AN ANGLO-SAXON DECAPITATION AND BURIAL AT STONEHENGE 



141 



particular interest is the emergence of the motif of 

 the burial mound as a haunted place (Semple 1 998). 

 In Old English poetic and prose sources, prehistoric 

 monuments are often associated with supernatural 

 entities, such as the god Woden and other monsters, 

 demons and elves. The development of political and 

 mortuary practices between the 8th and 10th 

 centuries involved the use of prehistoric 

 monuments, barrows in particular, as places of 

 execution and disposal of executed criminals. 

 Certain prehistoric monuments thus changed from 

 performing a positive social role, to a negative one, 

 paralleling the move from pre-Christian mortuary 

 practice to Christian burial. 



Decapitation and burial 



The absence of finds might indicate that the 

 Stonehenge corpse was stripped before burial, 

 although metal dress fittings were apparently not 

 ubiquitous during the 7th century when changes 

 in burial customs led to a marked decline in grave 

 finds in comparison to the 6th century (Owen 

 Crocker 1986, 107). Burial took place in a shallow 

 grave that was too short and with the head placed 

 in on top. The position of the hands is not recorded, 

 but only 20 per cent of decapitations from later 

 Anglo-Saxon execution cemeteries have the hands 

 tied, either behind the back or to the front (Reynolds 

 1998, 161-2). The forcing of bodies into cramped 

 graves suggests outcast status, with a lack of effort 

 and a degree of contempt evident in the whole 

 process. 



Postholes at either end of the grave would be 

 difficult to explain, but it is just possible they held 

 a gallows of two uprights and a cross-beam similar 

 to that depicted in an early 1 1 th century manuscript 

 (BL MS Cotton Claudius BIV, f. 59). Pairs of 

 postholes, presumably gallows settings, have been 

 recognised from middle to late Anglo-Saxon 

 execution cemeteries at South Acre, Norfolk, 

 Stockbridge Down, Hampshire and Sutton Hoo, 

 Suffolk (Wymer 1996; Hill 1937; Carver 1998). 

 Hawley's comment that the circular sides of each 

 of the postholes could be seen at either end of the 

 grave brings to mind comparable features from early 

 Anglo-Saxon (5th-7th century) cemeteries, notably 

 St Peter's, Broadstairs, Kent (Hogarth 1973). 



Execution by decapitation was rare in the later 

 Anglo-Saxon period. Beheaded skeletons might be 

 unusual at execution cemeteries (4-12 per cent of 

 all bodies) or, in a minority of cemeteries, the 

 dominant occurrence (56-80 per cent) (Reynolds 



1998, 457-8, table 113). The earliest West Saxon 

 laws of King Ine of Wessex (688-725) 

 (Attenborough 1922) prescribe hanging and the 

 striking off of hands and feet for various offences (I 

 18, 24 and 37). A further clause (I 20) notes that a 

 person 'travelling off the highway' might be slain 

 (OE sleanne); a terminology suited rather better to 

 the sword than the gallows. The earliest explicit 

 reference to decapitation, however, is to be found 

 in the 10th century laws of Edgar (959-975) as a 

 punishment for swearing falsely that livestock were 

 bought in front of witnesses (IV Edgar 1 1). A series 

 of drawings from Late Anglo-Saxon manuscripts 

 show decapitation scenes and in each case the 

 instrument used is a sword (BL MS Cotton 

 Claudius BIV, f. 38; BL MS Cotton Cleopatra 

 CVTII, f. 16v; BL MS Harley 603, ff, 7v, 19, 59 and 

 75v). 



Archaeology of execution 



The Stonehenge execution burial is of especial 

 importance as one of the earliest known located 

 both at a prehistoric monument and in a boundary 

 zone. The execution burials at Sutton Hoo have 

 7th century origins (Carver 1998), but their 

 relationship to prehistoric remains there is 

 uncertain. Maiden Castle, however, the burial place 

 of the mutilated man noted above, is located on 

 the boundary between the Dorset Domesday 

 Hundreds of Cullifordtree and St George. About 

 thirty execution cemeteries of Middle and Late 

 Anglo-Saxon date are now recognised, and virtually 

 all of these re-use earlier monuments located on 

 hundred or shire boundaries (Reynolds 1999, 108). 

 The hundred itself was a self-contained judicial 

 territory that maintained the various agencies 

 necessary to uphold the law (prisons, courts, places 

 of judicial ordeal, execution sites), at least by the 

 later Anglo-Saxon period. 



Other probable execution victims from 8th and 

 9th century contexts include the two women, one 

 perhaps staked out, found on the Thames foreshore, 

 London, and the woman fromYarnton, Oxfordshire, 

 buried face-down in a ditch close to a contemporary 

 family burial plot (Wroe-Brown 1 999, 1 3; Hey pers. 

 comm.). Execution cemeteries dated from about 

 AD 800 by radiocarbon occur at several sites 

 including Staines, Surrey, and Cambridge (Poulton 

 pers. comm.; Mortimer pers. comm.) . A more local 

 example is provided by the bounds of a remarkably 

 detailed land charter of AD 778 for an estate at 

 Little Bedwyn, 30 km north-east of Stonehenge 



