south of Dorset, was characterized by the rekindling of old tensions and the remaking of old tribal boundaries, as raids and the wandering armies of usurpers eroded the material prosperity of Britannia. In the case of Badbury, rubble was taken from a nearby Romano-Celtic temple to strengthen the ramparts, which, on the basis of abandonments of other temples, must have taken place during the end of the 4th century, either at the time of the Great Conspiracy of 367 C.E. or later, during the usurpations of Magnus Maximus or Constantine III.    

The nature of the site during the 'Dark Ages', between the beginning of the 5th and the end of the 7th century A.D., however, is poorly understood. Badbury's imposing physical form and ancient past have led many to draw a line between it and the clash of Mons Badonicus, the Battle of Mount Badon where, as the Historia Brittonum and later romances elaborate, Arthur heroically won against the pagan Saxons, with the virgin Mary by his side, securing a half-century of relative peace. It must have been a strategically important site for the sub-Roman Durotriges, as a place to garrison an army, with a full view of the Bokerley Dyke to the northeast. While the dyke itself would have been easy for a Saxon force to cross, the looming presence of Badbury might have made them think twice about trespassing into Briton territory. The refortified ramparts were used well after the sub-Roman period, when the fortress was occupied by the army of Edward the Elder in 899 C.E., during the revolt of his brother Aethelwold.

Could Badbury, then, be the site of Arthur's victory? In old English, the name Badbury simply means 'Baddan's fort', which means either a Saxon or Romano-Briton gave their name to it sometime in te sixth century. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle for 501 C.E. states that three Saxon chiefs led their warriors onto the Solent coast, slaying a Briton ruler 'of very high rank' at what would later become Portsmouth. One of those chiefs is called Bieda, which has been connected by some to the Baeddan of Welsh romance, the son of Melwas, later Maleagant in French literature. Plausibly, therefore, Badbury might have been Bieda's temporary stronghold, before being wrestled from it by the Britons. 

There are better candidates for Badon, however; aside from a location near Bath, known to the old Welsh as Cair Baddan, several historians have proposed that Badon, first mentioned in Gildas' letter of denouncement as Badonici Montis, is a copyists' error for Bradonici Montis, on the basis that Brad- is a fairly common element in Welsh place names. Andrew Breeze, in his latest book on the subject, suggests that Braydon in Wiltshire, regarding the local topography, fits with the written evidence, but I would agree with Alistair Hall, who argues in his recent work The Battle of Mount Badon that either Bardon or Breedon Hill in Linconshire is a more likely site, given its proximity to the proposed location of other Arthurian battles, and the fact that the area was a centre of Romano-British culture until the middle of the sixth century, with a mixed polity of Britons and federate Saxons established in Lincolnshire proper and a larger Brittonic kingdom centred around York, or Caer Ebrauc. 

At the very least, Badbury would have played a substantial role in the political and economic fortunes of the Britons of the south and south-west, not just in terms of heroic leaders and fateful battles, but as a physical reminder of the legacy of the native inhabitants.