The role of Anglo-Saxon great hall complexes in Kingdom formation, in comparison and in context, AD500-750

The aim of this thesis is to explain why the early Anglo-Saxon great hall complexes were built, why and how they developed over time and why they were abandoned. This is accomplished through two complementary studies. First, Part I of the thesis (Chapters 2-3) presents a broad comparative study of all known great hall complexes, exploring their characteristics, functions and development over time. Then, Part II (Chapters 4-8) explores the regional context of great hall complexes in the Upper Thames Valley, analysing the development of socio-economic power in the burials and settlements of the Upper Thames Valley and exploring the role of great hall complexes in this development. Chapters 8-9 bring together the conclusions from Part I and II of the thesis, building a comprehensive chronological narrative of the emergence, development and obsolescence of great hall complexes. In the course of these two studies, this thesis finds substantial and wide-ranging evidence for a chronological development of great hall complexes, paralleling and contributing to the development of a new elite ideology and the consolidation of the newly formed Anglo-Saxon kingdoms. The great hall complexes appear to have emerged out of the appropriation and monumentalisation of the public assembly, but as the Anglo-Saxon kings became increasingly powerful, the great hall complexes appear to have become increasingly exclusionary, shifting from public assemblies to private royal residences. At the same time, the great hall complexes appear to have become increasingly diverse, fracturing into a range of different high status sites. The combination of these two processes – the shift from public assemblies to private residences and the development of more complex settlement hierarchies – appears to have precipitated the separation of the elite from the wider populace, consolidating the new power structures of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms and rendering the great hall complexes obsolete.