Fenland Survey: An Essay in Landscape and Persistence

The Wessex Linear Ditches project focuses on the region forming the heart of the Wessex chalklands, and attempts to answer the question of the place of linear ditches in this prehistoic landscape. The report comprises three parts: a description of the archaeology and topography of the project, an analysis of the finds and environmental data, and a summary of the linear ditches and their context, with management approaches to their present day preservation. The results of the project to date show that the linear ditches system was developed through different stages, its function changing through time. These developments are seen to have a number of causes, including changes in demography and settlement which affected subsistence productivity, land ownership, and the scale of domestic production.