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REVIEW BY GRAEME CAVERS
This volume comprises an assessment of the evidence for Iron Age object deposition from two study areas, modern Wales and Scotland, with the objective of identifying patterns in the available data. Primarily a desk-based exercise based on the author’s doctoral research, the study works with museum and HER records, filtered and categorised using GIS-based analysis of soil types, to classify findspots of single objects, collections, and hoards of Iron Age material from these two regions. There is some time dedicated to the question of what should be considered to constitute a ‘wetland’ environment, and the author correctly and thoughtfully examines landscape context in a dynamic sense, noting that findspots that are now wetland may not always have been so, and vice versa. The inclusion of deposits from the intertidal zone opens up an interesting and often-overlooked aspect of watery deposition and the likelihood that this took place in coastal as well as freshwater contexts.
This reviewer wondered about some sweeping generalisations that seem to contrast with the highly procedural approach to the assessment of the material, particularly in relation to the influence of the Roman presence, which is dismissed as of limited significance (p.39), but occurs at precisely the time when numbers of high-value depositions – often including Roman and other exotic items – seem to spike. Similarly, one wonders whether the reliance on classification by wet location might confuse the patterns that emerge: are single coins and leather shoes correctly thought of as the same phenomenon as cauldron hoards?
The book is presented in ‘thesis’ style, with heavy emphasis on the data and its analysis, and is copiously illustrated with graphs, charts, and tables that present the results of these assessments. As a consequence, much of the book may not be for the casual reader. Nevertheless, the compilation of a very large and diverse dataset into an accessible format makes the book an invaluable reference point, and the inclusion of museum-quality photography for the majority of the objects discussed is particularly helpful.
Iron Age Wetland Deposition: Case studies from Wales and Scotland
Tiffany Treadway
BAR, £45
ISBN 978-1407314952
