Trees in Anglo-Saxon England: Literature, Lore and Landscape

[RandallS]

Title: Trees in Anglo-Saxon England: Literature, Lore and Landscape
Author(s): Della Hooke
Publisher: Boydell Press
Publication Date: September 2010
ISBN: 1843835657
ISBN-13: 978-1843835653
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[size=+1]From The Medieval Review:[/size]
In this deeply researched and engagingly written book, one of England's most accomplished landscape historians shifts her gaze from patterns of settlement and land use to trees and woodlands. Shaped by the distinctive English tradition of landscape history, which following the pioneering studies of W. G. Hoskins in the 1950s blends history, archeology, and the direct observation of local landscapes, [1] Hooke's voluminous scholarship--including a dozen books--has focused on the Anglo-Saxon period. In this book Hooke examines the role of trees from a broad, interdisciplinary perspective, one that should interest scholars in a variety of fields, including historical ecology, environmental history, medieval studies, literature, and folklore.

Read the full review  at The Medieval Review web site.

[size=+1]Additional Description:[/size]
Trees played a particularly important part in the rural economy of Anglo-Saxon England, both for wood and timber and as a wood-pasture resource, with hunting gaining a growing cultural role. But they are also powerful icons in many pre-Christian religions, with a degree of tree symbolism found in Christian scripture too. This wide-ranging book explores both the `real', historical and archaeological evidence of trees and woodland, and as they are depicted in Anglo-Saxon literature and legend. Place-name and charter references cast light upon the distribution of particular tree species (mapped here in detail for the first time) and also reflect upon regional character in a period that was fundamental for the evolution of the present landscape.

[size=+1]Special Notes:[/size]


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