Dr David Petts, 'New light on early medieval Lindisfarne'

The monastery of Lindisfarne was one of the most important ecclesiastical sites in early medieval Northumbria. It had important connections with both what is now Scotland, as well as the Anglo-Saxon world. Yet despite its importance, relatively little has been published on the archaeology of the monastery. David's talk will explore what the results of a major field project on the site by Durham University and DigVentures can tell us about life and death at this major religious centre, and bring in evidence from unpublished fieldwork to offer a new understanding of the plan and chronology of Lindisfarne. It will show how both archaeology and new analyses of the historical evidence are beginning to tell a very different story to the traditional one.